The Duran Podcast - Protests in Kiev. Elites turn on each other

Episode Date: July 24, 2025

Protests in Kiev. Elites turn on each other

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the protests in Kiev. Alexander, what are your thoughts on these protests in Kiev, which started out small. Yeah. They have grown. We're not talking about huge protests, though. No. But significant, I think the protests are significant enough that they've caught people's attention. Yeah.

And they revolve around the Nabu and the Sappo, which are two anti-com. corruption organizations, which were created by the United States and the European Union. I think mostly the United States, the U.S. State Department, after the 2014 Maidon coup. And I look at these organizations as a type of oversight policing organization that sits, you can probably say, on top of the president or maybe to the side of the president of the government, to monitor where the, you know, the, you can't. the money is going or how the money is being used. Is that a correct assessment of, I mean, they call it an anti-corruption agency, but my feeling is that this is more of an oversight

monitoring agency to make sure that whatever money is given to Project Ukraine, it ends up in the places, maybe in the pockets where this NABU wants it, wants it to go. I don't know. That's my thoughts on it. What are your thoughts? Well, absolutely. And can I just say, just to basically confirm your analysis. The single individual who played the single biggest role in setting these two things up back in 2014 was none other than the vice president of the United States, that champion anti-corruption campaigner Joe Biden. He was absolutely instrumental in setting these two things up. And this, of course, at a time when, as we know, his son, was doing incredibly creative and productive things in the Ukrainian economy.

So, I mean, there's no doubt at all, I think, that you're... Burisma that time period, right? Exactly, exactly. So, I mean, that's the actual origin point of these two organizations. And they were basically run by the U.S. Embassy, and they've been run by the U.S. embassy ever since. They were obviously run by the U.S. embassy in Obama's Day. then they were continued to be during Donald Trump's first term.

Donald Trump never really established control over the embassy in Kiev at that time. That's my own view. I mean, people may push back, but that's my own view. And of course, under Biden, in Biden's time, they continued to be run in the same way. So, I mean, they were basically controlled by the US embassy, which in turn was controlled by all the usual people that we know about. the deep state, the various apparatus, the various NGOs, the whole structure that was created way back in the 90s, which has grown and expanded and functioned ever since then. So that's

what they were. Now, I mean, if you're talking about corruption and these two agencies fighting corruption in Ukraine, I think most people who are familiar with the situation in Ukraine would say, that since 2014, corruption has got worse. And it was really very, very bad before 2014, but it's actually got worse since. So that really must put a big question mark over whether these organisations really did do much in the way of defeating corruption in Ukraine. So that's the first thing to say about them. So why has Zelensky at this particular point, in time. Why have, to be more precise, why have Zelensky and Yamak decided to close them down? Well, it could be because they've been seeing all these articles that have been appearing in the

media in the West, including the Seymour, Hirsch article, which is talking about an attempted regime change in Ukraine and all of that. Bear in mind that if you do, if you are the United States and you do want to carry out a regime change in Ukraine. You have these two agencies run by the U.S. embassy. They could start doing investigations against the president and his supporters and all kinds of things. They are there. They are obvious instruments lying there

that could be used to undermine the government, the Zelensky government. So that's one possibility. And when I say possibility, none of the things I'm going to suggest are in any way in conflict with each other. But my own view is that this action by Zelensky and Yarmak goes back to that analysis we have already discussed on these programs, which is that the priority for Zelensky and Yermak at this time, as the situation on the front lines deteriorates and is deteriorating rapidly, as problems in the economy

grow, as the flow of American aid stops, I mean, you know, we can discuss, we will discuss in other programs and we have already discussed in various programs, the flow of arms from the United States to Ukraine. The key thing to understand is that there are no more direct transfers of weapons from the United States to Ukraine, one. the weapons that Biden assigned run out. After that, it is entirely weapons bought by the Europeans from the United States that are going to be sent to Ukraine. And that suggests that there's going to be a slowdown in weapons supplies. It looks like there's going to be a slowdown in money transfers as well. Because whatever Trump's own personal feelings about this,

It's clear his base are not happy about financial transfers. So Zelensky, Yermak, can see the writing on the wall. Their priority over the next couple of months, therefore, is to retain control of Ukraine until the moment when it all ends so that they can go away and leave Ukraine and go to the West and set up their government in exile there and do all of those things that we've discussed in previous programs. Now, in order to achieve that, they need to have a complete tight control of the situation in Kiev.

So we've seen action being taken against opposition figures in Kiev. We see other steps being taken of the same sort of kind, attempts to tighten control of the military and people of this sort. And we also see institutions like Nabu and I can't remember them. I never can remember the name of the other organization. Saapo. Sapo. And these two organizations, Nabu and Saapo, they're now being in effect closed down

when we're told that they're being brought under the control of the Procurator General, Attorney General in Ukraine. In effect, they're being closed down. They're no longer going to function as they were. They're being closed down as part of this centralization drive that Zelensky and Yamak are conducting. This is not uncommon, by the way, in these kind of situations where a regime, like the one we're seeing in Kiev, senses that it is losing the war, its priority then becomes to maintain control. And that, I think, is why they've backed it against these two organizations. And of course, it has provoked a reaction because the closing down of these organizations

is in effect an attack on the NGO apparatus that has developed in Ukraine. and which has been run to a great extent out of the US embassy. And they have brought out their usual supporters on the streets. And of course, they make a big crowd, which they are. They're a big crowd. They are the usual people, the middle class people who you read articles in the Western media. They're the people who tend to write those articles about Ukraine. They're passionately anti-Russian and all of that.

They're fervidly pro-European, fervidly pro-American, all of those things. But they're not going to, in the end, in my opinion, pose a political threat to Zelensky in Ukraine because they're not part of the system in Ukraine that is now evolving with the nationalist brigades, with security forces, with certain key oligarchs. who continue for their own reasons to back Zelensky, their priorities are now moving away because they can all sense that this structure that was created in 2014 has outlived its purpose for them and they want to secure their positions before, as I said, the whole thing falls. So that's what I think. It is having an effect. You are seeing a lot of people going on to the streets

And of course, in the media in the West, the people who are plugged in with these organizations in Ukraine, who, as I said, source their articles about Ukraine from the sort of people that we see protesting. They are very unhappy about it. And you can see that the reporter about Zelensky has turned very negative over the last few weeks. And it'll continue to be that way. And it will become more so because they're starting to understand that he's not really, you know, what they were pretending that he was, what they were pretending that he was. He never really was. But there it is.

Yeah. I think that's the big story here is that the media, the collectiveist media has now turned on Zelensky. He's no longer the democratic, the courageous democratic leader of you. Ukraine, the Churchill number two, but now they're painting him as an authoritarian dictator. And the images that they use of Zelensky as well are very interesting. They show a very angry, very upset, very authoritarian type of leader in Ukraine. Those are the featured images that you see on articles from the Financial Times and the economist. And they're portraying Zelensky in a much different light to their audience. I think that's an interesting part to the story. But I agree with you.

I don't think these protests are going to lead to a regime change. There's nothing grassroots about this uprising. This is very much in line with, it's not exactly the same thing, but it does remind me with, say, the protests in Georgia when the Georgia Dream decided to put their foreign ages act and they went after the NGOs, you know, the collective West put people out onto the streets to protest Georgia Dream. It's pretty much the same thing in a way, it's similar in that Zelensky is now going after the anti-corruption agency NGO, whatever you want to call this thing, right?

This collective West construct. And so what does the collective West construct NGO do? It puts people out onto the streets to protest Zelensky. At the end of the day, my theory on all of this is that this is about who controls the money and who controls the money. That's exactly what is. And it's Zelensky. And I think that's what this is about.

I think the big tell, what really gave this away to me. was that the same day that this bill was signed was when Schmigal, the new defense minister, former prime minister, now he's the new defense minister, Nabu, one of the big tasks of Nabu is that it oversees defense procurement. That's one of its big tasks. One of the big jobs that it does is that it oversees the weapons and the military aid that goes to Ukraine. We're talking hundreds and billions of dollars that this agency overlooks. So you have Schmigel, former prime minister, now he's the new defense minister. What is he ask of the West?

$120 billion. The same day that he asks $120 billion for one year, you get the anti-corruption agency being folded under Zelensky, and then you get the protesters onto the streets. I see it as Zelensky's way of telling the West. No money, no Nabu, right? That's the way I see it. Give me $120 billion and maybe we can unfold Nabu and put it back to where it was. But if you don't give me the money, there's really no reason to have this committee

overlooking my activities anyway, because what's the point? No money and weapons are flowing. So why do we need this thing anyway? I don't know. You're your thoughts on. This is exactly what it is. It is all about money and money flows. This is why Zelensky and the people around him want to retain control at the end of the day.

It is all about controlling the money flows. It's why Schmigal is asking for $120 billion. He wants $60 billion there on the table. I mean, you know, he's already talking in this. I mean, you know, astronomer. Incredible sums. Huge amounts. The amazing thing is he's likely to get them to.

By the way, I mean, that's the other thing. that's so incredible. They're currently talking about, and Euroclear is pushing back on this, but they're now talking about transferring the Russian assets into a riskier vehicle so that they can generate more interest out of it. And Euroclear is saying, oh, hold on, this is this is appropriation. I mean, what you're doing is, who is going to cover us if the money is lost? And of course, they're going to go and do that anyway,

because this is exactly where he's heading. It's all about money flow. It's all about who controls the money. Is it the NGOs and all those people? I mean, do they get their cut? Are they, is their cut taken from them? Are the oligarchs, the remaining oligarchs, who are backing Zelensky?

Orinat Ahmed is being apparently the most important now. Are they going to get their payoffs, before it all closes down. What happens to Zelensky in Yermak? That's really all this is about. There is nothing else to it, to this, than that. And you're absolutely right. You know, the media in the West, you know,

they wanted to believe in this fantasy about, you know, Zelensky, the Peerless Knight and Churchill and all of this. I mean, they close their eyes to all of those realities. And now suddenly, as I said, They see the realities in Ukraine starting to emerge. Those realities have always been there. They have always been the underlying true realities of what Ukraine is all about. I mean, Ukraine, after it gained its independence, unfortunately and tragically, it involved

into this incredibly predatory system, which the West has shoveled money into. and they want to have even more money shoveled into it until, as I said, finally it stops. They want to increase the money flows in the last couple of months. And yes, Zelensky is now talking about a new law to regulate Nabu and Soppa. Before the end, he says he's going to propose a law in two weeks time. This is, as you correctly said, the olive branch. if you give me more money, I will allow these two institutions to continue. But of course, again, when they do continue, it'll be in a stripped down form

because they're not going to be quite as independent, independent of Zelensky, not of the US Embassy, and the European Commissioners, by the way, because most of the people who run Naboo, by the way, are picked by the Europeans, it seems. but the U.S. Embassy has the last word of control. Anyway, it's not going to be quite the same as it was, but, you know, we will cut you in a little bit more provided you give us more money. This is what the whole Ukraine story has been mostly about since its inception, as far as the Ukrainian political class is concerned.

Going all the way back to Maidan in 2015, 14, including Hunter Biden, Burisma, Russia Gate, which is now coming up again. This is the story of Ukraine, a place where all the money was flowing for 10 years, a little under 10 years, the West and the American people had no idea that all the money was flowing to Ukraine. and there were all of these globalists and elites and politicians benefiting from this. And then Russian President Vladimir Putin spoiled the game. And he went into Ukraine. That's right. And they're not going to forgive Russia and Putin for spoiling the game that they had set up in Ukraine.

So do you think Zelensky is pushing this too far because he's dealing with their money now? You see what I mean? It's like he's telling the globalist elite in the West, give me money or else, all of us are not going to benefit from the system that we had set up in Ukraine. And I'm just going to tear apart this organization that we set up and we were all benefiting from. So make sure you keep the money and the weapons flowing or else. Do you think he's taken it a step too far? Do you think he's miscalculated in this? game that he's playing with the West?

Very possibly. I mean, this is not immediate term. As I said, I don't think he's going to be overthrown as a result of these protests. And for the moment, the Western powers, I mean, Germany is still talking about buying more weapons for Ukraine from the United States and Bistorius. The defense minister there is talking about sending five Patriot missile systems to Ukraine, maybe in the spring or something about that. So at the moment, you know, they're not publicly going again.

against Zelensky. But you're absolutely. Graham is upset. Lindsay Graham is upset. Grasso is upset. Oh, so upset. Exactly. As I said, ultimately in the end,

he's made an awful lot of very important and powerful people in the West, extremely angry. So he may not realize it yet. But if his plan is when everything goes, you know, falls apart that he makes, he and Jermak and their friends make a quick dash and escape to the West and set up their government in exile there. They may find that they're not quite as welcome as they expected and that the actual government that's set up is not going to include them.

So, you know, that is a real possibility. And, you know, we could very well see play out that way. Just to repeat again, in these kind of systems, South Vietnam was another example, by the way, You go to the internal politics of South Vietnam. As the system there started to implode, you started to see more and more of this kind of cannibalism within the system. You know, people taking as much money as they could, where previously they'd all been working together to steal from everybody else. Now they're starting to steal from each other, which is essentially what you're seeing.

You saw that in Afghanistan. Remember how Al-Garney, when he left the president there, went away with suitcases for money. Some of them were left on the airport, all things of this guy, because he couldn't. There just was two marks being loaded onto the plane. So this is not a unique scenario that's playing out now. It's an infallible sign, as I said, that we are entering the end game. And, well, the question is, how long will it last? They'll try and draw it out as long as they can.

But as the end game approaches, this is going to intensify. And we're going to see more and more of this play out. And as I said, these games, these hunger games, if you like, in Kiev, are going to get more and more intense. Whatever happened to the Afghanistan guy, he just kind of disappeared. He didn't know where he is. I have no idea where he is. Yes, I have no idea.

So he's successfully disappeared. He successfully disappeared with vast amounts of cash, and he's no doubt living a perfectly agreeable life, wherever it is that he is. I don't think it's going to be true Zelensky in the same way, by the way. I mean, his international profile is far too high, and there'll be far too many people angry with him. Exactly, exactly. His profile is way too high for him to pull N.

Al-Gani, as the Afghanistan former leader did. But what does Russia say to all of this? What do you think is going through the minds of Putin and Lavrov and the Kremlin as they see all of this unfold? The first sign of cannibalization, which I think is a good way of describing it. They're now going after each other's money in a way, each other's proceeds from Project Ukraine. They were in it together over the last 10 years, but now they're going after each other. So what is what is the Kremlin say when they look at all of this? Well, that's a good question, actually. I, I, the Russians have not said very much about this, but I mean, I presume they are looking and watching these events very, very closely. And on the one hand, I think their priority

continues to beat the battlefield and the military operations there and those sort of things. But as they watch this play out in Kiev, I suspect that they will start to say to themselves, well, you know, this is a sign that the structure is starting to break down and that perhaps we can take advantage of it in some ways. Maybe we can start to create divisions within the political class in Kiev. Maybe we can play off people against each other or something like that. But, I mean, one thing it's not going to do is going to make them any more accommodating. I mean, they will sense that this is as a beginning to play out.

and then I'm going to want to make significant compromises to Zelensky or Yermak or whoever takes the place of these people. I think it's delusional to think they will. Right. All right. I guess we'll end it there. What do you think Trump is, the Trump White House is saying as all of this. I mean, they've got the whole, they've got Epstein, Russia Gates, so they have all of that. But there is a connection between Russia gate and project.

A very clear, strong connection between Russia gate and Project Ukraine. So what do you think the Trump has? And by the way, rumors that Epstein was also involved in Ukraine in some ways and that he was, that some of his money basically is Ukrainian money. I don't know that that is true, by the way. It goes back to what we were saying, that everyone was involved in Project Ukraine. And for many, many years, this was hidden from the American people. until the invasion, and that's one of the reasons that's so angry at Putin, it's because

the invasion exposed all of this. Yes, yes. Well, again, it's difficult to say exactly what Trump himself and the people immediately around him are thinking. I get the sense that Trump is now very, very involved in many other things. I mean, as you said, he's got Russia gate, it's got Epstein gate, he's got to worry about this bill that Lindsay Graham and Blumenthal, the still. pushing in Congress and he's pushing back against it. He's got complex trade negotiations coming

with China. He's got the situation in the Middle East. My own sense is that over the next couple of weeks, he really doesn't want to be thinking very much about Ukraine itself. I think that he say he hasn't written anything on true social about Ukraine for quite a long time, actually, a fact that people haven't really noticed. So I think that perhaps he is somewhat semi-detached from this. And I don't think he cares very much about Nabu and Saabani. These are not there. This is the institutions that had anything to do with him were created by him. They were, as I said, ultimately created by Biden. They were run by the U.S. embassy in Kiev, which was started. by people who were not sympathetic to Trump.

I mean, the ambassador, her name was Brink, who's just resigned is very, very hostile to Trump and was known to be a protégé of Victorian Newland. So I do think he's sorry that these institutions have been closed down, but whether he's aware of these bigger stories about, you know, that we've been discussing, that this is a power.

struggle going on within an elite that is gradually eating itself up now as the collapse comes. I don't know. Some people in Washington, well, as is some people, a lot of people in Washington understand all this very well and they are going to be furious about it. I mean, Lindsay Graham, you mentioned, but, you know, people in the deep state, the permanent apparatus, the people who have been sponsoring. Project Ukraine since its inception. They're going to be extremely angry and very, very unhappy about what has just happened. And as I said, when for the moment, when the music stops and

Zelensky and Yamak turn up in the West, they may find, as I said, they have not just a cold reception from these people, but perhaps an icy one and maybe all kinds of questions could be asked of them by their former friends. So I think that Trump himself, as I said, I don't think he's very engaged with this, but others in Washington definitely are. All right, we will end the video there, the durand.com.

We are on Rumble, Odyssey, Telegram, Rock, FitNX. Go to the Durant Shop, pickups and merch like what we are wearing in this video update. There's a link in the description box down below. Take care.