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Artwork by CHRIS SEDDON< ASSOCIATED PRESS: Ukraine’s acting government issued a warrant Monday for the arrest of President Viktor Yanukovych, last reportedly seen in the pro-Russian Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, accusing him of mass crimes against protesters who stood up for months against his rule. Calls are mounting in Ukraine to put Yanukovych on trial, after a tumultuous presidency in which he amassed powers, enriched his allies and cracked down on protesters. Anger boiled over last week after snipers attacked protesters in the bloodiest violence in Ukraine’s post-Soviet history. Ukraine’s acting interior minister, Arsen Avakhov, said on his official […]

Photo via @HAMISHNEWS LOS ANGELES TIMES: Ukraine’s capital fell into the hands of anti-government protesters Saturday morning. Without a shot fired, opposition units surrounded and took control of parliament, the Council of Ministers building and most important, the Presidential Administration building, when they discovered early in the morning that the riot police who had been guarding the sites were gone, an opposition leader said. “[The opposition] today controls all of Kiev as we have taken control of all government quarters,” Andriy Parubiy, commander of the opposition forces, told thousands of people in Independence Square. “We told those of [the police] […]

Photo by JERRY MILTON EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve been granted permission to excerpt a 3,000 word passage on the Butthole Surfers — easily The Greatest Show On Earth in the 1980s — from the forthcoming book NO SLAMDANCING, NO STAGEDIVING, NO SPIKES, an exhaustive oral history of City Gardens, the legendary 80s shithole/tri-state alt-rock mecca situated somewhere on the dark side of Trenton, in a a post-apocalyptic/post-industrial deadzone that could easily have served as location shots for David Lynch’s Eraserhead. And did we mention that Jon Stewart used to be the bartender? If you are unfamiliar with the life and legend […]

  FRESH AIR Alexander Payne directed and co-wrote the films Election, About Schmidt, Sideways and The Descendants. He’s directed Jack Nicholson and George Clooney in starring roles and has won two Oscars for best adapted screenplay. His new film, Nebraska, stars Bruce Dern, who won the best actor award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for his performance. Nebraska also just received six Independent Spirit Award nominations, including best feature and best director. In it, Dern plays an old man who is beginning to show signs of dementia — which is maybe why he falls for one of those junk-mail […]

Excellent Vice-produced up to the minute mini-documentary about the deadly Euromaidan uprising in Kiev. To date, this is easily the best piece of journalism we’ve seen about Euromaidan protests. Outstanding, gentlemen. NBC NEWS: The New Normal: Ordinary Men and Women Take Up Arms in Kiev PREVIOUSLY: Police Snipers Kill 70 Protesters PREVIOUSLY: Euromaidan’s Last Stand WIKIPEDIA: The February 2014 Euromaidan Riots

Artwork by HARIJZ FRESH AIR Filmmaker David O. Russell first talked with Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross back in 1994, and two decades later, he tells her: “It’s taken me 20 years since I first spoke to you to really make the films that I think I was meant to make, and to be at the level of filmmaking and storytelling and writing that I think I had ever aspired to.” Russell directed and co-wrote the movie American Hustle, which is nominated for 10 Oscars, including best picture, best director and best original screenplay. It’s tied with Gravity for the most […]

KIEV POST: At least two more bodies of protesters were taken to Ukraine Hotel on Kyiv’s Independence Square, for a total of 12 dead at this location. The additional deaths bring to at least 37 73 the number of protesters killed today, most from gunshot wounds by police near clashes this morning near October Palace. MORE NEW YORK TIMES: Ukraine’s descent into a spiral of violence accelerated on Thursday as protesters and riot police officers used firearms in a clash initiated by the opposition and apparently intended to reclaim areas of Independence Square, the symbolic central plaza in the capital […]

WASHINGTON POST: Members of the performance-art group Pussy Riot were attacked on a public plaza Wednesday by Cossacks brandishing whips and discharging pepper spray, a day after police picked them up and held them for nearly four hours without charges. An Associated Press video showed the Cossacks advancing on the five women and one man with whips, knocking them down and striking them. The performers had just been shown gathering quickly at an outdoor plaza in Sochi, about 20 miles from the Olympic Park, taking off coats, putting on their ski masks and preparing to perform when the Cossacks attacked. […]

Illustration by ALEX FINE EDITOR’S NOTE: To mark the passing of Devo drummer Alan Myers guitarist Bob Casale on Monday, here’s an encore posting of our 2008 Q&A with Devo mainman/Hollywood film score composer Mark Mothersbaugh, arguably among the most interesting we’ve been lucky enough to have on the site. Enjoy. Phawker: Let’s start with ancient history, I want to know about the evolution of the Devo idea, I’ve read conflicting things — that it was started sort of as a joke in the late 60s and then the shootings at Kent State radicalized you guys, tell me about that […]

Photo by VLAD SODEL/REUTERS TIME: On Tuesday night, police in Ukraine began to storm the protest camp in the center of the capital, Kiev, using water canons, tear gas, truncheons and rubber bullets. In the course of the day, which was the most violent in Ukraine’s post-Soviet history, 20 demonstrators were killed reportedly alongside seven members of the security forces. But the dilemma now facing the state and the police is far more complicated than clearing a city square filled with thousands of people. They also have to dislodge the intricate community of revolutionaries that has taken root there over […]

  NBC10: On Tuesday morning, Memeger announced that more than 100 FBI agents, prosecutors and Philadelphia Police officers teamed up to arrest 10 members of Ironworkers Local Union 401. The indictment against members of Local 401 accuses some of the suspects of using baseball bats, torching a future religious site and threats of violence to induce employers to hire union workers. “The defendants used ‘goon squads,’ which included union members and associates who committed assaults, arsons and other violent and destructive acts, to make their point emphatically clear,” said Memeger. “That point, to any contractor or builder, was, ‘You better […]