VKS – News from Valkyria

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Hystaiga cleared of responsibility for nightclub attack, jet shootdown

“The people responsible for the attacks are still out there and pose a significant threat”

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Tuesday, 14 November 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Warning: This article contains discussion of graphic violence, harassment, and suicide.

Ravneby — For the first time, the Valkyrian government has cleared the Hystaigan government of any responsibility for two 2019 events that then-Prime Minister Stella Kaufman gave as a pretext for the Kalkara War, one of the bloodiest wars that Valkyria had ever fought.

In the early morning of 13 June 2019, more than 200 people, mostly university-age Valkyrians, were enjoying prewinter festivities at a Ravneby nightclub. It would not be long before 192 of them would perish in an act of terrorism. With many of the building’s exits barred shut, the perpetrators released sarin, a toxic nerve agent, into the building, killing almost all of the building’s occupants.

In the late evening hours of 14 October, Captain Kaia Simonsen and Specialist Kalervo Mäkelä took flight near the Hystaigan–Valkyrian border. It would be the last time they would ever fly again. An unidentified rocket fired from the ground on the Hystaigan side of the mountainous border that is called Mount Kalkara struck their jet, instantly killing the two pilots and sending their remains and the aircraft itself crashing into the mountain.

By 28 October, the Valkyrian government led by Kaufman reached the conclusion that Hystaiga was responsible for both of these events, steering the nation towards a conflict with its western neighbour that would last nearly three years, the duration of her term as prime minister.

Smoke rising from where the Valkyrian jet crashed near Mount Kalkara, 15 October 2019

Valkyrian Prime Minister Steve Bennett gave an address on the floor of the storting, opposite of Kaufman, who now serves as the Leader of the Opposition. In it, Bennett looked straight at Kaufman and accused her and the Kaufman government of “irrational governance” and “jumping to conclusions” about the two events without having conducted a thorough inquiry into each of them.

The Socialist prime minister stated that the National Police have concluded that both of these events were committed by parties that did not involve the Hystaigan government or any person with ties to Hystaiga. In the case of the nightclub, the National Police determined that a Valkyrian militia group called Svartedauden (Black Death) was responsible for the attack, targeting the nightclub’s occupants for their perceived opposition to the group’s political goals.

As for the fighter jet, a Valkyrian man associated with a cultist movement in the nation’s northern reach has been arrested in connection to the shootdown. Based on the information provided by the National Police, the person in question fired a rocket at the jet from the Hystaigan side of the border to provoke an international conflict between the two central Cordilian nations.

The prime minister stated that the National Police have begun manhunts for the perpetrators of these attacks. The Office of Cultist Movement Investigations (Kontor for undersøkelser av kultistbevegelser, KUKB) and Centre for Organised Crime (Senter for organisert kriminalitet, SOK) within the National Police will respectively conduct the searches for the cultist and militia groups responsible for the attacks.

In his address, Bennett was also critical of the nation’s security services, particularly the Intelligence Directorate-General (Generaldirektoratet for Etterretning, GDE) for their failure to detect the rising threat posed by cultist movements and militia groups operating within Valkyria, which had been growing in popularity in the mid-2010s.

When Taeler Shaw became home minister in 2022, she initiated several reforms that saw the GDE open a task force with the National Police to conduct intelligence gathering on cultists and militias, the Domestic Counterterrorism Task Force (Innenlandsk arbeidsgruppe mot terror, IAGT). So far, the intelligence collected by the IAGT has been useful, resulting in the March 2023 arrests of more than a thousand suspected cultists, including the controversial arrest of Northern Party leader Jake Marshall.

Propaganda still from a Svartedauden recruitment video shot in Hystaiga, 2021

However, the IAGT’s intelligence-gathering activities regarding militias within Valkyria have been sparse. While the task force was successful in accumulating information on suspected cultists, the investigation into militias has proved difficult for Valkyrian security services. According to the home minister, militias have been more defensive of their operational security compared to cultist movements, making intelligence gathering on militias a more cumbersome task.

Very little is known about Svartedauden, a militia group that largely operates on encrypted networks, using overlays and virtual private networks to hide their tracks. Groups such as Svartedauden have made extensive use of encrypted messaging services to hide their communications from internet service providers, mobile network operators, and law enforcement.

The difficult task presented by militias like Svartedauden has been reflective of the arrests the National Police have made related to suspected militia activities, which has been less than 40 in 2023 alone, compared to the thousands of arrests made in connection to suspected cultist activities.

What is known about Svartedauden is its ideology and activities. The militia is overtly fascist, taking on imagery, symbols, and slogans from the fascist dictatorship that ruled over Valkyria for almost half of the 20th century, and glorifying Marshall Fallen, who served as the Chief of the Valkyrian Empire from 1923 until his death in 1966. The group does not consider the governments that succeeded the fascist regime since 1970 as legitimate.

Formed in 2004, Svartedauden was initially a group chat for six former students from the University of Gullkysten who were expelled after they attacked a socialist student. They spent 10 years in prison for the assault but reconnected after their release in 2015. The six co-founders of Svartedauden have not been seen in public or communicated with their relatives since, making it difficult for the National Police to locate them.

Today, the GDE estimates that Svartedauden has more than 2000 members across Valkyria, which was made possible due to the extensive social media campaign that the group has waged since its leaders’ release in 2015. Their ability to recruit was compounded by the political success of social democrat Margaret Harrison in 2016, who was the furthest left-wing leader elected in Valkyria at the time.

In its initial years, the group operated in the shadows, undetected by the Valkyrian security services. During this time, Svartedauden concentrated on recruitment and radicalisation, targeting disenchanted youths in secondary schools, universities, and workplaces. The election of Harrison as the president of Qvait and later as the prime minister of a united Qvait and Austurland – Valkyria – was an inflexion point for the group.

Harrison’s leadership tilted the nation to the left more than it had ever been with social democracy, feminism, and internationalism – all ideologies antithetical to Svartedauden – taking on a newfound role in Valkyria. According to University of Ravneby politics professor Magnus Djupvik, the rise of Svartedauden is attributable to the sociocultural backlash that ensued following Harrison’s rise to power.

Indeed, after Harrison’s election in 2016, alleged cultist movements grew in popularity at the same time and rate as militia groups. However, only the former caught the attention of the National Police, which was possible due to the persistence of the Populist Left, a party composed of mostly northern rural, agrarian social democrats who faced a greater threat from cultists. The militias that gained traction at the same time did not catch the attention of the Valkyrian security services.

In 2017, Svartedauden was responsible for the suicides of at least 19 people, 17 of whom were Valkyrian, after engaging in online harassment campaigns against them on social media. At the time, the National Police were unable to connect Svartedauden to the suicides until 2023. The harassment campaigns are thought to be the first criminal actions committed by the group.

Eventually, the group started leaving propaganda posters on university campuses and tagging dormitory doors with left-facing arrows to signify that the occupant was a leftist. In 2018, Svartedauden engaged in street fights with left-wing activists on university campuses, though they remained masked to maintain the secrecy of the group.

Members of the Valkyrian Special Forces near Dystalia, January 2022

The 2019 attack on the Ravneby nightclub represented a new level of crime for Svartedauden in terms of the organisation and planning necessary to execute the attack. Some former police investigators and intelligence analysts have told VKS that it would take highly-trained soldiers to execute the attack without a single member being arrested or killed, leading to speculation that those within Svartedauden who carried out the attack were current or former members of the Valkyrian Defence Force who had access to the military’s chemical reserves.

When Kaufman called for a declaration of war on Hystaiga in November 2019, she said that the National Police and GDE told her that “no non-state actor that can conceivably conduct an attack on Valkyria with chemical weapons and leave very little evidence of their responsibility”, but if active-duty Valkyrian soldiers with access to the nation’s chemical weapons arsenal indeed colluded with a neo-fascist militia, these facts change the calculus.

On Tuesday, Bennett stated that the national government will conduct an inquiry into the security services’ shortcomings, but the National Police and GDE will now conduct extensive investigations into Valkyrian militias moving forward, and the Valkyrian military will audit those who have access to the nation’s chemical weapons arsenal.

The implication that Svartedauden potentially has members in active service in the Valkyrian Defence Force has thrown one of the world’s most elite militaries into turmoil. Since 2016, the Defence Force has rigorously vetted its newest recruits for any signs of radicalism, but a loophole in the regulations exempted those who were already serving from being subject to the new vetting procedures.

Bennett, himself a former member of Njord Group, the most elite Special Forces unit within the Defence Force, said that soldiers found to be complicit in Svartedauden's activities would be court-martialed and imprisoned, “If anyone in the Defence Force collaborated with these fascists, they are traitors and enemies of freedom and will be treated with the utmost disdain accorded to such.”

With the threat that Svartedauden potentially poses, Bennett has called for a nationwide state of emergency, adding a new one on top of the existing state of emergency recently declared for Valkyria’s northern reach. The storting will vote on the declaration later Tuesday after interparty discussions on the declaration’s language. Thereafter, Jarlskona Kate Murphy will have to decide whether to grant her assent to the declaration of a state of emergency.

If granted, Valkyria will be under a nationwide state of emergency for the first time since its one and only invocation in 2019 due to the attacks. During such a state of emergency, which will likely be invoked due to the threat of an insurrection, the Valkyrian constitution permits the national government to mobilise the entire Defence Force to assist the National Police with their investigations and arrests. Further, the police and military will be able to detain people without trial for up to three months as opposed to three days.

The address from the prime minister drew strong reactions from all sides of the storting, evoking a variety of responses from those present. The feeling of the room was tense as Bennett identified Svartedauden as the perpetrators of the nightclub attack. However, audible jeers were coming from the opposition when Bennett accused Kaufman of naivety.

Kaufman, the first to respond to Bennett’s address in her position as the Leader of the Opposition, called his address to the storting as “chilling” and hoped that the people responsible for the attacks were brought to justice, but said that the accusations towards her were “ludicrous”. The former prime minister said that she “followed the facts” as they were known then and that her declaration of war was directly tied to the information provided to her by the National Police and GDE.

Kaufman went on to accuse her successor of using the address to initiate a “political witchhunt” against her and the conservative opposition, citing the recent criminal indictment of Marshall. She stated that the prime minister was deplorable to link the Valkyrian security services’ failures to her leadership, arguing that she inherited police investigators and intelligence analysts who were there long before she came to power.

The response from the western side of Mount Kalkara was one of relief. Blisse Starke, the Supreme Voice of Hystaiga, called Bennett’s address a welcome step towards the healing of both central Cordilian states and for the capture of the perpetrators of these attacks.

From her office in Karelia, Starke said that the perpetrators succeeded in drawing Valkyria into a war with an innocent nation and “permanently scarring” an entire generation of Hystaigans and Valkyrians. The Supreme Voice went further to accuse Kaufman of being “naive” and “eager” to enter into a conflict with Hystaiga. Starke said, “Now, the hard work must begin to bring these people to justice.”

In related news…

• State of emergency: what this means for daily life inside Valkyria
• Svartedauden: who are the people who founded the militia
• Valkyrian National Police to open checkpoints throughout the nation

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Valkyrian PM: Unrest in Crabry threatens Valkyrian sovereignty

Conflicts on Romordia and Jakub have unraveled inter-Gulf relations

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Monday, 20 November 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — The recent spate of violence seen in Romordia and Jakub threaten the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Valkyrian nation, Prime Minister Steve Bennett said on Sunday. Valkyria, which shares the Gulf of Kringalia with these two Crabryan nations, has recently taken in thousands of Romordian refugees, and the government expects that the unrest in Jakub will exacerbate the situation.

For now, the Valkyrian government has allowed most Romordian refugees to stay in Valkyria, but the statement made by Bennett indicates that the government is expecting an influx of Jakubian refugees, a situation that the government is trying to avoid, University of Ravneby sociology professor Marleena Ryynänen told the VKS. According to Ryynänen, the refugee crisis coming out of Crabry could fuel an anti-immigrant backlash that could topple Valkyria’s leftist government.

Bennett has called for the preservation of peace and democracy in Jakub and expressed a willingness to cooperate militarily with Weisserstein and other nations, if necessary, to keep the peace. This statement represents a dramatic break from the ones Bennett made in 2022 when the prime minister was trying to keep Valkyria out of international conflicts so soon after withdrawing the Valkyrian Defence Force from Hystaiga.

However, the calculus appears to have changed considering the political volatility of having an unstable continent right off Valkyria’s shores that could produce refugees in the millions. The political situation as it exists today has drawn comparisons to the circumstances facing Valkyria leading up to the 2019 general election when anti-immigrant attitudes surged after Prime Minister Margaret Harrison accepted nearly a quarter-million refugees over the course of three years.

In the intervening years, the Valkyrian left has taken on various views on immigration. A growing and influential faction in the Populist Left has expressed scepticism towards the matter, preferring little to no settlement of refugees within Valkyria. Members of the Labour Party and The Greens have continued their support for immigration into Valkyria. Meanwhile, the Socialist Party has taken an ambivalent view of the issue.

National Gendarmerie patrolling the coast off Gullkysten, 18 July 2023

Despite the government deferring on the deportation of Romordian refugees, The New Right and other conservative groups have sued the government in the courts, accusing the Bennett government of violating a five-year moratorium on refugees that was implemented by the Immigration Regulatory Act 2019 (IRA 19), a law passed during Stella Kaufman’s premiership. The moratorium is set to expire on 25 September 2024.

While Bennett has strongly supported repealing IRA 19, his government has been unable to do so because of resistance from the Populist Left. The Socialist prime minister has argued that the continued existence of IRA 19 in Valkyrian law has left a “black mark” on the nation and its ability to conduct foreign affairs.

The Valkyrian response to the crisis developing in Jakub stands in contrast to the indifference of the Rhaynan government. In the past few months, the two left-wing governments in Valkyria and Rhayna have seen eye-to-eye on various issues until now. Ryynänen argues that geography plays a large role in the two governments’ divergence on Jakub. Rhayna is situated further from Crabry, and its water access lies on the Cordilian west coast, limiting the prospect of having to take on refugees for Valkyria’s northern neighbour.

Bennett has stated that he does not want to conduct a violent military campaign in Jakub, but the prime minister believes that the indefinite presence of an international peacekeeping force in Crabry is necessary to limit further violence in the region.

In other news…

• State of emergency: no arrests made yet in connection to Svartedauden
• State of emergency: much of the same for residents of the Valkyrian north
• Deadline approaches for citizen proposals for Referendum Day 2024

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Valkyria must deport Romordian and Jakubian refugees, court says

A 2019 moratorium has hampered the government’s ability to accept refugees

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Saturday, 25 November 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — The Immigration Court has issued a ruling against the Valkyrian government’s deferral to deport refugees coming from Romordia and Jakub, ordering the government to deport them as soon as possible, citing a five-year moratorium imposed by the Immigration Regulatory Act 2019 (IRA 19).

Valkyrian Prime Minister Steve Bennett, who has yet to publicly comment on the issue, had previously been adamant about repealing IRA 19, but resistance from the Populist Left to do just so has left the refugee moratorium in place, which is set to expire on 25 September 2024. Until then, Valkyria cannot accept refugees from any nation. Despite the moratorium, more than 100,000 people have been detained by the National Gendarmerie after crossing the Valkyrian maritime boundary in a developing Cordilian migrant crisis.

The ruling by the Immigration Court has been derided by human rights organisations who have stated that Romordians and Jakubians no longer have a stable home to return to. Meanwhile, The New Right and other anti-immigrant groups have praised the ruling, calling it a matter of the rule of law.

The Valkyrian government, which had been trying to avoid having to deport the refugees, must now comply with the ruling. Bennett and Foreign Minister Avianna Aldridge, both leaders of the Socialist Party and the Labour Party respectively, have reportedly been trying to find loopholes in Valkyrian law that would allow the government to sidestep the 2019 moratorium, but the Conservative government that passed the law ensured that the moratorium was absolute and without exception.

Behind the scenes, representatives from the Socialist and Labour camps have reportedly tried to persuade the Populist Left to join the rest of the Alliance of Social Democrats in repealing IRA 19 and the refugee moratorium, but those efforts were said to have been futile. With a 53-seat majority in the Storting and the Populist Left holding 81 of the government’s seats, the governing Alliance of Social Democrats cannot afford to lose the latter’s support because it would trigger the government’s collapse.

Boat with refugees approaching Gullkysten, 11 November 2023

In Ravneby, the Valkyrian capital, duelling protests in support and opposition to taking in Romordian and Jakubian refugees have been waged for days. Recent polling conducted by the VKS earlier in November shows that the nation is evenly divided on the issue. For the first time since coming to power in July 2022, the left-wing government in Valkyria faces a critical test in having to take sides on a divisive issue.

However, the government itself has been divided on the issue. While there is consensus among the Socialists, Labour, Greens, and Pirates to repeal IRA 19, the Populist Left has not changed its position on the moratorium. Shortly after the ruling, Bennett called for an interparty meeting with the governing bloc’s leaders at the prime minister’s residence to decide the government’s next steps.

According to sources in the Utøvende, the prime minister does not have any plans to immediately deport the Romordian and Jakubian refugees present in Valkyria and hopes to find a solution that will see the country keep the refugees, but time is running out for the government to do just that.

In other news…

• Duelling protests in Ravneby challenge state of emergency curfew
• State of emergency: where isSvartedauden?
• The issues that Valkyrians will decide on Referendum Day 2024

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Valkyria passes exemptions in refugee moratorium

Romordians and Jakubians will be exempt from the 2019 moratorium on refugees

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Tuesday, 28 November 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — The storting voted to pass legislation that exempted Romordians and Jakubians from the five-year refugee moratorium imposed by the Immigration Regulatory Act 2019 (IRA 19), which is set to expire on 25 September 2024, less than ten months from Tuesday. While the storting could not repeal IRA 19 outright, the government’s ability to create an exception has partially alleviated what several human rights organisations called a preventable humanitarian disaster in Valkyria.

The legislation came after the party leaders of the governing Alliance of Social Democrats assembled at the Utøvende for a meeting called by Prime Minister Steve Bennett, who as the general secretary of the Socialist Party, met with Labour leader and Foreign Minister Avianna Aldridge, Populist Left leader and Home Minister Taeler Shaw, Pirate leader and Communications Minister David Mira, and Greens leader and Environment Minister Ruby Burke.

The five-leader meeting lasted for about nine hours on Saturday and ten hours on Sunday. During this two-day meeting, the leaders discussed the Immigration Court decision at length and ways to remedy the refugee crisis. According to sources who were present for the meeting, the environment was tense with four of the governing bloc’s leaders urging the Populist Left leader to drop the party’s opposition to repealing IRA 19.

Despite their urging, Shaw maintained the party’s line on IRA 19 on the first day of the meeting. However, the Populist Left leader came back to the meeting on the second day after meeting with the rest of the party’s members to present a compromise: an exemption for Romordians and Jakubians escaping their homelands due to the conflicts in their nations.

Bennett and the other party leaders agreed to the compromise, prompting them to return and the Alliance of Social Democrats to quickly draft legislation that would effectively create the exemption and overturn the Immigration Court’s ruling. Under a fast-tracked parliamentary process, the governing bloc allowed the exemption, titled the Amended Immigration Regulatory Act 2023 (AIRA 23), to skip the first two readings and head straight into a vote on whether to send the legislation to the jarlskona for signing.

All five parties, including the Populist Left, voted to pass the bill in a 384–231 vote that saw the Liberals and Communists join the governing bloc in support of the legislation. The four right-wing opposition parties and regionalist Austurland Interests party voted against AIRA 23. Given the urgency of the situation, Jarlskona Kate Murphy made herself present in the storting to give her signature of approval.

National Gendarmerie guarding a hotel holding refugees in Gullkysten, 24 November 2023

With AIRA 23’s passage, more than 100,000 Romordians and Jakubians will now be allowed to stay and live in Valkyria for an indefinite period of time. Most of the refugees had been detained by the National Gendarmerie and housed in hotels in or near Gullkysten. However, the exemption passed by the storting will allow them to be afforded the same privileges extended to pre-moratorium refugees, which are resettlement and job guarantees.

If Romordian and Jakubian refugees have any relatives in Valkyria, they will be allowed to live with them. If not, the government will assign them housing and employment. Refugees who have a skill or are experienced in a particular trade will be considered for jobs that match those skills.

However, AIRA 23 set a 200,000-person annual cap on the exemption, almost ensuring that Valkyria will reach the cap very quickly. Once the cap has been reached, the Valkyrian government will not have the authority to resettle any more Romordians or Jakubians and will have to deport them. Where is another question.

After the court ruling, Chancellor Marja Sanddorn of Gianatla offered to accept the refugees that Valkyria could not, so the Valkyrian government could make contact with other countries willing to accept refugees. For now, though, the refugees who have already come to Valkyria will be allowed to stay.

In other news…

• State of emergency: no signs of Svartedauden
• Hystaiga: reconstruction one year later
• ValkAI names AI ethicist as its new chief executive

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How Grønn became a government-granted monopoly

The worker cooperative controls 94% of the legal recreational drug market in Valkyria

Emmi Kuikka (she/her), Chief business writer
Monday, 4 December 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Gullkysten — In the past five years, Valkyria has legalised cannabis (2017), coca (2018), and psilocybin (2023) for recreational use, much to the chagrin of its neighbours and other Pacifican nations that favour criminalisation or other restrictive drug policies. Despite the pushback and criticism, drug liberalisation has continued unabated in the central Cordilian nation.

Indeed, in June 2023, psilocybin was legalised by the socialist government leading Valkyria more out of spite for international criticism of the nation’s liberal view of drugs than the recommendations made by Valkyrian health experts. The list of legal recreational drugs in Valkyria is growing, which now includes those three drugs and a host of other drugs that were never criminalised, such as ayahuasca, ibogaine, and salvia.

In the wake of legalisation, one company has gained the most from it: Grønn. Founded in 2015, the company skyrocketed its way to the top of the market by its business practices. As a worker cooperative, Grønn was able to prove to consumers that its products were grown and sold ethically in which most of the profits would return to the workers more than any single person or handful of people.

However, the Valkyrian government also played an outsized role in Grønn’s success. After Margaret Harrison rose to power in 2016, the national government introduced generous subsidies for unionised companies and cooperatives. The subsidies for Grønn were twofold because it was both a cooperative and all of its workers were officially recognised as members of the Valkyrian Workers Union.

By the time cannabis was legalised for recreational use in 2017, it was far more advantageous for the plant to be grown by a unionised cooperative than by a nonunionised corporation. When legalisation occurred in 2017, a scramble took place with many startups and other companies trying to establish a foothold in the newly legal market. In the ensuing free-for-all, only one company emerged on top: Grønn.

Unrivalled

Grønn’s flagship dispensary in Gullkysten, October 2023

Nearly one year after legalisation, Grønn controlled about 60 per cent of the cannabis market, putting the company ahead of anyone else and in a favourable position to establish control over a new legal market for coca in 2018. The farmers associated with Grønn who grew cannabis started using their crops to grow coca. Within months, 86 per cent of coca sales came from Grønn.

Six months have elapsed since psilocybin legalisation, and the Statistics Agency will soon release economic data related to the new market, but the latest quarterly reports from the largest known companies in the psilocybin industry show that Grønn may have a larger initial share in the industry compared to its initial shares in the cannabis and coca markets, holding about 95 per cent of all sales related to psilocybin.

In the five years since Valkyria began its legalisation of several recreational drugs, Grønn has positioned itself in a way that allowed the company to effectively become an industrial monopoly. With subsidies continuing to pour in from the Valkyrian government owing to the company’s status as a unionised cooperative and outsized public support for its business model, Grønn is unrivalled in its operations in the industry of recreational drugs.

While the national government under Prime Minister Steve Bennett has been sceptical or abhorrent of private monopolies, the socialist leader and his government have allowed Grønn to grow into its current form because of its worker ownership model. Even more, the company enjoys the prime minister’s personal support. Bennett has publicly used cannabis vaporisers sporting the Grønn logo.

During a questioning session in the storting, the prime minister defended Grønn’s business practices, stating the company “made profits that went straight into the pockets of the working class”. Bennett also cited that the National Police has yet to shut down any Grønn dispensary for noncompliance with Valkyrian drug laws, which entails selling recreational drugs to people under 18 years of age or opening dispensaries near pre-tertiary schools.

For the foreseeable future, there is no other company that can compete against Grønn, barring a total loss in government subsidies for the worker cooperative. In the meantime, the cooperative has been looking to establish itself in other industries. At an October business convention in Ravneby, Grønn president Karianna Westergaard said that the company was looking to open supermarkets and nightclubs throughout Valkyria using the Grønn name.

At the same time, the worker cooperative is seeking regulatory approval in other countries to begin selling either cannabis, coca, psilocybin, or a combination of the three wherever they are legal. So far, Grønn only does business in Valkyria, but it hopes to expand its operations internationally. The company has been leaning on its workplace democracy model as evidence of the ethical business practices it could spread beyond Valkyria.

From union president to cannabis entrepreneur

Karianna Westergaard, May 2023

Westergaard, who previously served as the president of the Valkyrian Workers Union from 2013 to 2017, oversaw Grønn’s transformation from a small-time hemp company to one of the largest and most influential enterprises in Valkyrian history. For the former union president, the timing of her appointment as the president of the fledgling company could not have been better.

In a March 2023 interview with left-wing magazine Arbeiderbladet, Westergaard told interviewer Joachim Vatne that she was keenly aware of the changes that the nation was going to undergo under Harrison’s leadership with cannabis legalisation and pro-worker legislation in the works. In her last year as the union president, she worked with the Labour Party’s legislation committee to secure government subsidies for union workplaces and cooperatives and endorsed the then-ongoing legislation to legalise cannabis.

The two events created the perfect conditions for one company to take the cannabis industry by storm, prompting Westergaard’s abrupt resignation as the union president in 2017 to serve as the president of what was then a little-known worker cooperative. Fuelled by newfound government subsidies and a newly legal market for recreational drugs, Grønn under Westergaard’s leadership skyrocketed into a multi-billion vekt business.

According to Westergaard, Grønn saved the cannabis industry from “free market predators” who would have cannibalised the industry and harmed the interests of the working class. With a worker cooperative leading the new industry, the working class would be able to grow, sell, and buy cannabis for themselves without any single person or small group of people enriching themselves in the process.

Indeed, while Westergaard leads a company worth more than 6 billion Valkyrian vekter, her net worth is no more than a million vekter, well below that of most Valkyrian chief executives. When she is not scheduled for any meetings with the board of directors or political leaders, Westergaard works eight hours a day and four days a week behind the counter of Grønn’s flagship dispensary in Gullkysten.

Westergaard prides herself on making the president of the worker cooperative no more special than the ordinary workers who keep Grønn running. One of the few benefits that comes with being Grønn’s president is an annual 10,000 vekt bonus, but Westergaard regularly donates half of the bonus to the union strike fund.

With Westergaard preventing corporations and other non-union companies from establishing a foothold in the recreational drug industry, she has already made it clear that she intends to open Grønn supermarkets and nightclubs to boost the nation’s union density and working-class influence. 34 per cent of all grocery workers in Valkyria are not affiliated with any union, and a measly 2 per cent of nightclub workers have union membership.

With the backing of the Valkyrian government and public opinion on her side, Westergaard is facing a downhill battle against companies that traditionally had the upper hand against unions and working-class interests, and there are few obstacles standing in her way. The next question is whether Westergaard can globalise what she managed to do in Valkyria.

In other news…

• State of emergency: police retrace steps in nightclub attack
• Spouse of former president dies, prompting state of mourning
• Inside the small movement to make Valkyria a monarchy again

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Kliegmean police arrest Valkyrians for drug possession

Valkyrian government condemns the arrests as “politically motivated”

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Monday, 4 December 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Mumiea — Police in Kliegme claimed to have arrested several Valkyrians for attempting to smuggle drugs that included cannabis, cocaine, and psilocybin into the Crabrayan nation on Monday. The Kliegmean authorities stated that the individuals, without evidence, claimed they were paid by Grønn, a Valkyrian drug company, to distribute the company’s products in the country’s market.

Responding to the arrests, Valkyrian Foreign Minister Avianna Aldridge expressed scepticism toward the Kliegmean authorities’ claims, stating that the “timing of the arrests is convenient considering the country’s recent hostility toward our sovereign right to legalise and decriminalise drugs”. Regardless, the Valkyrian government has promised cooperation to see the Kliegmean investigation to the end.

In a statement released by Grønn president Karianna Westergaard, she stated that the Valkyrian worker cooperative will share whatever evidence it has on the arrested individuals, including how they came into possession of Grønn products but strongly rejected any claim that Grønn was complicit in smuggling drugs.

Westergaard statement in full on Stream:

Karianna Westergaard Who am I? President, Grønn (since 2017). Former president, Valkyrian Workers Union (2013–2017). Rebel girl.

Translated from Valkyrisk: Grønn is a worker-owned business that prides itself on ethically growing and selling legal recreational drugs such as cannabis, coca, and psilocybin. While there are those in this world who profit from these drugs through violence and ecological destruction, Grønn's business practices are as transparent as a well-maintained aquarium. With us, you can follow the money and see that we do business with a high regard for ethics. With this in mind, I reject and condemn the claim that Grønn conducts any business that violates any nation’s laws. This company does not engage in smuggling nor does it sell cocaine. It never has, and it never will. It is a crime in Valkyria and many other nations to produce cocaine. The coca we produce and sell is meant to be chewed for its medicinal and religious qualities. While Grønn has international aspirations, we have no intention or will to violate any nation’s drug laws. If we become an international company, we will do it right – the legal way. Patiently, we will take our time to navigate the process of legalisation and registration. Right now, it is a crime to produce and sell cannabis, coca, and psilocybin in Kliegme. As such, Grønn does not conduct any business in Kliegme nor any other nation beyond Valkyria for that matter. However, the claims made by the Kliegmean authorities are distressing, and we will cooperate with their investigation and share whatever evidence we may have to see this investigation through its conclusion. Grønn is a business that has conducted itself with the utmost professionalism, respect for laws, dignity towards society, and care for the planet from the very first day of its existence in 2015. When Valkyria legalised cannabis in 2017, we went out of our way to ensure that we grew and sold our cannabis with the greatest care for water conservation, ecological preservation, and social justice and wellbeing. Grønn’s reputation did not grow in a vacuum. It took us many years of relationship-building and trust-building to earn the respect of the community we serve here in Valkyria. We would never throw all of this hard work away to do something so reckless, so irresponsible, and so unethical. Despite the intense scrutiny this company has been under by authorities beyond Valkyria and even authorities here in Valkyria during the Kaufman premiership, we have survived. We have regularly cooperated with authorities throughout our existence, allowed police to inspect our farms and dispensaries, and shared what we knew if anyone used our products unlawfully. Through all of that, not one arrest had been made of anyone who worked at Grønn. It is our hope to see drugs such as cannabis, coca, and psilocybin decriminalised and legalised in all lands of this world we share and for us all to partake in the ecstatic qualities of these drugs in a safe and ethical manner, but we have never violated any nation’s laws towards that end. Nor will we ever. Speaking personally now, I am proud of the work we do at Grønn. In a world where greed runs rampant, I work for a business of the working class, by the working class, and for the working class. This trade which I have dedicated the last six years of my life has brought me meaning, purpose, and happiness. When I clock in at work and see my coworkers, I see people who work hard and find joy in their profession. We are doing a great service to the community we serve who seek out our products for medicinal, recreational, and religious purposes and because of the way we conduct ourselves in this business. This isn’t some game of the poisoned drink either. We use the products we sell. We self-impose limits on how much people consume our products in a given time. We have volunteered our services to ensure that people struggling with addiction get the help and rehabilitation they need. We don’t prey on the people we serve because those people are our sisters, our brothers, our friends. Our community. We look forward to working with the Kliegmean authorities in their investigation and discovering the truth to these claims. I strongly believe that whatever comes out of this inquiry will vindicate and clear Grønn of any wrongdoing. If anyone within Grønn has run afoul of our principles, then they will be held to account. So far, our track record has shown us as a company that does business with high regard for ethics and upholding the law. We intend to keep it that way. –K #Grønn 14.9k Comment

In other news…

• Tracking Valkyria's transition to renewable energy
• Preserving the coral reefs in the Njord Gulf
• Progress in the push to nationalise housing in Gullkysten

[EmC]

Valkyrian home ministry has little to say about Kliegme smuggling case

Valkyrian home minister says investigation is underway

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Tuesday, 19 December 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — The Valkyrian Ministry of Home Affairs has the resources to conduct investigations thoroughly. Through the National Monitoring Service, the ministry has access to one of the most widespread surveillance systems in the world, with some cities listed in the top 30 for most surveillance cameras per square kilometre. Further, the Valkyrian government goes to great lengths to retain as much footage as possible for historical purposes.

And so, it should not take long for the National Police to retrace the steps of the Valkyrians who Kliegme detained on smuggling charges on 4 December. For the most part, the police just have to verify where a person was at a particular point of time before they can retrace their footsteps before and after the point of verification. However, the central Cordilian nation’s surveillance system is imperfect and can have blindspots in the countryside.

Since the arrests, the National Police have executed search warrants on Grønn’s surveillance footage and financial transactions in Sjávarborg, the city where most of the arrested Valkyrians were last seen before they travelled for Kliegme. At the same time, the police are likely poring through the National Monitoring Service’s (Nasjonal overvåkingstjeneste, NOS) extensive surveillance system to map their movements and interactions.

Despite the vast resources at the Ministry of Home Affairs’ disposal, the National Police and the wider ministry it is part of have publicly said little about the case other than affirming their cooperation with Kliegmean authorities. However, former National Police Director Marcus Rasmussen argues that the national state of emergency invoked due to the threat posed by Svartedauden has the National Police dedicating more resources to the manhunt.

“If there was no Svartedauden, the National Police would likely have already solved the Grønn case, but many members of the police force have been preoccupied with helping in the Svartedauden investigation,” Rasmussen told the VKS, “With all of the problems facing Valkyria right now, a smuggling case beyond our borders is taking a lower priority.”

In the years since legalisation and decriminalisation and a shift in national policing strategies, the National Police’s narcotics control directorate has shrunk in size compared to other police branches. While the directorate continues to arrest people who sell drugs illegally, most Valkyrians who consume recreational drugs now buy from licensed and regulated sellers such as Grønn.

Today, the narcotics control directorate spends more time with officials from the Medicines Authority to ensure that drug companies like Grønn are up-to-date on the certification of their workers and remain in compliance with national drug laws than hunting down drug dealers and users.

Cannabisallé in Sjávarborg, November 2023

On Grønn’s end, the worker cooperative’s president, Karianna Westergaard, has stated that the company has cooperated with both Valkyrian and Kliegmean authorities in the investigation. Westergaard confirmed that Grønn has provided the surveillance footage and financial transactions subject to the Valkyrian National Police’s search warrants. However, since the warrants are limited to Sjávarborg, Grønn has withheld footage and transactions occurring outside of the city.

Westergaard also stated that Grønn is conducting an internal investigation into its inventory. The company conducts monthly audits of its inventory and routinely releases inventory reports for public consumption. According to the reports, Grønn sees shrinkage at a rate of 1.21 per cent in all of its operations. Shrinkage refers to a company’s inventory of items, particularly that which is unaccounted for due to theft, damage, loss, or error.

However, Grønn has experienced an unusual rate of shrinkage in its Sjávarborg warehouses, which has been consistently experiencing shrinkage of at least 1.6 per cent, higher than anywhere else in Valkyria. Despite the discrepancy, the crime rate in Sjávarborg is no more different than other Valkyrian cities.

The abnormally high shrinkage in Grønn’s Sjávarborg warehouses appears to have started in March 2021, growing steadily from 1.18 per cent in February of that year before peaking at 1.79 per cent in May 2022 and remaining over 1.6 per cent ever since. In response to the shrinkage, Grønn closed several of its shops and one of its warehouses in 2022, but the closures did little to change the company’s losses in the city.

Grønn dispensary in Tvellingelver, July 2023

Because of the shrinkage Grønn encountered in Sjávarborg, the company hired private investigators to determine the cause, but their findings were inconclusive. The investigators hypothesised that clerical error was to blame for the losses but were unable to verify whether that was the case.

Over three months, the investigators participated in three inventory audits and found that several pallets worth of Grønn products were missing in each audit. They also kept an eye on video surveillance of the Sjávarborg warehouses but did not find anything suspicious in the footage.

The National Police have stated that they will investigate the shrinkage that occurred at the company’s warehouses in Sjávarborg, calling it a “point of interest” in the inquiry.

All the while the investigation continues, Grønn’s operations have been in doubt pending the results of the inquiry. The company has been trying to secure certification to distribute both recreational and medicinal cannabis internationally, but those efforts have been stymied by the Kliegmean smuggling case.

In other news…

• Valkyrian Green Road Initiative on a bumpy start
• Public sentiment divided on Crabrayan refugees
• State of emergency: no arrests made yet after one month

[EmC]

Steve Bennett announces he will be a father again

The Valkyrian prime minister and his spouse expect a child around September 2024

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Thursday, 21 December 2023

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — Valkyrian Prime Minister Steve Bennett and AI engineer Kaja Stoltenberg announced Thursday that they will have a second child after 24 years. The couple, who have been married since 1999, had been parents before until the death of Lucilla Steffánsdóttir Bennett in the Kalkara War on 7 April 2021 in the Battle of Dystalia.

In an extended post on Stream, the Valkyrian prime minister expressed joy at the prospect of being a parent again but somberly reflected on losing his first child. Bennett admitted that he “still cannot overcome the sadness of losing [his] daughter and [that] no other child could ever replace her”.

Before the Kalkara War, Lucilla Bennett was a biochemistry student at the University of Ravneby and a political activist who served as the vice president of the university’s Socialist Youth. In 2019, she volunteered in the election campaign of fellow Socialist Júlía Kjaransdóttir in Ravneby’s 1st constituency.

When the war began in late 2019, Lucilla Bennett was vocal in her opposition to the conflict, sharing her position publicly in various posts on Stream. However, she was eventually conscripted into the Valkyrian Ground Forces, receiving several months of training before her deployment to Hystaiga. There, she would go on to experience 14 months of combat as part of the 9th Infantry Regiment.

Lucilla Steffánsdóttir Bennett, July 2019

In photos, videos, and audio recordings stored on Lucilla Bennett’s phone, she documented the plight of Hystaigans under Valkyrian occupation, instances of war crimes committed by other soldiers in her unit, and mistreatment by fellow soldiers because of her and her father’s opposition to the Kalkara War. The phone, along with the photos and recordings stored on it, was kept secret by the Valkyrian government under Stella Kaufman until Steve Bennett became prime minister in 2022.

In some of the recordings, soldiers from the 9th Infantry Regiment were heard calling her a “traitor’s daughter”, toppling a water tower, and torturing and executing unarmed civilians in basements. In one self-recording, Lucilla Bennett had been crying, called the soldiers in her unit a “band of criminals”, and said she felt powerless in stopping the atrocities they were committing.

Shortly after midnight on 7 April 2021, Lucilla Bennett died in Dystalia after losing too much blood as a result of a gunshot wound in her neck that she sustained while trying to rescue wounded soldiers from another unit. Lucilla Bennett was three months away from her 21st birthday.

Because of her death, Steve Bennett and Kaja Stoltenberg both lost their only child, and the former became the first and only member of the storting to lose an immediate family member to the Kalkara War. Lucilla Bennett’s death marked a turning point in her father’s political career. Once seen as a pariah among the nation’s elected politicians, Bennett quickly became one of the most popular political leaders in Valkyria, eventually becoming prime minister.

While announcing his wife’s pregnancy, Bennett said that they agreed to give their second child a name that honours the memory and carries on the legacy of their first.

[EmC]

Gullkysten reaches tentative deal with landlords

Valkyria’s most populous city will take control of all rental properties by 2029

Emmi Kuikka (she/her), Chief business writer
Saturday, 27 January 2024

Austral | Valkyrisk | Austurmál | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Gullkysten — Natasja Gemzøe (pron), the mayor of Gullkysten, announced Saturday that the local government has reached a tentative agreement with landlords that will see Valkyria’s most populous city and financial centre assume control of all rental properties by 2029, concluding the first stage of negotiations between the local government and the landlords within the city.

Half a year after Ravneby, the Valkyrian capital, unilaterally announced the expropriation of all rental housing within the city, the compensation of which will be determined in the courts, Gullkysten has followed suit but reached an amicable agreement with the landlords in advance.

According to the agreement reached between the local government and the landlords, Gullkysten will expropriate rental properties in stages until the expropriation is complete by 2029. The city will take control of rental housing by compensating the landlords according to the land area they currently own in ascending order, ensuring that the smallest landlords in Gullkysten are paid first.

As part of the expropriation, the Gullkysten local government will receive financial assistance from the national government and give existing and potential tenants the option to buy a property outright for personal residential use. The expropriation comes ten months after the national government passed the Housing Act 2023, which will see rental housing nationalised and abolished in Valkyria by 2030.

While nationalising rental housing was made the ultimate responsibility of the national government, the Housing Act 2023 allowed local and regional governments to do the same with assistance from the national government. So far, Ravneby and Gullkysten, respectively the capital and most populous city of Valkyria, are the only two cities to have an expropriation plan. However, cities such as Àrborg and Tvillingelver have said they are exploring their options.

Valkyrian Prime Minister Steve Bennett had stated that the national government was giving local and regional governments time to come up with localised expropriation plans before the national government announces its plan to nationalise rental housing throughout Valkyria by 2030, setting a deadline for 1 August 2024. According to Planning Minister Daniel Yamamoto, the national government already has a plan drafted but is making constant revisions based on the localised expropriation plans of cities like Ravneby and Gullkysten.

Despite criticism from landlords and classical liberals, Valkyria is moving forward with its plan to nationalise housing. The decision to do so came as the national government, led by a left-wing coalition, sought to address and mitigate an increasingly difficult cost of living crisis that has made life more challenging for Valkyrians.

And so, the Bennett government believes that abolishing rent and nationalising the housing market will alleviate the financial stress of many Valkyrians. Moreover, the national government has been ramping up the construction of social housing with the goal of eradicating homelessness by 2035, which was a long-term plan initiated by Prime Minister Margaret Harrison through the Shelter Act 2017.

Reaction to Gullkysten's plan

Following the announcement made by Gemzøe, the response from local figures has been supportive. Former Prime Minister Harrison, who was born and raised in Gullkysten, called the agreement between the city and landlords as a “step in the right direction towards ending the housing affordability crisis and homelessness”. Grønn president Karianna Westergaard, who rents an apartment in Gullkysten, stated that “the working class will be guaranteed a home in Gullkysten”.

In Ravneby, Bennett and members of the governing Alliance of Social Democrats praised the agreement, with the prime minister stating that Gullkysten residents “will be protected against the malicious greed of landlords”. However, members of the liberal and right-wing opposition were critical of the plan. Liberal leader Jason Sullivan, who has been a sceptic of nationalised housing, said that the programme will harm foreign investment in Valkyria.

Despite the wide political differences between them, the left-wing government has found strange bedfellows in The New Right and The Northern Party. The national conservative parties support the government’s housing policy with The New Right leader, Nicole Chancellor, stating that the policy is in line with Valrissi traditionalist views on housing and calling landlordism an “Austral concept that is totally alien to Valkyrian culture”.

While the national conservatives initially abstained from voting or sharing their views on the Housing Act 2023, Chancellor came out forcefully in favour of the nationalisation of housing in October 2023, much to the surprise of members of the Centrist Democrats and Conservative Party. The New Right leader said that community-owned housing was “a sacrosanct aspect of Valrissi customs and traditions”.

Because of the support the Bennett government gets from the national conservatives on its housing policy, it is unlikely that the expropriation programme will stop anytime soon. According to a November 2023 poll conducted by the VKS, 64 per cent of Valkyrians support the government’s housing policy, driven in large part by those who describe themselves as socialists, social democrats, and national conservatives.

Because of the national conservatives, Valkyrian landlords’ hopes to overturn the Housing Act 2023 by legislation in a future government were effectively crushed, and it does not appear that the courts will overturn the law, virtually ensuring that rental housing will be abolished by 2030 in Valkyria. The only parties opposed to the law are the Conservatives, Centrist Democrats, and Liberals, who combined make up a minority in the Storting and are unlikely to repeal it.

Gemzøe's gambit

Gullkysten mayor Natasja Gemzøe, August 2023

Even before the announcement by the local government, Gullkysten already had 20 per cent of all private rental housing in the city under government control. Gemzøe, who is a member of the Socialist Party and has been the Gullkysten mayor since 2016, inherited a city in which only 7 per cent of its rental housing was publicly owned. During her mayoralty, she steadily worked toward expropriating private rental housing, oftentimes without the help of the national government during either the Harrison or Kaufman premierships.

When Bennett became the Valkyrian prime minister in 2022, Gemzøe found a powerful ally in Ravneby who could expedite the expropriation process that had started in 2016 for Gullkysten. With the help of subsidies from the national government, Gemzøe says that Gullkysten will be able to expropriate all private rental housing in the city by 2029. Now with a tentative agreement with the city’s landlords, the Gullkysten mayor believes that the path has been cleared for the total expropriation of all private rental housing in the city.

At the Gullkysten Socialist Party Conference in 2022, Gemzøe called Bennett the one of the city’s greatest benefactors whose proposed national policies would allow Gullkysten to grow and prosper. Indeed, the last two left-wing governments led by Harrison and now Bennett have enacted policies that have done just that. In eight years, Gullkysten not only grew as the nation’s financial hub, but the city and its residents took advantage of the policies enacted at the national level by the two leftist prime ministers.

Today, Gullkysten is now considered the de facto cannabis capital of the South Pacific, with no other city ahead of Gullkysten in the profits it reaps from the plant. Grønn, a cannabis company that dominates the industry like no other in the South Pacific, calls Gullkysten its home and has been steadily expanding despite the ongoing criminal investigation in Kliegme that has led to questions about the company’s involvement in the case.

Gullkysten, which exhibits the hallmarks of a global city as the home of the Pacifinext stock exchange and headquarters of the World Forum Committee for Economy, sees itself as a city that can compete with most other cities in the world. However, in its quest to become a global city, some of Gullkysten’s residents felt that they were being left behind by an increasingly unaffordable cost of living, triggering Gemzøe’s election as mayor in 2016.

Buoyed by a local approval rating in the 80s by multiple polling agencies and a national government that supports her housing expropriation programme, Gemzøe has been reelected twice in 2019 and 2022 in successive landslides and has succeeded in squeezing the landlords out of the city little by little, which is set to be accelerated by the national government’s subsidies and the tentative agreement the city made with the remaining landlords.

With the Valkyrian general election a little more than a year away, there is now talk about Gemzøe making a move into national politics. Since 2010, no politician in Valkyria has been the head of government for more than three years, but current polling suggests that Bennett may lead the national government for another term through 2028. If so, Gemzøe’s entry into national politics may even mean a Cabinet position in the next government should Bennett secure a second term as prime minister.

Since coming into office as the mayor of the nation’s most populous city in 2016, Gemzøe became an influential political figure, gaining the ears of two prime ministers owing to her position. Her name has been floated as a potential prime minister several times in the past decade, she has deferred the opportunity to become a national politician to continue serving as mayor.

The gambit appeared to have paid off since Gemzøe has been able to materialise her policy priorities, especially the expropriation, in Gullkysten and still have allies in Ravneby, save for the three years that Stella Kaufman served as prime minister. In her time as the mayor, Gemzøe has ingratiated herself among politicians on the left, convincing all left-wing parties in the city council to form a coalition that includes socialists, social democrats, ecologists, pirates, and even communists. Should Gemzøe enter national politics, she will have many allies waiting for her in Ravneby.

Gullkysten's future

Because of the expropriation process, some economists such as University of Ravneby professor Håkon Magnússon say that it’s uncertain how the abolition of private rental housing will affect Gullkysten in the long term, “We’ve been hearing from liberal political figures how expropriation will harm investment in both the region and the nation, but we heard the same arguments around cannabis. We just do not really know how it will pan out yet.”

The long term goal of the Gullkysten local government is the same as the national government. They intend to take control of all rental housing in the city and subsequently abolish rent in favour of an annual tax that will provide for the continued maintenance and expansion of residential space. According to the Socialist Party, the overarching goal is to divorce value from land in favour of assessing land’s utility to the people.

In pre-1600 Valkyrian society, ideas of land ownership and landlordism were foreign concepts because one’s home was determined by one’s clan. People could build homes for themselves and live freely within their community as long as they helped provide for their group. These pre-Austral ideas were subsequently suppressed when Australs started forming settlements along the Valkyrian coast and integrated themselves with local clans.

In the 21st century, there has been a palingenesis of communitarian ideas in Valkyria espoused by those in both the Socialist Party and The New Right, albeit for different ideological reasons. The cost of living crisis that Valkyria now faces has resulted in a sociopolitical backlash against the fundamental existence of landlordism in the nation, but how its abolition will affect cities like Gullkysten in a nation that has grown accustomed to laissez-faire is unknown.

However, Gemzøe has argued that Gullkysten, with its population of nearly 8 million and an additional 12 million in its metropolitan area, can be a global city without following liberal norms, that its unique approach to housing will make the city stand out among others and gain an advantage over them.

[EmC]

Police say organised theft occurred at Grønn warehouses

The company has since tightened security around its warehouses

Tove Jakobsdóttir (she/her), Chief politics writer
Monday, 3 March 2024

Austral | Valkyrian | Austurmál | Cimbrian | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Ravneby — After months of investigation, the Valkyrian National Police stated on Monday that Grønn was cleared of wrongdoing in the Kliegmean smuggling case. Daniel Giørtz, the director of the National Police, addressed the matter in a press conference, stating that the Grønn products smuggled into Kliegme were never sold and had likely been stolen as part of an organised theft ring in Sjávarborg.

Investigators in the case pored through thousands of hours of surveillance footage; scoured through thousands of pages of invoices, inventory notes, and other documents; and interviewed hundreds of current and former Grønn employees. In their inquiry, the National Police found that organised theft was at play with a masked and heavily armed crew posing as armoured truck drivers who would handle the company’s cash.

Instead, this crew orchestrated a string of thefts of Grønn’s products, stealing bales of cannabis and other drugs on top of the company’s cash. To make it hard for Grønn to detect the theft at several Sjávarborg warehouses, this group used intimidation and other coercive tactics against Grønn employees who were in charge of inventory.

On paper, unusual levels of shrinkage was still detected at the warehouses, but an in-company audit showed that it was actually worse than what was documented. The money flow in Sjávarborg fared worse than the inventory reports suggested, with Grønn losing hundreds of thousands of Valkyrian vekter each year in the city.

Grønn’s flagship dispensary in Gullkysten

Once the company was apprised by the National Police, Grønn tightened its security and reassigned personnel.
Verge, the company that handles Grønn’s money, was informed in February that all of their employees will be asked to provide identification every time they visit any of Grønn’s properties. The National Police, which offers a paid detail programme, will also now be paid by Grønn to provide for the company’s security.

Grønn’s president, Karianna Westergaard, published a statement on Stream on Tuesday denouncing the theft and announced the changes the company made in its security measures. Westergaard also stated that, since the beginning of the investigation, the theft occurring at the company’s Sjávarborg warehouses became “virtually nonexistent”.

As for the people who attempted to smuggle Grønn products into Kliegme, the National Police determined that they were never worked at Grønn and were not acting on the behalf of the company. The findings and corresponding evidence were handed off to Kliegmean authorities by the National Police liaison at the Valkyrian embassy in Mumiea.

However, the National Police stated that the organised theft that occurred in Sjávarborg will remain an open investigation as the people responsible are still at large.

[EmC]

Grønn will become multinational in the fourth quarter of 2024

The company will begin operations in multiple countries

Emmi Kuikka (she/her), Chief business writer
Saturday, 30 March 2024

Austral | Valkyrian | Austurmál | Cimbrian | Fjellspråk | Läntinen

Gullkysten — “This company will grow to become one of the largest providers of medicinal and recreational cannabis and union jobs here in Valkyria and in other nations. The day will come when this company will become a multinational cooperative.” When Karianna Westergaard stepped down as the president of the Valkyrian Workers Union to become the president of Grønn in 2017, she set out to make the company an economic juggernaut.

In November 2024, Westergaard will realise that seven-year-old goal as it begins operations in Eflad, Emerald, Hystaiga, Ravensland, Rhayna, and Vrigny. By year’s end, Grønn will operate in seven states throughout the South Pacific. However, Westergaard has stated that the company will start shipping products out to countries beyond the South Pacific region in 2025.

Karianna Westergaard Who am I? President, Grønn (since 2017). Former president, Valkyrian Workers Union (2013–2017). Rebel girl.

When I was elected the president of Grønn, I promised that we would deliver good-paying union jobs and wealth to the working class throughout the South Pacific. In 2024, we will deliver that promise when Grønn begins business in six other states. In November, we will open farms or shops or both in Eflad, Emerald, Hystaiga, Ravensland, Rhayna, and Vrigyny according to their respective laws and regulations. In these places, we will try to grow and sell domestically while limiting exports whenever possible. Our goal is to equitably distribute wealth within our workforce instead of concentrating it among a few. Being a unionised worker-led cooperative is not a weakness. It is our strength. Unlike predatory multinational corporations who only care about filling the pockets of those who sit on the board of directors, Grønn is a business built, operated, and maintained by members of the community. You may recognise them as your sisters, your brothers, your friends, not a stranger just trying to make another sale. When we welcome these workers, they will have just as much a say in the future of Grønn as those who work here in Valkyria. As part of this expansion, Grønn will move forward with a board of national directors composed of members who were chosen after extensive consultations with the major trade unions of each state: Annika Herzog, representing Efladian workers Marcus Forchhammer, representing Emeraldian workers Serena Blackmyre, represnting Hystaigan workers Freya Brøgger, representing Ravenslandic workers Evangelia Lytras, representing Rhaynan workers David Bowen, representing Vrignyan workers When Grønn begins operations in these states, the workforces of each state will be represented by their local trade unions. We intend to provide the same wages, benefits, and protections to these workers as those enjoyed by Valkyrian workers. Any improvement to wages, benefits, or protections to workers in one state will be extended to all workers in other states. There are not many companies out there that can claim to be owned and led by its workers and not on the scale we have done it. Grønn is one of the few companies where hard work can and is rewarding. Our work is a service to the communities of which we are part of, providing many with fair and equitable access to various plants, mushrooms, and drugs such as cannabis, coca, psilocybin, ayahuasca, ibogaine, and salvia. Come November, Grønn will be experimenting with the production and sale of LSD and MDMA in select national markets where they are legal for adult use. We hope to start up this experiment in Valkyria by then, but that depends on the decision the Storting makes in their legislation this year. We look forward to seeing you in all seven of these states. –K #Grønn 43.7k Comment

Grønn president Karianna Westergaard

Grønn’s expansion into six other states represents a significant victory for Westergaard, whose future as the company’s president fell into doubt after the company faced questions from the Kliegmean smuggling case. However, the company being cleared of wrongdoing by the Valkyrian National Police and the subsequent expansion comes as Westergaard’s term nears its end. In 2025, Grønn will hold a presidential election among its workers.

Since Westergaard became the company’s president in 2017, Grønn underwent a shift in its business operation, advancing beyond manufacturing hemp products to becoming a producer, manufacturer, and distributor of cannabis, coca, and various other recreational drugs. In 2025, the company will diversify its portfolio further by expanding into retail with the opening of a grocery store in Gullkysten.

Westergaard, a former president of the Valkyrian Workers Union, has been named as a potential contender for political office, with sources telling the VKS that she may consider a run for the storting in 2025, springboarding her potentially into a senior cabinet position if Prime Minister Steve Bennett and the Alliance of Social Democrats retain control of the government in the general election.

Following the legalisation of cannabis and other recreational drugs in Valkyria, Grønn emerged on top of the recreational drug industry and held a commanding position in the market. In 2023 alone, the company made 48 billion Valkyrian vekter in sales. According to Valeria Heyerdahl, a professor of economics at the University of Gullkysten, Grønn may make exponentially more sales in 2025 with the expansion into seven states.