Disinfo: Kyiv asked Russia to protect the population of Donbas and Crimea from the coronavirus

Summary

[Ukraine’s] Ministry of Foreign Affairs actually recognised the “LDNR” and Crimea as separate entities. On 15 April, an official statement to the Russian Federation appeared on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. There, Kyiv sophisticatedly asks [the Russian Federation] to protect the life of the population of Crimea and Donbas during the coronavirus pandemic.

Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation about the war in Ukraine and the illegal annexation of Crimea.

Ukraine's government did not ask the Russian Federation for help. The statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine expressed Kyiv's concern about the state of protection of life and health of the population in the temporarily occupied territories of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol, and certain areas in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Kyiv demands the Russian Federation provides, on a constant basis, exhaustive information on the spread of the coronavirus disease in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine and on the measures it is undertaking to assist the population of these territories to cope with the pandemic.

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News Front - Russian (Archived)

Reported in: Issue 193
DATE OF PUBLICATION: 20/04/2020
Language/target audience: Russian
Country: Ukraine
Keywords: DNR, LNR, Crimea

Ukraine does not help businesses and people affected by the quarantine

Ukrainian authorities rewrote the country’s budget to please the IMF. Payments to the regions, subsidies to the population and financing of medicine were reduced. Help for businesses and people affected by the quarantine is not provided.

April 22, 2020

Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative alleging that Ukraine is controlled by the IMF. It's also a narrative about the collapse of the financial system of Ukraine, and the absence of support for Ukrainian citizens in need, etc.

“The amendments to the [Ukrainian] national budget for the current year are being made to optimise spending in response to the external and domestic challenges related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic and the global economic crisis,” the head of the state’s press service said.

It is not plausible that the COVID-19 developed naturally

COVID-19, a disease that many experts weren’t expecting for a hundred thousand years, is a highly modified version of the Wuhan Horseshoe Bat Virus. It is not plausible that COVID-19 developed without a gene-splicing laboratory. The odds against such a disease developing naturally are astronomical yet we are continually informed of the opposite.

April 22, 2020

Disproof

Conspiracy theories about the 2019-nCoV coronavirus, there is no evidence to suggest that the virus is being used as a weapon against other states or that is was fabricated inside laboratories.

This Coronavirus comes from a family of viruses that include the common cold and viruses such as SARS and MERS. The medical Journal “Emerging Microbes & Infections” specifically said there is “No credible evidence supporting claims of the laboratory engineering”.

OPCW Ltamenah report was written under Western political pressure

Moscow criticised the report of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on the use of toxic substances in the town of Ltamenah in 2017, and considered that it was formulated with political pressure from Western countries.

April 22, 2020

Disproof

This is a recurring disinformation narrative aiming to discredit the OPCW. The OPCW is an independent inter-governmental international organisation with 193 member states - including Russia.

Pro-Kremlin outlets began portraying the OPCW as a pawn in Western geopolitical designs around mid-2018, when the organisation was being granted new powers to assign blame for chemical attacks, especially in the Syrian Douma.