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Disinfo: Due to a very high decline in Lithuania’s population, the country will be depopulated in 20 years

Summary

The population decline in Lithuania is so rapid that virtually no people will remain in the country in twenty years. Hence, Lithuania will not need any nuclear energy sector as kerosene lamps will suffice for the remaining people.

Disproof

This message is consistent with pro-Kremlin narrative about the socio-economic and demographic degradation in the Baltic states because of their membership of the EU. See earlier disinformation case alleging that the Baltic states are dying because they chose not to be with Russia.

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Sputnik Belarus - Russian (Archived)
  • Reported in: Issue 148
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 26/04/2019
  • Outlet language(s) Russian
  • Countries and/or Regions discussed in the disinformation: Lithuania
  • Keywords: Nuclear issues, Baltic states
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The European Union is obliged to participate in US wars

Washington castrated the European Union at its birth by imposing a clause to be inserted in the Treaty of Maastricht – the “suzerainty” of NATO. The EU has a vassal status in relation to the United States. We should remember the total support offered by the European Union to all of the Pentagon’s adventures, in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen. In all these cases, without exception, the EU marched along its suzerain, NATO. The European Union, which was imagined at a time when the world was divided into two irreconcilable blocs, is today completely unadapted. If they want to avoid being dragged by the United States into conflicts which are not their own, its members will have to free themselves from the European treaties and the integrated command of NATO.

Apr 25, 2019
Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin narrative on the United States, dictating EU and member state policies. Similar examples can be found here and here.

Ukraine will start issuing foreigners' passports as in the Baltic states

The law strengthening the use of the Ukrainian language adopted by Kyiv proves that Ukraine is following the Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian scenarios, which means that disloyal parts of the population are excluded from public life based on their languages. The next step will be issuing passports for foreigners, as in the Baltic countries.

Apr 25, 2019
Disproof

This message is consistent with a recurring disinformation narrative about Ukrainian statehood and human rights violated in Ukraine. Alien's (non-citizen's) passports are issued in Estonia and Latvia. They were granted to the people who did not reside in the countries before their annexation by the Soviet Union in 1940, as well as to their descendants, in case they did not successfully pass exams proving proficiency in the state languages and knowledge of the countries' history. Despite the new law's ambiguity (president-elect Volodymyr Zelensky already stated he will be reviewing it), it is ungrounded to speculate about the introduction of alien's (non-citizen's) passports in Ukraine. For other disinformation cases about Russian language being suppressed see here.

Russia gave passports to Donbas locals because Kyiv deprived them of any rights and social benefits

Russia provided passports to Donbas locals, because Kyiv deprived the region of social transfers and pensions, and furthermore denied local citizens their voting rights.

Apr 25, 2019
Disproof

Since 2014, the Ukrainian government has required citizens in Donetsk and Luhansk, which are not controlled by Kyiv, to register as internally displaced persons in government-controlled areas of Ukraine in order to receive their pensions and other entitlements. The website of the Ministry of Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced Persons of Ukraine declared that residents of the Donbas, who live in territory not controlled by Kyiv, could nonetheless participate in the presidential elections. To do this, they had to come to the Department of State for Voter Registration in order to submit an application. The text of the Trilateral Contact Group (Minsk Protocol) does not stipulate any recognition of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk "People's Republics" nor any need to consult with them about national issues. The text states "to ensure early local elections in accordance with the Ukrainian law... on temporary Order of Local Self-Governance in Particular Districts of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts". There is no mention of the fact that the Ukrainian parliament should coordinate bills with the so-called "DPR" and "LNR". This is a recurring disinformation narrative about the Ukrainian elections.