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Disinfo: Latvians find NATO’s ‘blind’ missiles in the gardens and military equipment on the roads

Summary

Latvians have ‘blind’ missiles being dropped in their gardens and finding lost military equipment on the roads. NATO soldiers are completely ignoring the local laws in the Baltic countries: fighting, debauchery, and vandalism are constant ‘side effects’ of these anti-Russian drills.

Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about NATO and the Baltic States.

Sputnik uses footage showing a post published by a Facebook user, Oksana Bondarenko (now Laimīgās Stundas) on December 14, 2019. The author of the post indicated Tīnūžu pagasts as a location which is in Ikšķile municipality, in the central part of the country, some 200 km away from Daugavpils, where the NATO base is located.

Another footage that we see in the video, which according to Sputnik, shows the current protests in Latvia, is from 2016. That year, on June 6, the 2nd Cavalry Regiment arrived in Daugavpils and conducted a training operation Dragoon Ride. It was that day when Representatives of the Latvian Armed Forces and Police removed the poster with text attacking US soldiers in Latvia. An administrative case has been initiated for placing a poster without permission. Then-President of Latvia Raimonds Vējonis later said in his TV statement that this was an isolated incident and did not reflect the general attitudes of Latvians.

See more debunking by Myth Detector. Read here similar cases claiming that Lithuania is temporarily NATO-occupied territory ruled by non-Lithuanians, that Eastern European countries in NATO are under Washington’s political and military control, that the US views the Baltic states not as independent countries but as a NATO springboard for conducting a military attack against Belarus and Russia, and that the Baltic states are dying because they chose not to be with Russia.

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publication/media

Sputnik Georgia - Russian [from 01:35 to 01:54] (Archived)
  • Reported in: Issue 185
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 12/02/2020
  • Language/target audience: Russian
  • Country: Baltic states
  • Keywords: NATO

Disclaimer

Cases in the EUvsDisinfo database focus on messages in the international information space that are identified as providing a partial, distorted, or false depiction of reality and spread key pro-Kremlin messages. This does not necessarily imply, however, that a given outlet is linked to the Kremlin or editorially pro-Kremlin, or that it has intentionally sought to disinform. EUvsDisinfo publications do not represent an official EU position, as the information and opinions expressed are based on media reporting and analysis of the East Stratcom Task Force.

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Germans imprisoned by the Soviets were happy

The conditions for (German) prisoners in the Soviet Union (in terms of food and support) were not so bad. Many prisoners, upon their return to Germany, remembered the warmth of their interactions with the Russian population, and in these days we can even call it human relations.

February 19, 2020
Disproof

This message is part of the Kremlin’s policy of historical revisionism.

Adelbert Holl in his memoir describes the daily life in the camps:

Russia is falsely accused of misdeeds by simply affirming that its responsibility is “highly likely”

After 2014, the UN started using a new method against Russia and other countries. Now it is enough to stigmatise and blame a country, often Russia itself, for some kind of sin and not bother seeking further evidence, simply by saying that its guilt is “highly likely”. This is a really cheap way, in every sense, of waging a psychological war.

February 19, 2020
Disproof

This is part of a recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative to portray Russia as a blameless victim of Western machinations. One of the most prominent cases in which the expression “highly likely” has been used by Western authorities is the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergey Skripal and his daughter Yulia with Novichok, as in UK prime minister Theresa May’s letter to the UN Security Council on March 2018, after the British investigation had established that either the Russian Government was behind the attack or it had lost control of the nerve agent to a non-State actor. Since then, the only relevant suspects of the case have been identified as operatives of the Russian military intelligence service (GRU). You can see other examples of disinformation about Russia’s alleged innocence in our database, such as claims about false UK and US accusations for the downing of the flight MH17, the Mueller report as proof of how Russia is always falsely blamed, the annexation of Crimea as the will of its population and in full compliance of international law, the Skripal case as a sham, the recurrent accusations of Russophobia or anti-Russian stances, or the affirmation that is NATO, not Russia, who is involved in the Donbass conflict.

Armenia initiates a referendum to ratify the Istanbul Convention

The authorities initiated a consitutional referendum to change members of the Constitutional court. This is aimed at ratifying the Istanbul Convention, even though it contradicts the Constitution.

For the Convention to be ratified, the Constitutional Court needs to conclude that it does not contradict Armenia’s Constitution.

With its current staff, the Constitutional Court of Armenia, would never reach such a conclusion. So, it is very important for the authorities to change the members of the Constitutional Court as soon as possible.

February 19, 2020
Disproof

Recurring disinformation narrative about the Istanbul Convention. The Istanbul Convention (the Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence) is a treaty of the Council of Europe for the creation of a legal framework at pan-European level to protect women against all forms of violence, and prevent, prosecute and eliminate violence against women and domestic violence.

The referendum has nothing to do with the Istanbul Convention. Under the proposed amendments, the Constitutional court’s chairman and six other members appointed by former Armenian governments would be replaced by other judges to be confirmed by the current parliament. The chairman and members of the CC are accused of having remaining links to the “former corrupt regime”.