Disinfo: Russia fighting Collective West and NATO in Ukraine war

Summary

Russia is now taking a blow which shows that the actual fight is aimed against the collective West and NATO forces.

Disproof

This is a recurring disinformation narrative from pro-Kremlin outlets claiming the West and NATO troops in particular are directly involved in Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine on the Ukrainian side.  The claim also builds on the well-known Kremlin narrative of the West encircling Russia.

Some NATO member states are providing Ukraine with military assistance to repel the unprovoked Russian aggression, but they are not involved in direct fighting. Ukraine receives weapons with the sole aim of restoring its territorial integrity within its internationally recognised borders. Western instructors are teaching Ukrainian soldiers how to use modern weaponry, but there are no NATO troops fighting on the front. NATO condemns in the strongest possible terms Russia's war on Ukraine. NATO as an organisation is not involved in fighting in Ukraine.

After so many war crimes committed by Russian troops in Ukraine, Moscow de facto ruled out prospects for a quick peaceful agreement. Kyiv’s position is that peace talks with Moscow will be possible only after the complete and unconditional withdrawal of Russian troops from the entire Ukrainian territory including the illegally annexed Crimean peninsula and the separatist-controlled regions in the East.

Read more disinformation cases about the Russian unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine.

publication/media

  • Reported in: Issue 307
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 02/09/2022
  • Countries and/or Regions discussed in the disinformation: Ukraine, Russia, EU, US
  • Keywords: Invasion of Ukraine, NATO
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Disinfo: Ukrainians are bewitched and do not know what they are doing

The majority of Russians see that Russia is not facing Ukraine, but the West, which is fighting Russia with the hands of the Ukrainians.

In Russia we do not observe any hatred towards Ukrainians, because we see them as victims, in the first place, who have been manipulated and maliciously deceived. They are "bewitched", and they themselves do not know what they are doing.

Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative aimed at portraying Ukraine as a non-independent state that is under direct foreign control.

Since 16 July 1990, when it adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty, Ukraine has been an independent and sovereign state. It has democratically elected state institutions, including the Parliament and a President, who take all the decisions regarding state governance. As a sovereign state, it decides its own international political orientation freely.

Disinfo: IAEA delegation, like that of the OSCE, will pass on intelligence to the Ukrainian army

It can be assumed that the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] delegation includes professional members of intelligence services, including from Poland and Lithuania, who have no nuclear power plants, and yet they have their own specialists on the team.

Let us remember that the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE) observers are the ones who "observed" the armistice in Donbas. As it turned out, half of them were officers in Western intelligence services, and they passed the information to the Ukrainian army.

Disproof

Multiple claims made with no evidence. The claim that members of the IAEA Support and Assistance Mission to Zaporizhzhya (ISAMZ) are intelligence officers who will pass information to the Ukrainian army is consistent with recurring pro-Kremlin claim attempting to discredit independent international organisations, especially those who monitor the implementation and respect of international treaties and instruments such as the OSCE, the OPCW, and now the IAEA.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is an independent organisation of the UN family and includes 175 member states. Russia itself is a founding member of the IAEA as well as one of the earliest ratifiers of its Statute, and remains a member state until this day. It is also worth mentioning that Russia committed to facilitate the IAEA visit; a lack of facilitation from the Russian side, as an occupying force of the plant and the surrounding region, would make the visit of the IAEA delegation impossible.

Disinfo: Ukraine bombed the meeting place of the IAEA mission and Zaporizhzhia NPP

Ukrainian Armed Forces bombed the meeting place of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) mission and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant

Disproof

Recurring pro-Kremlin narrative about Ukraine attacking the Zaporizhzhia power plant. The claim was neither counterbalanced nor critically challenged in the article.

No evidence was provided to back the claim that Ukraine is shelling the Zaporizhzhia power plant and the the meeting place of the IAEA mission. In fact, there has been an increasing number of reports that Russia uses the nuclear site as a so-called “sheltered” artillery park, "using the facilities to fire on Ukrainian positions in the belief that Ukraine would not fire back and risk a nuclear accident".