Disinfo: The West is creating mechanisms in the OPCW to discredit unfavourable states

Summary

Western countries create a mechanism within the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to discredit governments that they do not like.

The scheme used for this purpose begins with organising provocations by Western-funded NGOs (especially the "White Helmets"), and then the main Western media covers these events extensively, and they finally resort to the OPCW structure later to legitimise these fakes.

Disproof

Recurring disinformation narratives attacking the independence and integrity of the OPCW and absolving the Syrian regime of responsibility for chemical attacks.

Despite the fact that Russia is a member of the OPCW, 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.

Allegations of "staged" chemical attacks are a part of the ongoing campaign by Syria and Russia to smear the White Helmets as terrorists and war criminals.

An investigation mechanism set up by the OPCW has twice blamed Syrian government forces for chemical attacks. On 12 April 2021, it said it found “reasonable grounds to believe” that a Syrian air force military helicopter dropped a chlorine cylinder on a Syrian town in 2018, sickening 12 people.

On 8 April 2020, the team found reasonable grounds to believe that the Syrian Arab Air Force was responsible for attacks using chlorine and the nerve agent sarin in March 2017 in the town of Latamneh.

The investigative team was established after Russia blocked the extension of a joint investigation mechanism set up by the United Nations and OPCW in 2015. That mechanism accused Syria of chemical weapons attacks, including unleashing sarin in an aerial attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in April 2017 that killed about 100 people.

According to the OPCW's director-general, the organisation has been targeted by a disinformation campaign when the organisation was being granted new powers to assign blame for chemical attacks. 18 countries issued a joint statement, which called for an end to the unacceptable Russian defamation of the OPCW.

See similar cases in our database claiming that the chemical attacks in Syria have been staged and filmed by the media of the Western countries; or that the White Helmets have falsified chemical attacks evidence; or that OPCW violated chemical weapons convention to serve Western interests, or that the OPCW report on Ltamenah chemical attacks is misinformation; or that the UN’s JIM was disbanded due to unprofessionalism; or that the OPCW’s IIT is an illegal Western tool.

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  • Reported in: Issue 242
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 20/04/2021
  • Article language(s) Arabic
  • Countries and/or Regions discussed in the disinformation: Syria, Russia
  • Keywords: Syrian War, West, White Helmets, OPCW, United Nations, Chemical weapons/attack
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Disinfo: Czech allegations against Russia aim to overshadow failed attempt on Lukashenka's life

The US State Department immediately declared that they are not involved in any plot to make an attempt on [Lukashenka's life]. That is, they are not denying the conspiracy itself but only declared that they are not involved. However, who is going to believe the Americans now? In an absolutely similar manner, they were denying their involvement in the coup attempts in Venezuela and in the attempt on Maduro's life.

The US pretends that nothing has happened and the case of the detained US citizen is planned to be dealt with as normal. However, judging by the events that immediately took place in Czechia, the United States admitted its failure. The thing is that Czechia, all of a sudden, announced that military warehouses on its territory were blown up by Russians back in 2014. This whole story is meant to serve as a cover-up for the failed coup d'etat in Belarus.

Apr 19, 2021
Disproof

An unsubstantiated claim about the explosion of an ammunition depot in Czechia in 2014, attempting to ridicule the revelations about GRU's involvement as an 'American attempt to cover a failed attempt on Lukashenka's life'. The second claim is also not supported by any evidence.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš and the temporary Minister of Foreign Affairs Jan Hamáček announced on 17 April that the Czech intelligence services collected evidence demonstrating Russian involvement in the 2014 Vrbětice explosion. More specifically, it implicates Unit 29155, a division of Russia's GRU agency previously linked to "assassination attempts and other subversive actions across Europe." According to Mr Babiš, the first discussions around the GRU’s involvement took place on the 7th of April 2021.

Disinfo: The escalation in Donbas is part of a US destabilisation pattern in post-Soviet states

The US wants to divide the Eurasian alliance by encircling Russia as much as possible. How to do it? By looking for a provocation, activating the Donbass conflict and throwing gasoline on the flames, which may get out of control [...]. The US is decided to put Russia in a disastrous situation throughout the post-Soviet environment: war between Azerbaijan and Armenia, the coup in Kyrgyzstan, the coup in Belarus, the government change and pressure over Moldova, the harassment of Nord Stream 2, the mermaid songs that we are hearing towards Georgia. It is all about encircling and setting up a provocation, while the West only points to the other side as the threat. The US states it clearly in its documents, for example in “Overextending and Unbalancing Russia” of the RAND Corporation.

Apr 19, 2021
Disproof

This is a mix of several recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives about encircling Russia, popular protests as the result of Western-led colour revolutions and Russia as the ultimate target of international events. In this case, these narratives aim to blame the West for the recent escalation in Donbas, exempting Russia of any responsibility for its military buildup in the Ukrainian border.

Contrary to the claim, the escalation of tensions is not due to any US or Western provocation. Moscow-backed separatists have been mounting tensions in Donbas over the recent weeks under the pretext that Ukrainian troops are planning an offensive. Four Ukrainian soldiers were killed on 26 March 2021, which is the largest daily death toll for government troops since the fragile truce that took effect July 2020.

Disinfo: The West ignored the murder of a 6-year old child in a Ukrainian bombing in Donbas

These are the values of the West: an attack by Kyiv in Donbas killed a 6-year old child and the West did not comment. Neither the executors of the attack nor their Western backers minded that one of the victims was this child. A statement by the French and German foreign ministers Jean-Yves Le Drian and Heiko Maas didn’t mention this, it only showed their concern by the escalation of the conflict and its support to Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty and denounced Russia for moving troops inside Russian territory.

The death, or rather the murder, of this innocent child is already being investigated by the UN, while the incident has been silenced by the media.

Apr 19, 2021
Disproof

This is a deliberate disinformation narrative about the Ukrainian army and the West, without a factual basis. While it is true that on April 6, the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine confirmed the death of a child “due to blast trauma and shrapnel wounds”, according to research by Russian and Ukrainian journalists who investigated the incident his death was not the result of a bombing by the Ukrainian army but an accident with explosives or old ammunition,.

Pro-Kremlin disinformation outlets such as RT German had initially spread information that a child allegedly died as a result of a Ukrainian drone attack in the NGCA [Non-Government-controlled-area] of Donbas, in the village of Oleksandrivske. The claim about a drone bombing was debunked by military expert Oleksandr Kovalenko, who wrote that an unmanned aircraft could not reach Oleksandrivske because the distance from the village to the government-controlled territory is about 30 kilometres. Then, the narrative in these pro-Kremlin disinformation pieces in Spanish language ignored the alleged presence of a drone and shifted the claim towards a generic “bombing” of unspecified origin.