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Sat, Mar 5, 2022, 20:20
- Released earlier today, the letter has been signed by dozens of venues, promoters and artists, including Closer, ∄ and Cxema.
Ukraine's electronic music scene has published an open letter asking the global community to "fight against Russian aggression."
Released earlier today, March 5th, the letter has been signed by dozens of venues, promoters and artists, including Closer, ∄, PORT, Daria Kolosova, Rhythm Büro, Схема and Strichka Festival.
"We, the representatives of the music community, see the actions of Russian promoters, DJs and artists, who keep on holding events and performing, while the military of their country is bombing our cities," the letter reads.
The letter later outlines four ways the global electronic music community can support Ukraine:
• Cancel all cooperation with Russian artists, promoters, clubs, organizations, who do not actively resist the actions of their government and do not explicitly take action to stop the Russian military invasion of Ukraine
• Demand that every citizen of The Russian Federation takes to the streets to protests against the war in Ukraine, or resists silently by boycotting his/her job, and sabotaging Russia in any other possible way
• Remove all representatives affiliated with the Russian state from the supervisory and advisory boards of your organizations
• Refuse any donations, funding or sponsorship from Russian organizations and their affiliates based in other countries
The letter, which you can read in full here, also includes links to ways people can help from within Ukraine and abroad.
Last Friday, March 4th, Russia introduced two new laws criminalising anti-war protests and independent war reporting, according to Human Rights Watch. The maximum penalty is 15 years in prison. On Sunday, March 6th, more than 4,500 protesters were arrested in Russia, The Washington Post reports.
On February 24th, the Russian military launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine that has so far left cities destroyed, thousands of people dead and more than 1 million people displaced. The war is ongoing.
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Update, March 7th: This piece was updated with a paragraph about the new, severe punishments facing anti-war protesters and political dissenters in Russia.