Călin Cismaș-Bercse

It's incredible, but we still have snowdrifts. Winter refuses to give up its grip. I took these photos this afternoon. Today would have been my mom's 79th birthday. 20 seniors My 🅿️ 🅿️ is subbotinawed@gmail.com

A speech at the UN today by one of my heroes, Iranian national football player Shiva Amini, brought tears to my eyes. She spoke about how Iran’s regime threatens female athletes even with rape, simply for competing freely, playing against Israeli teams, or refusing compulsory hijab. And now we see it again. Five players from Iran’s women’s national team had to flee their hotel in Australia and seek police protection just for refusing to sing the regime’s anthem. Imagine that. Playing football can make you an enemy of the state. Everyone needs to hear @Shiva_amini_11 and be the voice of athletes who have been killed or those who were still in prison. In Iran.

More and more human tragedies caused by Russia: Russian strike on Sloviansk, Donetsk region. Three Russian aviation bombs killed two people and injured 11 more, damaging at least six residential buildings.

6 Ukrainian veterans. Severe combat head trauma. They need 2 months of rehabilitation to regain basic functions. A full day of therapy costs $170. Our KSE students launched a campaign to help raise $70,000 and cover the full course for all six. foundation.kse.ua/en/projects/st… 1/

“Stay here. Stay here.” “ Help our girls, Help our girls” When I heard the desperate cry of this Iranian man in Australia, begging for protection for the women football players who were threatened simply for refusing to sing the Islamic Republic’s anthem, I couldn’t hold back my tears. My heart is shattered.💔 This is what real love for your homeland looks like. This is the fear of knowing what awaits these girls if they return prison, torture, humiliation. Exile is painful. Living far from your family, leaving your country overnight, is devastating. But imagine the terror of living under a regime where women are punished, imprisoned, even executed for the smallest act of defiance. That is why Iranians in exile throw themselves in front of buses, pleading for protection for these young athletes. Not out of politics but out of love, responsibility, and fear for their lives. This is not just about football. It’s about people who only want to have normal life, normal sport normal country….A free #Iran.

1/8 All eyes are on the Middle East, but the full-scale war in Ukraine is now in its 5th year. While attention fades, the reality remains unchanged: Ukraine is still winning, and Russia is still losing the unprovoked war it started

More than 70,000 women are serving in Ukraine’s Armed Forces. Every day they risk everything to defend their motherland—while challenging long-standing stereotypes. This is 20% more than in 2022, when russia first launched its full-scale invasion. Duty called, and women answered.

@FerozKh3 @AlinejadMasih Maybe you were in a hurry and forgot to fill in the statistics, so well documented: Women hanged or killed in the pre-Islamic regime: 1978 - 3 women killed. Women hanged or killed in the Islamic regime: 2010-2024 - at least 241 women; 2024 - 31-34 women; 2025 - 64 women.

I was banned from European Parliament for this speech in 2016. Just listen and ask why this simple demand was too radical for Europe, and how many women were killed for it. Happy International Women’s Day 💔

@AlinejadMasih Europe banned you from their Parliament for demanding women's freedom. Then funded the regime that killed women for showing hair. Your courage exposed their moral bankruptcy. They chose diplomacy over principle. History records who stood for women when it cost something.

8 March 1930 | A French Jewish girl, Blima Motyka, was born in Paris. She arrived at #Auschwitz on 10 December 1943 in a transport of 1,000 Jews deported from Drancy. She was among the 661 people murdered in a gas chamber after selection. --- ▶ A short video showing the ruins of gas chamber and crematorium III: youtube.com/shorts/ipQmBPA…

Kherson. russian artillery keeps randomly shelling the city. Today a 54-year-old woman was killed. Not on the battlefield. Not at a military base. In her own apartment. This is the systematic murder of civilians. And the so-called civilized world keeps tolerating it.

Today is International Women’s Day, so here’s a phot of an Udi woman from Vartashen in traditional dress, early 20th century. 🔵 The Udis are a remnant of the Caucasian kingdom of Albania/Aluank/Arran (not to be confused with the one in the Balkans). There are only a few thousand Udis left in the entire world. ℹ️ As I mentioned recently - last year, while working on a project, I discovered a small treasure in a 1923 issue of the weekly illustrated journal “Plamya” (which was published in Tbilisi in the last century): an article about the Udis was accompanied by photographs taken in Vartashen by a Vartashen-born Udi zincographer and photographer (more about him a bit later). The photos preserved in the magazine are of poor quality, so to improve them I used various applications. In most cases, restoring them to nearly their original quality was successful. I will gradually share these truly valuable and interesting photographs. Each photo deserves to be posted separately, and some merit a more detailed description.

46th Brigade sent a request video from their positions at the frontlines, they urgently need FPV drone detectors, as they are under constant attacks by FPV drones‼️ They also need Starlink mini and powerstations for their position‼️ Please help and support linktr.ee/1t1f

📸 Mariupol, March 7, 2022. Two weeks later, this building was destroyed by a russian strike. The three girls in this photo were killed. They were buried in the yard of the kindergarten across the street. They believed the "civilized" world would protect them. It failed them.

The head of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) literally stated that they don’t care about what Russian soldiers did in Ukraine. The problem is that we do care. The Russian Paralympic Movement takes an active part in spreading Russian propaganda. Because of that, it was sanctioned by Ukraine. Many athletes are soldiers from the war in Ukraine-here are just a few examples. Russian Paralympic athletes, to whom the IPC has just gifted licenses, were also involved in propaganda events with members of Putin’s team. This whole story is just getting worse and worse.

Today is #WomensDay — and in Belarus, the regime talks about the “Year of the Belarusian Woman.” Meanwhile, about 170 women are behind bars as political prisoners — denied medical care and contact with their families. Today and every day, we must demand their release.

This year, I will not celebrate “International Women’s Day.” When I witnessed the silence, indeed the complicity, of global women’s movements as Rojava- one of the most brilliant, egalitarian, pro-women revolutions the world has ever seen- was being slaughtered; when I saw the world’s women silent while our brave Women’s Protection Units (YPJ)- who pledged their lives to protect all women- were executed, thrown off buildings, beheaded, and their braids, the symbols of their courage, cut off by Islamist extremists, I understood something vital: Some of you women are handmaidens of patriarchy. Some of you bow to empire, war, violence, Epstein, and worse men. I do not wish you power or success. I do not wish you a happy Women’s Day. I wish your weakness to be crushed and your betrayals to be exposed. So this International Women’s Day, I speak only of Kurdish women: the long denied, the long silenced, the long oppressed. Kurdish women: courageous, revolutionaries, world-shapers. You, who alone picked up arms against ISIS when the world trembled in fear. You, who endured chemical bombardments, slavery, kidnapping, massacres, and genocide of your culture, identity and language- yet stood to defend yourself, defended Life, defended Freedom. You, who climbed the ancient mountains of Kurdistan to defend your honor and your nation- you carry decades of Kurdish revolutions on your back, the grief of a staeless people, yet continue to inspire with your unending love for freedom, hope, and peace. You who brought our kidnapped Yezidi sisters home from the clutches of ISIS! You who still perch on the highest peaks of the Zagros and Qandil mountains, resolute and unyielding. On this day, I wish you- Kurdish women: the oppressed yet courageous; the silenced yet outspoken; the stateless yet defenders of human rights; the victim yet the revolutionary- Happy Women’s Day. Though you face yet another existential war in Rojhilat, Eastern Kurdistan, no other women on this planet are better equipped to carry the burden- and the honor- of liberating yourselves from the patriarchal dystopia the Ayatollahs have created. You have resisted for decades, and you have witnessed the courage of your Kurdish sisters in Basur defeat Saddam’s dictatorship; in Bakur, how your Kurdish susters continue to resist the murderous assimilations of the Turkish regime; and in Rojava, how your Kurdish sisters made Assad and ISIS tremble in fear, and now terrorize the new oppressor, Ahmad al-Sharaa. To the women of Rojhilat and Rojava who remain under existential threats- you embody “Jin, Jiyan, Azadi”! You are Life, and through you, we Kurds will have our Freedom!

La vidéo « Sepehr, mon fils » avait bouleversé tout un peuple. On y voit un père filmer des centaines de cadavres au sol dans des sacs mortuaires et chercher son fils pendant 12 longues minutes, on y voit des familles hurler en reconnaissant leurs fils, leur frère, leur cousin ou leur ami. Des centaines de corps massacrés par Khamenei en quelques heures … Cet influenceur iranien a réalisé cette vidéo bouleversante en hommage aux dizaines de milliers d’iraniens massacrés en 2 nuits par Khamenei et son régime criminel Beaucoup commentent sur les réseaux sociaux et pensent savoir ce que les Iraniens ressentent et leur intiment l’ordre de mourir en silence sans jamais réclamer de l’aide. Mais la réalité est qu’à mains nues, les Iraniens n’auraient jamais réussi leur révolution. Khamenei aurait tué encore des centaines de milliers de nos compatriotes pour garder le pouvoir. Voilà pourquoi ce peuple est prêt à supporter une guerre pour avoir peut être une chance de se libérer enfin de ces barbares.

This International Women’s Day, we honor 9 Ukrainian women whose names the world should know — women who have made, and continue to make, the ultimate sacrifice for Ukraine’s existence and its fight against russian terror. Read their stories. Remember their names.