Disinfo: Russia never attacked Ukraine

Summary

-When Russia says it is not a threat to Ukraine. There are people who are still sceptical, what can we tell them?

-Why on earth would they consider Russia as a threat? Russia is one of the guarantors of the peace agreements signed in Minsk six years ago. Russia has never attacked Ukraine.

Disproof

A recurrent narrative about Russia's peaceful intentions in Ukraine. The attacks against Ukraine in 2014-2015 and the current situation in Donbas are being dismissed this way as blatant slander.

The war in Ukraine is not a civil conflict but a well-documented act of aggression by Russian armed forces, ongoing since February 2014.

There is irrefutable evidence of direct Russian military involvement in Ukraine. The Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has stated that “the information available suggests that the situation within the territory of Crimea and Sevastopol amounts to an international armed conflict between Ukraine and the Russian Federation. This international armed conflict began at the latest on 26 February 2014 when the Russian Federation deployed members of its armed forces to gain control over parts of the Ukrainian territory without the consent of the Ukrainian Government."

The European Union stated in July 2014 that "arms and fighters continue flowing into Ukraine from the Russian Federation".

According to the US Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) Russian special forces and troops operated to mobilise, lead, equip, and support separatist militias in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine from spring 2014 to the present, although their presence was denied by Moscow. On top of that, Russian President Vladimir Putin admitted Russia's military presence in Ukraine in 2015.

Read also similar cases: Russia never participated in the Ukrainian conflict: this is a civil war, Russia has never participated in the Ukrainian crisis, Russia has never been a party in the Donbas conflict, There have never been Russian forces in Ukraine, Russia is not a party in the conflict in Ukraine, it is a civil war.

publication/media

  • Reported in: Issue 240
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 13/04/2021
  • Article language(s) French, Russian
  • Countries and/or Regions discussed in the disinformation: Russia, Ukraine
  • Keywords: Donbas, Eastern Ukraine, Civil war, Military
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Disinfo: An Ukrainian drone kills a 5 years old child near Donetsk

On Saturday 3 April 3, a 5 years old child perished in the western suburbs of Donetsk in a drone attack with an explosive device by the Ukrainian army.

The Ukrainian armed forces used an unmanned aerial device equipped with an improvised explosive device, which was dropped on the village of Aleksandrovka. As a result, a child born in 2016 died and a resident born in 1954 was injured.

At that time, two civilians were in their garden. As a result of the criminal actions of Ukrainian activists, a child born in 2016 was killed, while a local woman born in 1954 was injured and taken to hospital where she received necessary medical treatment.”

This tragic incident strongly reacted to the President of the Russian Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, who denounced the guilty silence of the West. “The European media don't talk about it. There are no statements from the European Parliament or the US State Department. The foreign ministers of European states do not talk about it. No decision has been taken on the expulsion of diplomats. And we do not stigmatise a president of the country who sent a military drone to war against his own people.

There are no big initiatives on behalf of the dead child to impose sanctions on Kiev, there is no reaction at all. The West in general simply ignores the crimes in Kiev. [...] On the geopolitical chessboard, Brussels and Washington are trying to play a bloody gambit, hardly realising that the game cannot be won "

OSCE agents report the case of a five-year-old child killed on April 2 outside his grandmother's house by an explosive device. According to the authorities of the DPR this tragedy results from the shelling by the Ukrainian army of a village close to the line of contact.

Disproof

The claim is doubtful and unverified. The case has been covered by Euvsdisinfo, Stop Fake, The Insider, Censor.net. The involvement of Ukrainian drone is a striking story but very unlikely, the probable hypothesis is that the child died from a mine stored by his family members since the most active period of the war 2014-2015.

It attracted emotional reaction at highest political level since the death of a 5 year old child is striking and triggered narratives about the cruelty of Ukrainians and the heartless western world that doesn't react.

Disinfo: The EMA delayed the reception of Sputnik V's application for 6 weeks for political reasons

Russia sent the application for registration of its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine to the European Medicines Agency (EMA) on 21 January 2021, but the latter only confirmed having received the dossier in early March.

This 6 weeks delay, between 21 January and 4 March 2021, shows what the EU's priorities for vaccination are.

Disproof

Pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about vaccines, targeting the European Medicines Agency.

On 10 February 2021 the EMA denied having received any application for the Sputnik V vaccine. EMA informed:

Disinfo: The US is building biolaboratories on Russian borders

Russia must pay attention to the information about the existence of dangerous biological laboratories operating near our borders, because the West has extensive experience in the genocide of the peoples of America and Australia, including the extermination of humans with the help of viruses and bacteria.

Some of the former Soviet states - Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan - have built biological laboratories for the Americans on their soil, and they are unlikely to give up cooperation with them.

Disproof

This is a recurring disinformation alleging that the United States develops biological weapons and has secret biological laboratories around the world. Consistent with the Pro-Kremlin disinformation campaign against biological laboratories in Armenia, Georgia, Ukraine and other countries.

The disinformation about US biolabs in countries bordering Russia aiming to encircle Moscow and spread infectious diseases is a part of a years-long disinformation campaign led by the Kremlin. In fact, biological laboratories are involved in preventing the risks of complex diseases and, together with other similar projects, counteracting bioterrorism.