As Western Canada rebels at the ballot box, Italy captures an audacious Ukrainian hero. A new force for freedom emerges to challenge Syrian tyranny, and Iran now wants one of my favorite humans dead.
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The Global Fight Against Tyranny

1. Canada's Battle River Rebellion
2. German Duplicity Snares a Ukrainian Hero
3. Rwanda's Savior Takes Tyrannical Turn
4. Syria's Shiny New Freedom Force
5. Putin Hoodwinks Another American President

Country names are followed by their 2025 freedom scores according to Freedom House.
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​Note: Last week's subject line "For Sale in the USA: Human Rights" triggered spam filters due to the "For Sale" wording, slightly damaging my domain's reputation. I'll limit source links for the next few weeks as it recovers.

In the sprawling wheat fields and oil patches of rural Alberta, where the spirit of independence runs deep, Canadian liberty has staged a remarkable comeback.
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Last week, 80% of voters in the Battle River-Crowfoot "riding" penned the name "Poilievre"—a stunning majority for a write-in election—proclaiming Albertans' searing anger with Liberal governance. In Canada, a "riding" is equivalent to an American congressional district.
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This dramatic resurrection comes just months after Pierre Poilievre's shock defeat to Mark Carney's Liberals in April's general election. The Conservatives had led by 25 points before Trump's trade war transformed the race. Poilievre even lost his own seat.
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Yet some Canadian readers report that Western Canadians are now in near-revolt. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith captured their fury: Albertans have "had enough of having their livelihoods and prosperity attacked by a hostile federal government". Both Alberta and Saskatchewan have strengthened sovereignty measures, pushing back against Ottawa. Smith even opened the door to an Alberta secession referendum.
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Their anger is justified. Alberta produces 84% of Canada’s oil exports, but forfeits $15-27 billion annually to Ottawa while provinces like Quebec receive billions in transfer payments. Liberal policies have imposed carbon taxes and canceled oil and gas projects. Carney now offers compromise, but refuses to repeal the "no more pipelines act” that threatens Western Canadians’ livelihoods.
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And despite Liberal attempts to paint Poilievre as Trump's ally, he champions a fundamentally different economic vision. While Trump embraces protectionism and economic nationalism, Poilievre champions genuine economic freedom. Where Trump imposes tariffs, Poilievre advocates free trade.
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As Ottawa shackles Western Canada’s economic engine, Poilievre's victory represents more than a political comeback— it marks freedom's counterattack in the Great White North.

Under cover of night in 2022, seven Ukrainian operatives descended 80 meters into the Baltic's frigid waters, risking their lives for the resistance. Over two days, they planted timed explosives on the Nord Stream pipelines pumping Russian gas into European homes.
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"Operation Diameter" had sailed from Germany to Danish waters on a yacht chartered with forged documents. When charges detonated, they severed Russia's primary revenue stream.
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This week, acting on a German warrant, Italian Carabinieri swarmed a bungalow hotel in San Clemente and arrested former Ukrainian captain "Serhii K" as he accompanied his family on holiday, accusing him of orchestrating the sabotage. He peacefully surrendered.
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Serhii’s passport check-in had triggered a police alert—ending his three-year fugitive run. In court, he defiantly flashed the Ukrainian trident, denying all charges.
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Ukrainian forces recognized the truth: these pipelines financed the weapons that decimated Ukrainian cities and ended thousands of innocent lives. Cheap energy promises had led to the pipelines’ construction despite Russia's 2014 Crimea annexation.
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Yet last month, the EU—with German support—sanctioned the same pipelines, exposing their hypocrisy. Russia now demands an emergency UN meeting on the matter, playing victim while destroying Ukrainian infrastructure daily. Meanwhile, Poland stands tall. Warsaw “failed” to arrest a fellow saboteur, allowing his escape to Ukraine.
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Now Germany invokes rule of law, demanding justice—for severing tyranny’s lifeline.
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Let the cry echo across the globe: "Free Serhii K!"

Bill Clinton beamed as he awarded Rwandan President Paul Kagame the 2009 Clinton Global Citizen Award for halting the 1994 genocide, proclaiming him "one of the greatest leaders of our time."
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Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza knew better. The following year, she returned to Rwanda from a comfortable exile to run for president on a promise to restore democracy. The Kagame government soon imprisoned her on fabricated charges.
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From behind bars, Ingabire wrote a book about Kagame’s corrupt judicial system with help from a nurse, activist, and mother of four—who sent Ingabire a copy signed "the struggle for democracy continues."
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Shortly thereafter, the woman disappeared forever.
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Meanwhile, Kagame transformed from genocide-stopper to genocide-enabler, deploying Rwandan troops to support M23's reign of terror in Congo. At home, he targeted opposition families with torture and economic destruction. Many fellow members of Ingabire's party have disappeared under suspicious circumstances. From his gleaming Kigali headquarters, Africa's most admired dictator has become one of its most dangerous.
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Ingabire was released in 2018 after serving eight years, but Kagame never stopped targeting her. After she announced another presidential run in June, Rwandan security forces surrounded her home, arresting her on charges of "spreading false information" and "forming a criminal association."
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Her son’s stark message now demands our attention: “It’s time democracies woke up to the true nature of this regime.”
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Trump recently called Kagame “a friend”.

The machetes fell without mercy in Suwayda's scorching July heat as Sunni militias turned the Druze heartland into a killing field, leaving hundreds of bodies sprawled across dusty streets. Most of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s forces stood idle. Some participated. Israeli warplanes soon thundered overhead, striking Damascus in defense of their Druze allies.
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March's carnage had already dimmed the euphoria of Assad's overthrow. Over 1,400 people, mostly Alawites, were killed as Sunni fighters took revenge for decades of persecution under the Assad regime. When Al-Sharaa's investigation absolved his military, minorities saw the writing on the wall.
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But a new democratic alliance has emerged from the ashes of war to challenge al-Sharaa. George Sabra, a Christian politician who spent eight brutal years in Assad's dungeons, has joined forces with Ayman Asfari, the Syrian-British billionaire who built his fortune while secretly funding the “White Helmets”—who saved civilians from bombed rubble during Assad's war.
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Once a rigid communist, Sabra evolved through decades of prison into a pluralistic social democrat. Asfari brings resources, international credibility, decades of political experience.
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This week, they launched the Syrian Centenary Initiative, demanding political pluralism, constitutional reform, minority protections, and an end to sectarian governance.
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Al-Sharaa’s circle responded by launching smear campaigns while decision-making narrows to his Idlib loyalists. Critics face harassment; journalists get arrested. Syria's new strongman grows more isolated as Druze and Alawites recoil.
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As Syria’s revolutionary promise fades, a new force for freedom rises.

For months, I’d hammered Trump's fealty in the face of Vladimir Putin's relentless territorial aggression. The sight of my country rolling out the red carpet for a tyrant was even more infuriating.
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But last week's summit with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Europe's leaders—still beaming from their inclusion—seemed to offer a glimmer of hope.
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Perhaps Trump's capitulation to Russia's sphere of influence wasn't surrender after all. Perhaps it was pragmatic engagement—showing Putin the international respect he craves while enabling America to defend liberty from a stronger diplomatic position.
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That delusion was quickly crushed by fresh and egregious Russian demands. After the summit, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov—Putin's chief diplomat and propagandist—threw up fresh obstacles to any meeting with Zelensky, demanding that Russia and China be included as a guarantor states.
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That’s right—Ukraine's attacker now seeks to guarantee its defense.
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Lavrov also revealed Russia’s enduring goal is complete political control over Ukraine, leading Trump to shift yet again. He argued Ukraine needs to go on offense. Expect Putin to charm him into another reversal.
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George W. Bush once found Putin “very straightforward and trustworthy”, claiming to have “a sense of his soul”. Barack Obama believed his assurances on Crimea. Now, Trump’s self-obsessed diplomacy repeatedly blinds him to Putin’s true intentions.
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As the old adage goes, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me”.
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Fool our elected presidents for over two decades straight - shame on us.
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Freedom Fighter of the Week: Narges Mohammadi

Of hundreds of activists I've encountered researching freedom movements, one woman shines above all—her courage unrivaled.
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Now Iran's Intelligence Ministry wants her dead.
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In 2014, a Tehran graveyard fell silent as Narges Mohammadi—already one of Iran’s fiercest women’s rights advocates—stepped forward. At fellow freedom fighter Sattar Beheshti's grave, she defied the brutal theocracy she knew was watching—openly accusing it of torture. The video exploded across social media.
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Months later, intelligence agents smashed down her door, dragging her to Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison. Judge Abolqasem Salavati—the regime's "hanging judge" who issues death sentences with glee—sentenced her to sixteen years for opposing executions.
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But even Evin’s darkest chambers could not dim her light. She organized sit-ins demanding better treatment and an end to the death penalty. When guards held her arms as the prison director personally beat her, she smuggled out letters detailing every savage moment. She developed epilepsy-like seizures from torture and suffered a heart attack requiring emergency surgery—and yet she persisted. In December, gravely ill with a bone lesion, Mohammadi was granted a 21-day suspension of sentence for medical treatment—Tehran feared global backlash if she died untreated.
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She remains at home, but the regime now issues menacing threats: the Intelligence Ministry recently warned her of “physical elimination.” Yet she defies them still, writing her autobiography and a searing new account of sexual abuse against women in Evin.
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When she won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023, I was thrilled. In typical fashion, she smuggled her acceptance speech from prison in scraps. Her children reassembled them into a message of resistance and hope—broadcast to the world.
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Facing death after decades of torture, beatings, and threats, Mohammadi still refuses surrender.

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