Comments by "R Johansen" (@rjohansen9486) on "Hindustan Times"
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NATO hasn't OCCUPIED any countries "in it's way" (that's the Russian way). The European countries have applied for membership in NATO of own free will. They seek protection from an increasingly aggressive Russia. But most of all protection against ANY hostile countries. And by joining NATO, the member states can cooperate in a better way regarding arms, branches of arms and costs etc. This is a cost effective way of doing things, instead of every country have to "have it all".
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
After September 1990 when the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution had been unilaterally repealed by the Socialist Republic of Serbia, Kosovo's autonomy suffered and so the region was faced with state-organized oppression: from the early 1990s, Albanian language radio and television were restricted and newspapers shut down. Kosovar Albanians were fired in large numbers from public enterprises and institutions, including banks, hospitals, the post office and schools. In June 1991, the University of Priština assembly and several faculty councils were dissolved and replaced by Serbs. Kosovar Albanian teachers were prevented from entering school premises for the new school year beginning in September 1991, forcing students to study at home
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We all know that East Germany, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia lost their sovereignty after WW2, but are free now.
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The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins.
Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes. According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol. While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible. Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: "There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer," Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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You are lying again! Only 3 % in Sweden have very/somewhat favorable views on Russia.
Pew Research Center, survey in July 2023:
Across 24 countries surveyed, views of Russia are overwhelmingly negative, with a median of 82% saying they have an unfavorable opinion of the country, compared with 15% who say they have a favorable view.
Sweden 3 %, Germany 10 %, Spain 5 %, Australia 8 %, South Africa 28 %.
India, which has not formally taken a stance on the war, stands out as the only country where a majority (57%) has a favorable opinion of Russia. Views are also less negative in Indonesia, Kenya and Nigeria, where about four-in-ten say they have a favorable opinion.
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WoWa-C Вот посмотрите кого США поставили на ключевые посты в Европе, почти все они либо родственники нацистской Германии, либо их деды воевали против России в союзе с Германией. И чего вы от них ждете от России? Нет, конечно.
Этот пост - самое тупое, что я читал за последнее время. В Европе нет абсолютно ничего, размещенного Соединенными Штатами. Большинство людей в Европе являются потомками тех, кто воевал ПРОТИВ нацистов. Даже русский должен это ругать. И кто бы ни был в союзе с нацистами, это были, конечно же, русские/советские люди. И только после того, как Гитлер напал и на них, они обернулись и стали просить США и Европу о помощи. И они это получили. В Россию были отправлены миллионы тонн вооружения и техники. Иди, изучай настоящую историю, мой друг!
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The most prominent fascist country is Russia.
World101: What does fascism mean?
Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism, militarism, and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen. This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent.
In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies. However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority. And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests.
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Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision. Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
Russian-led forces prevent the OSCE from accomplishing its mission in Donbas as spelled out in the Minsk Agreements. It is an unstated irony in Vienna — understood by every single diplomatic mission and member of the international staff — that Russia approves the mandate of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine when it votes in Vienna, but then blocks implementation of that same mission on the ground in Ukraine. Because Russia is a member of the OSCE, and the SMM wants to preserve what little access it has to the occupied territories, the mission is guarded in what it says about ceasefire violations and restrictions on its freedom of movement. Privately, however, they acknowledge that some 80% of such violations and restrictions come from the Russian-controlled side of the border, and those that occur on the Ukrainian side are largely for safety reasons (e.g., avoiding mined approaches to bridges.)
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И Украина, и оккупированные территории Донбасса понесли жертвы из-за военных действий, которые Российская Федерация ведет там с 2014 года. Но Россия на протяжении этих восьми лет настаивала и пыталась убедить мир, что действия Вооруженных Сил Украины на Донбассе «направлены на уничтожение населения Донбасса» и не являются борьбой за территориальную целостность Украины. И несмотря на ЛОЖНОСТЬ аргумента, российская пропагандистская машина все же сумела убедить российскую аудиторию в том, что российское вторжение в Украину является «актом возмездия за Донбасс».
Официальные данные ООН свидетельствуют о том, что цифра потерь в 14 000 человек, использованная Путиным, относится не только к гражданскому населению. Во время военных действий России против Украины в 2014–2021 годах в войне на Донбассе погибло 14,5 тысяч человек. Из этих 14 тысяч 3404 были гражданскими лицами, 4400 - украинскими военнослужащими и 6500 - российскими боевиками. Цифра, которой оперирует Путин, — это общее число жертв, понесенных в войне на Донбассе обеими сторонами.
Российская Федерация не только вооружила сепаратистов, но и отправила солдат без опознавательных знаков. Россия первоначально отрицала наличие российских вооруженных сил на Донбассе, но 17 апреля 2014 года Владимир Путин наконец подтвердил присутствие российских военных. Александр Бородай, премьер-министр самопровозглашенной Донецкой Народной Республики, заявил, что до августа 2015 года на Донбассе воевали 50 тысяч граждан России.
Именно против ЭТИХ СОЛДАТ боролось украинское правительство, а НЕ «обстрелы невинных на Донбассе», как вам скажет российская пропаганда.
Данные, полученные из докладов так называемого «Уполномоченного по правам человека в Донецкой Народной Республике», показывают, что цифры потерь даже ниже, чем у ООН. В отчете за 2020 год общие потери Донецкой Народной Республики (ДНР) с начала войны на Донбассе оцениваются в 4959 человек. Именно такую цифру официально фиксирует «законодательный орган» ДНР.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a series of events began that led to his ousting as president. Amid ECONOMIC PRESSURE FROM RUSSIA, YANUKOVYCH SUDDENLY CHANGED HIS MIND and withdrew from signing an association agreement with the EU, instead accepting a Russian trade deal and loan bailout. This sparked mass protests against Yanukovych, dubbed the "Euromaidan", which met a harsh response from authorities. The civil unrest peaked in February 2014, when almost 100 protesters were killed by police. Yanukovych signed an agreement with the opposition, but he secretly fled the capital later that day. The next day, 22 February, Ukraine's parliament voted to remove him from his post and schedule early elections on the grounds that he had withdrawn from his constitutional duties, rather than through the impeachment process.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians.
On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@dilipshah5882 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Cheap oil and gas, do you think it was charity?
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. Germany was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted). As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe.
They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion. Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely. Back to its historical boundaries, e.g. from 1460 (small area around Moscow).
The world must prepare for an armed peace, with EU and NATO membership for Ukraine as the only credible guarantee against new adventures from the Gremlins. What happens inside the remnants of Muscovia and North Korea is their own problem. After a certain point there is no point in trying to help a mafia regime. Too bad for the population, but then they'd rather get rid of the regime themselves.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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This is typical russian tactics!
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
Since the beginning of russia’s war against Ukraine, at least 64 large and medium-sized enterprises, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider the KKK in the US and skinheads and neo-Nazi groups in RUSSIA a much bigger problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv.
There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity. When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education.
"Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools. To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total."
- "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots.’
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The Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution. Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA HAD PUT MUCH PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government CORRUPTION AND ABUSE POWER, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, SPARKING THE DONBASS WAR.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the South-Eastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. They are looting and plunder all over. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia. The Russians in the now occupied Donbass has started indoctrination of children. All history books that mention Ukraine as a nation are forbidden and burned. The children have to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian (both languages was teach before). Also many children are kidnapped/deportet to Russia. Mostly those who the authoroties suspects are pro-Ukrainian. Some of them far East in Russia, where they have small chances for returning home.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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- During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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When the Soviet Union broke up, Ukraine held a significant number of nuclear weapons. In fact, the country had more nuclear warheads than China, the UK and France combined, making it the third-largest nuclear power in the world. Three years later, Ukraine reached an agreement with Russia and the US to hand over its nuclear weapons to be destroyed. In return, Russia promised to forever recognize the independence of the whole of Ukraine, including Crimea.
Crimea was governed by the Constitution of Crimea as an autonomous republic of Ukraine. They had their freedom as an autonomous Republic until Russia annexed them. Russia has no more historic right to Crimea than Ukraine. Besides, Soviet/Russia has replaced a large part of the population.
Their background is this, briefly: The Cimmerians, Bulgars, Greeks, Scythians, Goths, Huns, Khazars, Kievan Rus', Byzantine Greeks, Kipchaks, Ottoman Turks, Golden Horde Tatars, the Mongols , the Venetians, the Genoese, Crimean Khanate, Ottoman Empire, the Russian Empire, Germany, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, and later the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Each controlled Crimea until Crimea became part of independent Ukraine with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
The total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv.
There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity. When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education.
"Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools. To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total." "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson. There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots.’
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
(These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion. )
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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Hmm, why didn't HT mention more of his speech?? here's more:
"While the battlefield is frozen, over the long term “Ukraine has a good chance to win this because Western countries have bigger economic muscles and can ramp up their defense industry to the kind of levels that Russia can’t compete with,” Häkkänen added. “We can do it, and Ukraine can, but it needs decisive steps from Western countries.”
Part of the issue with increased military production in the West, Häkkänen said, was the slow recognition that Russia’s full-scale invasion permanently changed the political landscape of Europe.
“I think many Western countries were thinking that this was a short-term” problem, he said. “But now I think that in the U.S. and in NATO countries, almost everyone knows that this is the end of the last 30 years” since the Soviet Union fell. “Now we’re going into some kind of a new cold war.”
This month, Häkkänen’s government announced it is doubling its production of ammunition, committing to send much of it to Ukraine as it struggles with thinning supplies from Western allies and the slow buildup of production capabilities in the U.S. and Europe.
Other European officials share his concern.
Belgian Defense Chief Michel Hofman, while visiting Belgian soldiers stationed in Romania this week, warned that Russia has “already shown that they have the will to attack a neighbor,” and “it is absolutely possible that they will also have other ideas later. Either in the south in Moldova or the Baltic states.”
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Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories. “The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.” Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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What does fas cism mean? (my "check" paranthesis regarding Ruzzia)
Fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check). However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fasc ist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Russia have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. The attacks have resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
These number doesn't include all of the areas controlled by the Russians.
The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol.
During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Let us know when it has grown 1000 %.
Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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What does fas cism mean? (my "check" paranthesis regarding Ruzzia)
Fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check). However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fasc ist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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Slovenia - 1991
The first of the six republics to formally leave Yugoslavia was Slovenia, declaring independence on 25 June 1991. This triggered an intervention of the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) which turned into a brief military conflict, generally referred to as the Ten-Day War. It ended in a victory of the Slovenian forces, with the JNA withdrawing its soldiers and equipment.
Croatia - 1991-1995
Croatia declared independence on the same day as Slovenia. But while Slovenia’s withdrawal from the Yugoslav Federation was comparatively bloodless, Croatia’s was not to be. The sizeable ethnic Serb minority in Croatia openly rejected the authority of the newly proclaimed Croatian state citing the right to remain within Yugoslavia. With the help of the JNA and Serbia, Croatian Serbs rebelled, declaring nearly a third of Croatia’s territory under their control to be an independent Serb state. Croats and other non-Serbs were expelled from its territory in a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing. Heavy fighting in the second half of 1991 witnessed the shelling of the ancient city of Dubrovnik, and the siege and destruction of Vukovar by Serb forces.
Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Soviet/Russian War list (1929 - ):
1929: Sino – Soviet conflict. China
1929: Afghanistan
1930: Afghanistan.
1932: Chechnya.
1934: China.
1937: China.
1939: Poland
1939: Finland
1940: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.
1940: Romania
(1941 – 1945: WW2, Allied with the West)
1945 – 1960s: Ukraine, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Hungary, Germany.
1946 – 1954: First Indochina War
1950 – 1953: Korean War.
1955 – 1975: Vietnam War.
1953: East Germany.
1956: Hungary.
1961 – 1968: Albania.
1968: Czechoslovakia.
1969: China.
1969 – 1970: Israel.
1974 – 1991: Eritrea.
1975 – 1991: Angola.
1977 – 1978: Somalia.
1979 – 1989: Afghanistan.
1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia.
1991 – 1993: Georgia.
1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia.
1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania.
1992: North Ossetia.
1992 – 1997: Tajikistan.
1994 – 1996: First Chechen War.
1999: Dagestan.
1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War.
2008: Georgia.
2009 – 2017: North Caucasus.
2014 - : Ukraine
2015 - : Syria.
2018 - : Central African Republic.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin denied. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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There are two Minsk Agreements, not just one. The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected.
By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later.
The LPR and DPR are not recognized as legitimate entities under the Minsk Agreements. The signatures of the leaders of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics were added after they had already been signed by Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE. They were not among the original signatories, and indeed Ukraine would not have signed had their signatures been part of the deal. There is nothing in the content or format of the Agreement that legitimizes these entities and they should not be treated as negotiating partners in any sense. Russia alone controls the forces occupying parts of eastern Ukraine.
Despite that, however, Russia untruthfully claims not to be a party and only a facilitator — and that the real agreements are between Ukraine and the so-called “separatists,” who call themselves the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics (LPR and DPR), but are in fact Russian supplied and directed.
Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision. Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
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What a bunch of crap!! It doesn't deserve an answer, but a few points: "The American Army was directly involved in the murders."
This is absolute bollocks! The Berkut killed most of the people and Russia friendly Yanukovych was in charge.
The term "Berkut" came to be used for any professional special police unit in Ukraine. Prior to the 2014 Ukrainian revolution, the Berkut had a history of illegal activities against Ukrainian citizens, such as racketeering, terrorism, physical violence, torture, anti-Ukrainian sentiment, voter intimidation and other secret police tactics against those who would elect non-Yanukovych candidates, and violence against protesters during Euromaidan and the Orange Revolution. The new government held the Berkut responsible for most of the Heavenly Hundred civilian deaths. Acting Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov signed a decree that dissolved the agency, which was replaced with the National Guard of Ukraine.
In March 2014, Berkut units stationed in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol defected to the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs during the annexation of Crimea by Russia, after the territories were approved as federal subjects.A Berkut effectively became an agency of Russia when units were allowed to preserve their old name, and now serve within the National Guard of Russia as the gendarmerie for Crimea.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@maksimluzin1121 Diplomat Wolfgang Sporrer:
There were several reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@Elyron-wv3ne The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased.
In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents.
Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Diplomat W.Sporrer (who participated):
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
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@bubamaranovichok4901 "I still remember unlike you my young friend, who won the second WW". I don't think you do! WW2 was won by the Allied, which consisted of USA, UK, Soviet, in addition a whole series of Western countries and China.
But at the beginning of the war, Soviet/russia was allied with Hit ler. Their plan was to divide Europe between them. The na zies should get the west and Soviet/russia the east. Not before Hit ler also attacked Soviet (2 years into the war) did the Soviets turn to the West. Stalin begged for help and the West provided him with millions of tons of supply, shipped in to Murmansk. Slowly the war turned for the Allied. With all the new supply the Soviets fought the naz ies in the east and USA, UK and rest of Europe attacked the naz ies from the west. Hit ler was pinned and lost, the war was over in 1945. Still the Soviets didn't leave from several eastern European countries (but of course, that was their plan anyway)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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"We don't want foreign Military bases in Africa". Does that include India and Russia too?
- Russia has, or planned to have bases in: Central African Republic, Egypt, Eritrea, Madagascar, Mozambique and Sudan. and military activity in Mali and Libya too.
- India has military bases in Mozambique, Madagascar, Mauritius and Seychelles.
(India also has bases in Tajikistan, Bhutan, Nepal, Oman, Iran, Sri Lanka and Singapore) Should they go home??
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia
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1/ Russian soldiers say hundreds of their number are being killed trying to retake newly liberated Andriivka. Even artillerymen are being sent in as infantry in 'meat assaults', "literally [armed] with shovels" and without artillery support.
2/ The Russian Army's 94th regiment is said to be taking the brunt of the fighting as Ukrainian forces advance south of Bakhmut. The wife of one soldier serving with the regiment, a man called Denis, says they are suffering huge casualties.
3/ "He called on Thursday and said that the Ukrainian armed forces were taking Andriiivka and breaking through to Bakhmut," his wife Vera says.
4/ "And they are being thrown into Andriiivka with almost no weapons. He said: roughly speaking, we are coming at them with shovels and no artillery support. There is nowhere to retreat, because behind them are our own men, who will not spare them either.
5/ "Six hundred didn't return from their missions. And all this in just two days. And the official reports tell us that only two or three people were killed."
6/ Posts on Telegram say that the men are experiencing very heavy incoming fire: "the enemy does not stop attempting a breakthrough using cluster munitions." Denis himself says that "the 94th Regiment is being zeroed out [killed] ... our regiment is here to be put down."
7/ He says that its commander, a man named Zaitsev with the callsign 'Rapira', told the men explicitly that they were there to die. "He's a local, either from the DNR or the LNR. We're his third regiment. He left two regiments here, he said that "I'll leave you here too"."
8/ Denis compares Zaitsev unfavourably to his previous commander, who he says was a more humane man. "Our last commanding officer got us out of it. That's what got him fired. That he didn't send his men out to be butchered."
9/ He confirms that there were originally a thousand men in the regiment but their numbers have been reduced to 400 by the constant fighting. "We are constantly thrown into the area of Andriivka, which is processed by the AFU artillery. Basically, we are driven there for meat.
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10/ "You give the coordinates to our artillery, what targets we need to work on. And the artillery does not work, because they have no shells." (It's possible that the artillery itself may have been destroyed – Ukraine has been targeting it heavily – rather than lacking shells.)
11/ Coordination with the artillery has broken down, according to Denis. "There's no co-operation with anyone else. Everything is very slow – either the artillery doesn't fire or you have to wait a long time for a shot."
12/ Now the men are being sent on 'meat assaults' which they are not expected to survive. "The orders are to take over [Andriivka], take what's left of it. Rubble, to put it crudely.
13/ "Although [the commanders] themselves know very well, and there is video confirmation, that the enemy is constantly working throughout the village. The AFU artillery is working constantly. They send men into the village, but they will not let them come out.
14/ "This is perfectly well known to everyone. And when you tell the command that this is exactly what is happening in this direction, you are answered "so what?" That's a quote: "So what?""
15/ Retreat is impossible, according to Denis, because commanders have positioned 'blocking units' behind the front line to shoot any retreaters. The men believe that they will be killed whatever happens, by one side or the other.
16/ Denis says that the men "are not in the mood to die for nothing. If there is artillery support, co-operation with other units, and there is no ammunition famine, then everyone is ready to fight. But nobody wants to fight like this."
17/ He blames the commanders' insistence on ordering obviously suicidal attacks on their false claims that they have not in fact lost control of Andriivka. It's likely they've also made such claims to their superiors, in another example of the Russian military's culture of lying.
18/ "They tell us in plain words: go and get a foothold there. And we see that our positions there have not been ours for a long time, so we raise a "bird" [drone]. In fact, it is obvious to the naked eye that our positions there have long since ceased to be ours.
19/ "But the command claims that they are.
"We've got 25 men going out on a mission, six coming back. Now we have artillerymen going to the assault. They were told – you don't have ammunition anyway, go with the infantry. And the guys don't know what an assault is.
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20/ "Information about our situation does not go anywhere upstairs, it is overridden somewhere on the middle level. That's why we're trying to get the word out now. It's not a good idea to just send people to slaughter.
21/ "Soldiers from other units who don't know us, if you give them our regiment number, they say: "Guys, you are being nullified. That's the way it is."
His wife Vera says that the soldiers and their relatives are afraid to go public with their concerns about the situation.
22/ She says that her mother-in-law "wrote to the group of mothers and wives of the mobilised 94th regiment that our guys are in a difficult situation. That they have no weapons. And she suggested that this information should be "spread" on social networks.
23/ "And everyone jumped on her: don't, they say, don't set everyone up. They're more worried about their salaries than their husbands. They are worried that if the names of the rebels come to light, they will simply be made "missing" and will not receive any payments."
24/ Vera doesn't blame them for this attitude. "I also understand those who are afraid of publicity. If now defamatory information from my husband goes out, if his surname gets publicised, he will simply be recognised as an enemy of the people.
25/ "And then this status will automatically go to the children. My husband is also afraid that it will affect my son."
26/ At home, reports Radio Freedom, "little Fedya, sitting on his mum's lap, taps his finger on the phone. On the screen saver is a picture of a young man with his son on his shoulders."
27/ "Daddy," says the boy.
"Yes, Daddy," Vera nods. "I don't want my son to know his father only from pictures."
Denis's family have not heard from him since his interview on 16 September. On 17 September, Ukraine announced the recapture of Andriivka.
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@MarkNOTW World101: What does fascism mean? (my "check" paranthesis)
Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check). This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check).
However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory.
El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
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There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@sandycaspillo6731 You didn't answer the question, are you against super powers invading smaller countries? Or are you just a hypocrite?
"Who invaded more countries?" I haven't counted, you tell me! But here is a few:
Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Chechnya, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Sahka, Khanty, Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Georgia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Hungary, Transnistria, Romania,Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, East Germany, Korea, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Northern Caucasus, Kuril Islands, Afghanistan
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@jvs333 Everyone can find this info online, but maybe not in censored Russian media:
"Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians.
In July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@biancaenera2500 Wiki: Although Russia's regions enjoy a degree of autonomous self-government, the election of regional governors was substituted by direct appointment by the president in 2005.
Russia has suffered democratic backsliding during Putin's and Medvedev's tenures. Freedom House has listed Russia as being "not free" since 2005.
The Economist Intelligence Unit has rated Russia as "authoritarian" since 2011, whereas it had previously been considered a "hybrid regime" (with "some form of democratic government" in place) as late as 2007. The Russian Federation states itself that Russia is a democratic federal law-bound state with a republican form of government, which has been proven of not being acted upon today. Political scientist Larry Diamond, stated in 2015 "no serious scholar would consider Russia today a democracy"
Natalia Arno, former head of the International Republican Institute's operations in Russia, describes elections in Russia's "managed democracy" thusly,
Political actors who support the president are permitted to put their name on the ballot and to nominally run against him, but whenever a person arose who actually wanted to challenge the system, they always ran into bureaucratic barriers.
Maybe the Central Election Commission would find a problem with the signatures that the candidate collected in order to register, or maybe the candidate would be charged with a crime based on questionable evidence, but something would always happen”.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.” @PerceivedREALITY999
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule. @PerceivedREALITY999
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine. @PerceivedREALITY999
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There was enough time for the engineers/scientists to figure out the problems with Luna, but the authorities of Russia couldn't let India win the race.
Themoscowtimes: On Aug. 11, 2023, Luna-25 was finally launched from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East. A month earlier, India launched its lunar vehicle, Chandrayaan 3, which was supposed to land relatively close to its Russian counterpart. An unspoken race unfolded between the two probes. India had a head start, but its craft was moving along a more conservative trajectory. According to the plan, Chandrayaan 3 was supposed to land two days later than Russia’s spacecraft, on Aug. 23.
Eventually, Luna-25 was able to get closer to the Moon than Chandrayaan 3, but by that time Russian experts noticed "alarming signs."
An error occurred during the first correction of the craft’s trajectory to the Moon, which required the engines to be restarted. It had already become clear that the Luna-25’s flight was not going according to plan, although this was not officially reported. Once it started orbiting the Moon, nothing prevented the scientists from leaving the device for a few days, or even months, so they could study its shortcomings and try to fix them. Luna-25 was expected to operate on the Moon for up to a year, so the station could have stayed in orbit for a long time in the event of a malfunction. But if that happened, India would have beaten Russia in the race to become the first conqueror of the Moon’s circumpolar region.
In addition, on Aug. 22, Russia celebrates Flag Day. The flag of Russia had been placed on board the Luna-25 before its launch — perhaps Roscosmos wanted to debut a photo of the Russian flag planted on the Moon to mark the holiday
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Russian missiles struck the busy city center of Kramatorsk and a nearby village on Tuesday, killing at least four people and injuring dozens.
A 17-year-old girl was among those killed, and an eight-month-old baby was among the 42 injured, the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office said.
The attack quickly prompted accusations that Russian forces had targeted civilians.
“At the epicenter of the explosion were also apartment buildings, commercial premises, cars, a post office and other buildings, in which windows, glass and doors were blown out,” adding that rescue teams are still working to locate victims under the rubble.
Restaurants in the targeted plaza are popular with Kramatorsk residents and with the military; RIA Pizza, one of the establishments, is often frequented by journalists.
An eyewitness to the aftermath of the strike in Kramatorsk city described up to a dozen people being pulled from the rubble. It was not clear if these people were dead or alive, the man told CNN teams on the ground.
A Ukrainian soldier assisting rescue efforts told CNN that the victims he saw were “mostly young people, military and civilians; there are also small children.”
The soldier, who asked to be identified only by the call sign Alex, said there had been a banquet for 45 people at one of the restaurants when the strike occurred, and that it hit “right in the center of the cafe.”
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It had nothing to do with NATO expansion, but everything to do with putin's imperialistic project!
Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat. In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime.
It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.” Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Slovenia - 1991
The first of the six republics to formally leave Yugoslavia was Slovenia, declaring independence on 25 June 1991. This triggered an intervention of the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) which turned into a brief military conflict, generally referred to as the Ten-Day War. It ended in a victory of the Slovenian forces, with the JNA withdrawing its soldiers and equipment.
Croatia - 1991-1995
Croatia declared independence on the same day as Slovenia. But while Slovenia’s withdrawal from the Yugoslav Federation was comparatively bloodless, Croatia’s was not to be. The sizeable ethnic Serb minority in Croatia openly rejected the authority of the newly proclaimed Croatian state citing the right to remain within Yugoslavia. With the help of the JNA and Serbia, Croatian Serbs rebelled, declaring nearly a third of Croatia’s territory under their control to be an independent Serb state. Croats and other non-Serbs were expelled from its territory in a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing. Heavy fighting in the second half of 1991 witnessed the shelling of the ancient city of Dubrovnik, and the siege and destruction of Vukovar by Serb forces.
Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country.
Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee.
As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@jimmyc974 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959.
This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people.
In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents.
Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. There has been no escalation of the conflict in recent years, 90% of Donbas civilians died in 2014-2015
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On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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@@alextim6961 Where do you get the "facts" from?? Two months ago: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Do some research!
As of May 2023, over 30 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
Since being signed in July last year, the U.N. says the Black Sea Grain Initiative has allowed more than 32 million metric tons of food commodities to be exported to 45 countries worldwide.
It is for this reason that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had described the deal as playing an “indispensable role” in global food security.
Guterres said in early July that the agreement “must continue” at a time when conflict, the climate crisis, energy prices and other factors roil the production and affordability of food, while 258 million people face hunger in 58 countries worldwide.
In 2021, Ukraine exported $5.87B in Wheat, making it the 5th largest exporter of Wheat in the world. At the same year, Wheat was the 3rd most exported product in Ukraine. The main destination of Wheat exports from Ukraine are: Egypt ($851M), Indonesia ($640M), Pakistan ($594M), Nigeria ($490M), and Ethiopia ($440M).
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Yes, Russia should have never broke the Minsk agreements!
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@dfg5228 MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The pre-history to the U.S. fleet arrival in Bengal:
wiki: Pakistan lost the Bangladesh Liberation War in East Pakistan.
Pakistan came under increasing criticism from India, the Soviet Union, Japan, and Europe as the plight of the refugees and their impact on the Indian economy were highlighted by Indira Gandhi in the UN and on a number of global tours.
Ali Bhutto at this time led a high level delegation to Beijing to obtain commitment from China of support in case of Indian intervention while Pakistan pressed at the UN for an International Peacekeeping Force for the India-East Pakistan border. The Pakistani efforts at the UN were however blocked by the Soviet Union in the Security council.
On 3 December, Pakistan preemptively striked against India. The Indian response was a defensive military strategy in the western theatre while a massive, coordinated and decisive offensive thrust into East-Pakistan. On 5 December, United States began attempts for a UN-sponsored ceasefire, which were twice vetoed by the USSR in the security council. India extended her recognition of Bangladesh on 6 December.
On 8 December, Washington received intelligence reports that India was planning an offensive into West Pakistan. It was in this situation that the United States dispatched a ten-ship naval task force, the US Task Force 74, from the Seventh Fleet off South Vietnam into the Bay of Bengal.
The US government stated at the time that the goal of the task force was to help evacuate Pakistani forces from East Pakistan following a ceasefire.
The slow progress of Task Force 74 met an increased Soviet naval presence in the Indian Ocean. The smaller Soviet presence had in fact been already enhanced to match a British contingent in the area and consisted of both surface vessels and at least one nuclear submarine. Both forces mantained their presence in the theatre until January 1972, well after from the operations on the ground was clear that Pakistan was in no position to continue the war.
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@binoemixtv9395 You keep saying that, but how about you learning to read?:
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@giselameunier4788 Obviously you know nothing about the Minsk agreements. Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops.
In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent.
That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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NATO Summit: G7 countries agrees on long-term security commitment for Ukraine.
NATO allies pledge new military package for Ukraine.
As the specific areas of security and military cooperation, the press release listed providing modern military equipment on land, in the air, and at sea, training, intelligence sharing, developing resistance to cyber and hybrid threats, supporting Ukraine's defense industry, and interoperability with NATO forces.
The U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and Japan governments agreed to provide Ukraine with "modern military equipment across land, air, and sea domains."
The aid will prioritize air defense, artillery, long-range weapon systems, armored vehicles, and air combat capabilities, AFP reported.
G7 also reportedly pledged to provide Ukraine further military and financial assistance in case of a future Russian armed attack.
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Maybe because the US is the largest economy on the planet and are a member of this group?
The G20 - or Group of Twenty - is a club of countries that meets to discuss global economic and political issues.
Between them, G20 countries account for 85% of the world's economic output and more than 75% of world trade. They contain two-thirds of global population.
The G20 members are the EU plus 19 nations: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the UK and the US.
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Fascism: (my "check" paranthesis regarding Ruzzia) Fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check). This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check). However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check).
And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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UN High Commissioner for Human Rights : "During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians.
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month."
Amnesty: Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories. “The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.” Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
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On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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Historically, "far-right politics" has been used to describe the experiences of fas cism, Na zism, and Falang ism. Contemporary definitions now include neo-fas cism, neo-Naz ism, the Third Position, the alt-right, racial supremacism and other ideologies or organizations that feature aspects of authoritarian, ultra-nationalist, chauvinist, xenophobic, theocratic, racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, or reactionary views.
Far-right politics have led to oppression, political violence, forced assimilation, eth nic clean sing, and gen0 cide against groups of people based on their supposed inferiority or their perceived threat to the native ethnic group, nation, state, national religion, dominant culture, or conservative social institutions.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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That's a lie, he never said they would sign the treaty.
"At the same time, Arakhamiia denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Johnson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to Arakhamiia, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin. Arakhamiia added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“
"When asked why Ukraine did not agree to this point, Arakhamia replied that there was no confidence in the Russians, because they were ready to promise anything. ... Secondly, there was no confidence in the Russians that they would do it. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“
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This is a list of some of the people/nations ru SSia has coloni zed or been at war with:
Ludic, Veps, Votic, Moksha, Erzya, Mari, Komi, Udmurt, Mansi, Khanty, Nenets, Nganasan, Selkup, Samoyeds and countless other native people.
Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Tsjetsjenia, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, Ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Ingria, Karelia, Sakha, Kaliningrad, Kurilene, Khanty
Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Georgia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Hungary, Transnistria, Romania, Bulgaria, Northern Caucasus.
Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Sochi conflict, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Soviet/Russian wars since WW2:
1945 – 1960s: Ukraine, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Hungary, Germany.
1946 – 1954: First Indochina War
1950 – 1953: Korean War.
1955 – 1975: Vietnam War.
1953: East Germany.
1956: Hungary.
1961 – 1968: Albania.
1968: Czechoslovakia.
1969: China.
1969 – 1970: Israel.
1974 – 1991: Eritrea.
1975 – 1991: Angola.
1977 – 1978: Somalia.
1979 – 1989: Afghanistan.
1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia.
1991 – 1993: Georgia.
1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia.
1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania.
1992: North Ossetia.
1992 – 1997: Tajikistan.
1994 – 1996: First Chechen War.
1999: Dagestan.
1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War.
2008: Georgia.
2009 – 2017: North Caucasus.
2014 - : Ukraine
2015 - : Syria.
2018 - : Central African Republic, Libya, Sudan, Mali, Congo
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Right up to the sanctions, Russia bought weapons from France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Czech Republic, Finland, Croatia, Slovakia, Turkey and Spain. And are still buying from Iran, china, India, North Korea, South Africa, Myanmar among others.
They recruit soldiers mainly from Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Most of them are seasonal workers that normally work some months in Russia per year. Now they are lured into conscription by high salaries and promise of citizenship. In addition there are mercenaries from many other countries.
And Russia hasn't won the war yet, so all your statements are proven incorrect!
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
n the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@festekj What a BS story! In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution. Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA HAD PUT MUCH PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government CORRUPTION AND ABUSE POWER, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, SPARKING THE DONBASS WAR.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the South-Eastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. They are looting and plunder all over. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia. The Russians in the now occupied Donbass has started indoctrination of children. All history books that mention Ukraine as a nation are forbidden and burned. The children have to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian (both languages was teach before). Also many children are kidnapped/deportet to Russia. Mostly those who the authoroties suspects are pro-Ukrainian. Some of them far East in Russia, where they have small chances for returning home.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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@Radio9730killer You forgot the Russian/Soviet list: Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Chechnya, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, Ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Ingria, Karelia, Sakha, Kaliningrad, Kurilene, Khanty
Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Georgia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Hungary, Transnistria, Yugoslavia, Northern Caucasus, Kuril Islands, Afghanistan,
1917: Kazakhstan
1917-1921: Ukraine
1924: Georgia
1929: Sino – Soviet conflict. China
1929: Afghanistan 1930: Afghanistan.
1932: Chechnya.
1934: China.
1937: China.
1939: Poland
1939: Finland
1940: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.
1940: Romania
(1941 – 1945: WW2, Allied with the West)
1945 – 1960s:
Ukraine,
Poland,
Estonia,
Latvia,
Lithuania,
Bulgaria,
Serbia,
Croatia,
Romania,
Hungary,
Germany. 1946 – 1954: First Indochina War 1950 – 1953: Korean War. 1955 – 1975: Vietnam War. 1953: East Germany. 1956: Hungary. 1961 – 1968: Albania. 1968: Czechoslovakia. 1969: China. 1969 – 1970: Israel. 1974 – 1991: Eritrea. 1975 – 1991: Angola. 1977 – 1978: Somalia. 1979 – 1989: Afghanistan. 1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia. 1991 – 1993: Georgia. 1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia. 1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania. 1992: North Ossetia. 1992 – 1997: Tajikistan. 1994 – 1996: First Chechen War. 1999: Dagestan. 1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War. 2008: Georgia. 2009 – 2017: North Caucasus. 2014 - : Ukraine 2015 - : Syria. 2018 - : Central African Republic.
Libya,
Mali,
Burkina Faso,
Ghana,
Ivory Coast,
Nigeria,
Cameroon,
Sudan,
Kongo,
Angola,
Zimbabwe,
Mozambique,
Madagskar
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in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@maksimluzin1121 The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected. By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later.
The LPR and DPR are not recognized as legitimate entities under the Minsk Agreements. The signatures of the leaders of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics were added after they had already been signed by Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE. They were not among the original signatories, and indeed Ukraine would not have signed had their signatures been part of the deal. There is nothing in the content or format of the Agreement that legitimizes these entities and they should not be treated as negotiating partners in any sense. Russia alone controls the forces occupying parts of eastern Ukraine.
Despite that, however, Russia untruthfully claims not to be a party and only a facilitator — and that the real agreements are between Ukraine and the so-called “separatists,” who call themselves the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics (LPR and DPR), but are in fact Russian supplied and directed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine. Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final.
Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood. This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself.
Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does.
But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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The UN published a report in March highlighting summary executions, torture, and other instances in which Russia and Ukraine violated international human rights laws in their treatment of prisoners of war.
The report comes after another UN report last week found that Russian forces in Ukraine committed an array of violations that amount to war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
Details: The most recent report by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is based on interviews with more than 400 POWs and focuses on how they were treated in the one-year period since Russia attacked Ukraine.
Those interviewed include Ukrainian POWs who have been released as well as Russians held captive in Ukraine.
UN monitors said they were not given "confidential access" to POWs held by Russia.
Instances under Russia's control include the "summary executions of 15 POWs, the use of POWs as human shields, the deaths of two wounded men POWs due to a lack of medical care, and torture or other ill-treatment to extract information," per the report.
The monitors interviewed 24 women POWs held by Russia as well, finding that 17 of them "were subjected to beatings, electrocution, forced nudity, cavity searches and threats of sexual violence."
Meanwhile, the monitors documented the summary executions of at least 25 Russian POWs at the hands of Ukrainian forces.
Of note: Ill-treatment of POWs took place on both sides, but was it was far more common against Ukrainians, AP reports.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine. Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final.
Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood. This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime.
It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.” Over the past months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country.
Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@_upiter-5. The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing.
“Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative.
“Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.”
The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”.
Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@MGB2408 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively.
In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides.
THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 At the same time, Arakhamiia denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Johnson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to Arakhamiia, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin. Arakhamiia added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“
more of what he said. „When asked why Ukraine did not agree to this point, Arakhamia replied that there was no confidence in the Russians, because they were ready to promise anything. ... Secondly, there was no confidence in the Russians that they would do it. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“ You’re picking and choosing to support a false conclusion.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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The Ukrainian government should act on its expressed commitment not to use banned antipersonnel landmines, investigate its military’s use of these weapons, and hold those responsible to account, Human Rights Watch said today. The government statement, at a June 21, 2023 meeting of the Mine Ban Treaty in Geneva, came nearly five months after Ukrainian officials said they would examine reports by Human Rights Watch and other groups that Ukraine’s forces used these weapons in operations to retake territory occupied by Russian forces
“The Ukrainian government’s pledge to investigate its military’s apparent use of banned antipersonnel mines is an important recognition of its duty to protect civilians,” said Steve Goose, arms director at Human Rights Watch. “A prompt, transparent, and thorough inquiry could have far-reaching benefits for Ukrainians both now and for future generations.”
Since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, RUSSIAN FORCES HAVE USED AT LEAST 13 TYPES of antipersonnel mines in multiple areas across Ukraine, killing and injuring civilians. Human Rights Watch has published four reports documenting Russian forces’ use of antipersonnel landmines in Ukraine since 2022. Russia, which has not joined the Mine Ban Treaty, violates international humanitarian law when using antipersonnel mines because they are inherently indiscriminate weapons.
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The humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Ukraine has rightly commanded the attention of policymakers worldwide. However, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will likely have consequences that echo far beyond the borders of either country. Recent research discuss how the war’s impact on food commodity prices may shape the distribution of violent conflict in Africa.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has worsened the food security crisis in many African countries, Human Rights Watch said today. Many countries in East, West, Middle, and Southern Africa rely on Russia and Ukraine for a significant percentage of their wheat, fertilizer, or vegetable oils imports, but the war disrupts global commodity markets and trade flows to Africa, increasing already high food prices in the region. Even countries that import little from the two countries are indirectly impacted by higher world prices for key commodities.
In 2020 alone, wheat constituted 90 per cent of Russia’s $4 billion worth of exports to Africa, while Ukraine followed closely behind with exports worth $3 billion, of which wheat accounted for 48 per cent and maize 31 per cent. Millions face severe hunger as the war threatens supplies of key staple crops.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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Yes, Putin and Russia broke the agreements.
The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected. By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later.
Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision. Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
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@JohnAkaSB Russian Soldiers Ask: 'We Have Nothing To Fight With. Why Should We Go Up Against Tanks With Only Machine Guns?'
The video appeared this week on Telegram and other Russian social-media networks: a group of more than two dozen men in masks and camouflage, standing in a snowy field and appealing for help.
"We are the soldiers of the 1st, 3rd, and 4th Platoons, 254th Regiment, 7th Company, 3rd Battalion. Please help us sort out the situation," the soldiers say. "Our commander gave us an order not to retreat from our positions. But the commander gave us no cover and no support. We had only machine guns, and all the rest of the weapons were damaged."
"Now they're accusing us of desertion, since the company commander says he didn't give the order," they said. "In sum, command doesn't care about us."
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@JohnAkaSB In an effort to reverse the military's flagging campaign to pound Ukraine into surrender, the Kremlin in September ordered the call-up of 300,000 men, many of them reservists. In the months prior, Russian authorities had conducted what experts called a "covert mobilization," recruiting volunteers with offers of high salaries.
But Russia's national logistics and recruiting infrastructure was largely unprepared to deal with the influx of troops who needed to be housed, clothed, equipped, and trained before being deployed.
Troops have complained, even before arriving on the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, of things like not getting paid, not having enough rations, or merely a lack of discipline and organization among commanders.
"They were sent to the front line with only their naked asses, so to speak, to fight tanks with only machine guns," said Alyona Savochkina, whose husband, Viktor, was one of the soldiers appearing in the video. "Basic kit, grenades. All of them. They had no reinforcements. Nothing."
She says her husband's unit is badly underequipped and underfed. She said they are supplied with food items sent by relatives. "But now they are threatening to deprive them of even this," she said.
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- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Hopefully someone will write an UNBIASED book, stating facts and allowing the readers to form their own judgments. Everything I said can be fact checked and verified." Here are some REAL truth:
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there.
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Furthermore, the priest did not want to comment on the speech of the Russian Patriarch Kirill. Burdin: "I will die and stand before God. The Patriarch will not answer God for me. I will answer for myself, for what I did and said. The same applies to the Patriarch: he will appear before God, and I will not be responsible for him, but he himself."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
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There wasn't any peace deal in 2022. putin rejected them all.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people.
In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict.
Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Diplomat W.Sporrer (who participated):
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
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@malcolmdavid722 Moscow has been unhappy with the deal since its inception, saying that it failed to deliver on a promise to free up Russian agricultural exports that have been blocked by Western sanctions. While food and fertilizers are not under sanctions, Russia says sanctions-related restrictions on its banking, transit and insurance make trade untenable.
The U.N.'s Guterres pushed back against those claims in a press conference Monday, saying Russia's grain trade had "reached high export volumes" and its fertilizer markets were "stabilizing" under policies laid out in a memorandum of understanding between the U.N. and Russia last July. the most prominent exporter in the Black Sea region is Russia, from which strong exports continue to flow in 2022/23 and is forecast to reach a record for annual wheat exports.
Despite the Russian government claims of export challenges, Russia’s grain and oilseed exports have thrived during the current marketing year with ample supplies and competitive prices. Export volumes could be even larger, but the Russian government continues to apply export taxes and quotas, trade-restricting measures that are self-imposed.
Guterres said the U.N. sent a letter to Putin last week with new proposed measures to address Russia's complaints, including allowing a subsidiary of the Russian Agricultural Bank to reconnect to SWIFT, the world's dominant financial messaging system.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming.
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February.
Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure."
Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life."
Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports.
Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. T
he amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion.
According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@radio9730 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@Valentin_126 LeMonde: A week after Moscow announced a strike on a building in Kharkiv, northeastern Ukraine, where Russia alleged "French mercenaries" had been deployed, France's services in charge of information warfare – which report to both the foreign ministry and the military – say they have gathered evidence that this was a Russian disinformation operation.
Russia tried once again to boost its media offensive by organizing a vote on a resolution, in the Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, on Wednesday, January 24, denouncing the alleged presence of these "mercenaries." However, that same day, several media outlets received information suggesting that this was an act of manipulation.
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@marcosvidal4940 "14,000 dead civilians. Women and children were also "well armed and trained Russian soldiers without patches" ?"
The estimated number of fatalities in the Donbas war was 14,200–14,400 by the end of December 2021, including non-combat military deaths. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, 6,500 were pro-Russian separatist forces, 4,400 were Ukrainian forces, and 3,404 were civilians (including 298 passengers and crew of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. The responsibility for investigation was delegated to the Dutch Safety Board and the Dutch-led joint investigation team, who in 2016 reported that the airliner had been downed by a Buk surface-to-air missile launched from pro-Russian separatist-controlled territory in Ukraine. The JIT found that the Buk originated from the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the Russian Federation and had been transported from Russia on the day of the crash, fired from a field in a rebel-controlled area and the launch system returned to Russia afterwards.).
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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What does fascism mean? (my "check" paranthesis regarding Russia)
Experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check).
However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people.
In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation.
He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood. This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime.
It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.” Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@@alextim6961 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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? The US has NOT given 350 bn! The numbers are between 119 and 175 bn USD, depending on how you do the math (but only $83.4 billion has been sent). And of that total, 75 bn is given to US companies. Only 35 bn is budget support for Ukraine. 69 bn is military support. That means Ukraine has received 76 bn (35 bn budget support and 41 bn as weapons) The U.S has given 0,3 % of their GDP (0,5 when all that is promised is received). Estonia for example, has given 2,5 % Denmark 2,5 % Lithuania 1,8% Norway 1,7 %.
On top of that, the actual value of the weapons and equipment sent to Ukraine by the USA is about 60% lower than they were priced because the price was for new stock. Much of the military equipment and ammunition sent to Ukraine is old and of limited combat effectiveness because it came from aging US stockpiles, some of the ammunition is expired, and a majority of the equipment isn't even used by the US military anymore (and therefore has an effective value of $0 to the USA). Normally, this stock would have to be disposed of, but giving it to Ukraine means there are effectively no disposal expenses. Furthermore, much of the funding for Ukraine is being spent in the USA, such as employing US workers to manufacture the replacement equipment and supplies for refilling US stockpiles.
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There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@stevenbond8251 Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@Peter-xg5fq Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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@bbaker7467 LOL, 100.000 killed at Bakhmut, but only 70.000 in total? How is that?
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded
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@Michael98721 "They were NOT ALLIES! It was a non aggression pact that the Nazi's rapidly broke!"
Rapidly broke?? It lasted almost 2 years, so 1/3 of the WW2.
In addition to the publicly-announced stipulations of non-aggression, the treaty included the Secret Protocol, which defined the borders of Soviet and German spheres of influence across Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland.
Soon after the pact, Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ordered the Soviet invasion of Poland on 17 September.
After the invasions, the new border between the two countries was confirmed by the supplementary protocol of the German–Soviet Frontier Treaty
In March 1940. Parts of the Karelia and Salla regions in Finland were annexed by the Soviet Union following the Winter War. The Soviet annexation of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and parts of Romania (Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and the Hertsa region) followed.
Stalin's invasion of Bukovina in 1940 violated the pact, since it went beyond the Soviet sphere of influence that had been agreed with the Axis.
The territories of Poland annexed by the Soviet Union following the 1939 Soviet invasion east of the Curzon line remained in the Soviet Union after the war, and are now in Ukraine and Belarus.
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@MarkNOTW What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final.
Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined.
Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what) Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia
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If Kyiv is so easy to capture, why haven't Russia taken it? We all know why, they can't! They made a fool of themselves last time, with that 64 km long convoy completely stuck.
No peace deal was made in Turkey.
20th March 2022:
Turkey’s foreign minister Cavusoglu met foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov and Dmytro Kuleba.
“Of course, it is not an easy thing to come to terms with while the war is going on, while civilians are killed, but we would like to say that momentum is still gained,” foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said in live comments from the southern Turkish province of Antalya on Sunday.
Cavusoglu said Turkey was in contact with the negotiating teams from the two countries but he refused to divulge the details of the talks as “we play an honest mediator and facilitator role.”
Foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov of Russia and Dmytro Kuleba of Ukraine met in the Turkish resort town of Antalya earlier this month with Cavusoglu also attending. The discussions DID NOT YIELD CONCRETE RESULTS.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly appealed for peace, urging Russia to accept “meaningful” talks for an end to the invasion.
“This is the time to meet, to talk, time for renewing territorial integrity and fairness for Ukraine,” he said.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated. Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins.
Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes. According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths. The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol.
While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible. Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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@hannahr77 You forgot the Russian/Soviet:
1917: Kazakhstan
1917-1921: Ukraine
1924: Georgia
1929: Sino – Soviet conflict. China
1929: Afghanistan
1930: Afghanistan.
1932: Chechnya.
1934: China.
1937: China.
1939: Poland
1939: Finland
1940: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.
1940: Romania
(1941 – 1945: WW2, Allied with the West)
1945 – 1960s:
Ukraine,
Poland,
Estonia,
Latvia,
Lithuania,
Bulgaria,
Serbia,
Croatia,
Romania,
Hungary,
Germany.
1946 – 1954: First Indochina War
1950 – 1953: Korean War.
1955 – 1975: Vietnam War.
1953: East Germany.
1956: Hungary.
1961 – 1968: Albania.
1968: Czechoslovakia.
1969: China.
1969 – 1970: Israel.
1974 – 1991: Eritrea.
1975 – 1991: Angola.
1977 – 1978: Somalia.
1979 – 1989: Afghanistan.
1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia.
1991 – 1993: Georgia.
1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia.
1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania.
1992: North Ossetia.
1992 – 1997: Tajikistan.
1994 – 1996: First Chechen War.
1999: Dagestan.
1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War.
2008: Georgia.
2009 – 2017: North Caucasus.
2014 - : Ukraine
2015 - : Syria.
2018 - : Central African Republic.
Libya,
Mali,
Burkina Faso,
Ghana,
Ivory Coast,
Nigeria,
Cameroon,
Sudan,
Kongo,
Angola,
Zimbabwe,
Mozambique,
Madagskar
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There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine.
Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia
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One Austrian artist was in a similar state in 1945 as little Putler today.
What does fascism mean?:
Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check).
However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I:
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II:
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
Sept 2020- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@HgHg-yp6ft I'm sorry, but you have it all backwords. In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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The history of the Crimean Peninsula, historically known as Tauris begins around the 5th century BCE when several Greek colonies were established along its coast. The culture remained Greek for almost two thousand years.
In the medieval period, it was partially conquered by Kievan Rus. Thereafter a period to the Mongols, who later lost to the Ottoman Empire.
In 1774, the Ottoman Empire was defeated by Catherine the Great. From 1853 to 1856, the strategic position of the peninsula in controlling the Black Sea meant that it was the site of the principal engagements of the Crimean War, where Russia lost to a French-led alliance.
By the late 19th century, Crimean Tatars continued to form a slight plurality of Crimea's still largely rural population and were the predominant portion of the population in the mountainous area and about half of the steppe population. There were large numbers of Russians concentrated in the Feodosiya district and Ukrainians as well as smaller numbers of Jews, Belarussians, Turks, Armenians, and Greeks and Roma. Germans and Bulgarians settled in the Crimea at the beginning of the 19th century.
During the ensuing Russian Civil War, Crimea changed hands numerous times and was for a time a stronghold of the anti-Bolshevik White Army. It was in Crimea that the White Russians made their last stand against the Red Army in 1920.
Approximately 50,000 White prisoners of war and civilians were summarily executed by shooting or hanging after the defeat at the end of 1920. This is considered one of the largest massacres in the Civil War. BETWEEN 56,000 AND 150,000 OF THE CIVILIAN POPULATION WERE THEN MURDERED as part of the Red Terror, organized by Béla Kun.
In 1921, the Crimean ASSR was created as an autonomous republic of the Russian SFSR.
However, this did not protect the Crimean Tatars, who constituted about 25% of the Crimean population, from Joseph Stalin's repressions of the 1930s. The Greeks were another cultural group that suffered. Their lands were lost during the process of collectivisation, in which farmers were not compensated with wages. Schools which taught Greek were closed and GREEK LITERATURE WAS DESTROYED, because the Soviets considered the Greeks as "counter-revolutionary" with their links to capitalist state Greece, and their independent culture.
Crimea experienced two severe famines in the 20th century, the Famine of 1921–1922 and the Holodomor of 1932–1933.[40] A large Slavic population (mainly Russians and Ukrainians) influx occurred in the 1930s as a result of the Soviet policy of regional development. (THE INHABITANTS WERE LITERALLY EXCHANGED WITH SLAVIC PEOPLE). These demographic changes permanently altered the ethnic balance in the region
On 18 May 1944, the entire population of the Crimean Tatars were forcibly deported in the "Sürgün" (Crimean Tatar for exile) to Central Asia by Stalin. The ASSR was downgraded to an oblast within the Russian SFSR in 1945 following the ETHNIC CLEANSING OF THE CRIMEAN TATARS and in 1954, Crimea was transferred to the Ukrainian SSR as part of celebrations of the 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Pereyaslav.
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Republic of Crimea was formed in 1992, although the republic was abolished in 1995, with the Autonomous Republic of Crimea established firmly under Ukrainian authority and Sevastopol being administered as a city with special status.
In 2014, Crimea saw intense demonstrations against the removal of the Ukrainian president Yanukovych culminating in pro-Russian forces occupying strategic points in Crimea and the Republic of Crimea declared independence from Ukraine following a disputed referendum supporting reunification. Russia then formally annexed Crimea, although most countries recognise Crimea as part of Ukraine.
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@jimmyc974 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident.
He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed.
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There wasn't any real deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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We can also mention the Katyn massacres, done by the Soviet/Russians.
The Katyn massacre was a series of mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia prisoners of war carried out by the Soviet Union, specifically the NKVD ("People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs", the Soviet secret police) in April and May 1940. Though the killings also occurred in the Kalinin and Kharkiv prisons and elsewhere, the massacre is named after the Katyn forest, where some of the mass graves were first discovered by German Nazi forces.
The order to execute captive members of the Polish officer corps was secretly issued by the Soviet Politburo led by Joseph Stalin. Of the total killed, about 8,000 were officers imprisoned during the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland, another 6,000 were police officers, and the remaining 8,000 were Polish intelligentsia the Soviets deemed to be "intelligence agents and gendarmes, spies and saboteurs, former landowners, factory owners and officials". The Polish Army officer class was representative of the multi-ethnic Polish state; the murdered included ethnic Poles, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and 700–900 Polish Jews including the chief Rabbi of the Polish Army, Baruch Steinberg
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On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
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@gilbertknight6617 - Between April 17 and May 31, 2022, Human Rights Watch interviewed 54 civilians in the towns and villages of Mykhailo-Kotsiubynske and Yahidne in the northern Chernihiv region; Malaya Rohan, Pokotylivka, Selekstiine, and Yakovlivka in the eastern Kharkiv region; and from Polohy in the southern Zaporizhzhia region.
In Yahidne, Russian forces unlawfully held nearly 350 civilians for a month in the basement of a schoolhouse near the front lines that the Russians used as a military base. Ukrainian attacks in those areas damaged homes and other structures.
In Malaya Rohan, Russian forces set up a base at a farm, where they parked dozens of military vehicles. The soldiers unlawfully prevented civilians from leaving the area. On March 26, an exchange of artillery fire resulted in damage to a nearby farm and the death of 140 livestock.
Russian forces took control of Malaya Rohan village, five kilometers east of Kharkiv, on February 27. Human Rights Watch researchers visited the village on May 24 and interviewed eight residents.
Vasyl Osmachko, 74, said that Russian forces set up a checkpoint near his home soon after they arrived, and that tanks regularly drove up and down his street. He and his neighbors said Russian forces never took any steps to evacuate the civilian population as the Russians set up their military presence in the village, and they did not let civilians through their checkpoints, preventing them from leaving the village or going to other neighborhoods.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the strikes on Kyiv and other cities a long way from the front suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives.
Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews.
"The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life."
Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Soviet/Russian wars:
1924: Georgia
1929: Sino – Soviet conflict. China
1929: Afghanistan
1930: Afghanistan.
1932: Chechnya.
1934: China.
1937: China.
1939: Poland (allied with Hitler)
1939: Finland
1940: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. (still allied with Hitler)
1940: Romania
(1941 – 1945: WW2, Allied with the West)
1945 – 1960s: Ukraine, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Hungary, Germany.
1946 – 1954: First Indochina War
1950 – 1953: Korean War.
1955 – 1975: Vietnam War.
1953: East Germany.
1956: Hungary.
1961 – 1968: Albania.
1968: Czechoslovakia.
1969: China.
1969 – 1970: Israel.
1974 – 1991: Eritrea.
1975 – 1991: Angola.
1977 – 1978: Somalia.
1979 – 1989: Afghanistan.
1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia.
1991 – 1993: Georgia.
1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia.
1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania.
1992: North Ossetia.
1992 – 1997: Tajikistan.
1994 – 1996: First Chechen War.
1999: Dagestan.
1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War.
2008: Georgia.
2009 – 2017: North Caucasus.
2014 - : Ukraine
2015 - : Syria.
2018 - : Central African Republic.
2021 - : Mali.
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You are lying as always! Putin has rejected all the realistic peace plans.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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What do you call this?:
NATO Summit: G7 countries agrees on long-term security commitment for Ukraine.
NATO allies pledge new military package for Ukraine.
As the specific areas of security and military cooperation, the press release listed providing modern military equipment on land, in the air, and at sea, training, intelligence sharing, developing resistance to cyber and hybrid threats, supporting Ukraine's defense industry, and interoperability with NATO forces.
The U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and Japan governments agreed to provide Ukraine with "modern military equipment across land, air, and sea domains."
The aid will prioritize air defense, artillery, long-range weapon systems, armored vehicles, and air combat capabilities, AFP reported.
G7 also reportedly pledged to provide Ukraine further military and financial assistance in case of a future Russian armed attack.
Dry your tears, boy!
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@@alextim6961 World101: What does fascism mean? (my "check" paranthesis regarding the fascist russian regime)
Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check).
However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959.
This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people.
In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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Diplomat W.Sporrer (who participated):
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred.
This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat. In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine. Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final.
Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Slovenia - 1991
The first of the six republics to formally leave Yugoslavia was Slovenia, declaring independence on 25 June 1991. This triggered an intervention of the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) which turned into a brief military conflict, generally referred to as the Ten-Day War. It ended in a victory of the Slovenian forces, with the JNA withdrawing its soldiers and equipment.
Croatia - 1991-1995
Croatia declared independence on the same day as Slovenia. But while Slovenia’s withdrawal from the Yugoslav Federation was comparatively bloodless, Croatia’s was not to be. The sizeable ethnic Serb minority in Croatia openly rejected the authority of the newly proclaimed Croatian state citing the right to remain within Yugoslavia. With the help of the JNA and Serbia, Croatian Serbs rebelled, declaring nearly a third of Croatia’s territory under their control to be an independent Serb state. Croats and other non-Serbs were expelled from its territory in a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing. Heavy fighting in the second half of 1991 witnessed the shelling of the ancient city of Dubrovnik, and the siege and destruction of Vukovar by Serb forces.
Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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@MarkNOTW The Russian's got beaten in Kyiv, they did not withdraw voluntarily.
Wiki: Russian forces initially captured several towns and cities, but logistical and supply failures, stiff Ukrainian resistance, and subsequent poor morale caused the advance to stall. With heavy losses and the inability to make further progress, Russia withdrew its forces from Kyiv and Zhytomyr oblasts in April 2022, and Ukrainian forces retook control.
The Ukrainians also claimed that at the beginning of the invasion, just 30 SOF soldiers managed to halt the Russian attack. The Ukrainians ambushed the Russian convoy, guarded by some 2,000 troops, and destroyed three lead vehicles, attacked the rest of the convoy, destroying the bridges in the process. This engagement ended up temporarily stalling the entire Russian advance from Belarus, which consisted of 70,000 soldiers and 7,000 vehicles.
Without admitting defeat, the battered Russian invasion forces retreated not just from Kyiv Oblast, but also from Sumy and Chernihiv Oblasts. International media outlets reported jubilation among the civilian population in the capital and other areas from which the Russians retreated. Celebration soon gave way to outrage, as evidence of Russian atrocities in places like Bucha emerged. Media coverage of such discoveries led to additional rounds of sanctions against Russia and pledges of further military aid to Ukraine.
Ukrainian authorities said that more than 300 civilian inhabitants of Bucha had been summarily executed. The bodies were discovered after the Russians withdrew. In total, 458 civilian deaths were recorded in Bucha, along with 1,300 deaths in Russian-occupied areas of Kyiv Oblast.
For international military observers, the retreat culminated the Battle of Kyiv as a surprise upset that dispelled notions of a quick Russian victory and showcased Ukraine's resilience, as well as unexpected weaknesses in the Russian military. The Institute for the Study of War wrote in its 3 April campaign assessment, "The continued existence of an independent Ukrainian state with its capital in Kyiv is no longer in question at this time, although much fighting remains and the war could still turn Russia's way."
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You forgot the oppressed Yakutia, Alash, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Caucasus, Altai, Karelia, Abkhazia, Ossetia, Tuva, and many others.
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@sam-jv6mr It's a big leap from not staying neutral to deserve a rape of it's country, don't you think?
Do you mean that Finland deserve the same treatment? What about Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Czechia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Slovenia? And what about Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan?
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@jimmyc974 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3.. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48: India: 2,389
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During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@groenegrasmat The Lend-Lease Act enacted March 11, 1941 (and ended Sept 20, 1945), was a policy under which the United States supplied the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, France, China, and other Allied nations with food, oil, and materiel between 1941 and 1945. The aid was given for free on the basis that such help was essential for the defense of the United States.
A total of $50.1 billion (equivalent to $719 billion in 2021) worth of supplies was shipped. In all, $31.4 billion went to the United Kingdom, $11.3 billion to the Soviet Union, $3.2 billion to France, $1.6 billion to China, and the remaining $2.6 billion to other Allies.
Materiel delivered under the act was supplied at no cost, to be used until returned or destroyed. In practice, most equipment was destroyed, although some hardware (such as ships) was returned after the war. Supplies that arrived after the termination date were sold to the United Kingdom at a large discount for £1.075 billion, using long-term loans from the United States, which were finally repaid in 2006.
Similarly, the Soviet Union repaid $722 million in 1971, with the remainder of the debt written off.
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Early 2023: In just one year, nearly 3,000 cases have been brought before Russian military courts involving soldiers who have defied President Vladimir Putin's orders to fight.
Now, for the first time, a woman has been sentenced. Madina Kabalojeva, who is pregnant, was sentenced to six years in a penal colony by a military court in Vladikavkaz for defying Putin's 'partial' mobilization orders, according to various Russian and international media outlets, including Kommersant and DOXA.
After Putin ordered mobilization, sanctions were tightened. What previously resulted in a maximum of five years in prison was suddenly doubled.
New sanctions were also added, making 'unauthorized surrender' punishable by up to ten years in prison. According to Mediazona, three times as many people have already been sentenced since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"It's not surprising that Russian men don't want to die at the front. When you see that convicts are being taken out of prison to serve as soldiers, it also shows how far Russia is willing to go to find soldiers and that there are recruitment problems."
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@Ghastly_Grinner The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
Leak from the Kremlin
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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Is the Russian condition better than it was during winter?
Calls between Russian soldiers and their loved ones – eavesdropped by Ukraine - reveal reality of war for Kremlin’s forces.
“No one feeds us anything, mum,” he complained. “Our supply is shit, to be honest. We draw water from puddles, then we strain it and drink it.”
Two days before Andrey made his afternoon call back home, the Russian forces had “finally” started firing at Ukrainian positions with phosphorus bombs, he told his mother, but the promises of munitions that could turn the battle had come to nothing.
Andrey reassured his mother, who lives in Kostroma, a city 310 miles north-east of Moscow, that he would be OK. “I always say prayers Mum,” he said. “Every morning.”
It is not known whether those prayers were met. When approached by the Guardian his mother said her son was not with her, before breaking down in tears and putting the phone down.
Others shared with the Guardian, include a conversation on 6 November between a father and the colleagues of his son, Andrei, who had been killed serving in the 35th motorised rifle brigade, 5th company.
“Reinforcements: no; communication: no”, responded a soldier to questions from the grieving parent about the status of the men who had survived a Ukrainian onslaught. “They said we weren’t allowed to retreat. Otherwise, we may be shot.”
In a third intercept from 26 October a soldier in the Donetsk region tells his wife how he had fled with three others from the bloodshed and was contemplating surrender. “I’m in a sleeping bag, all wet, coughing, generally fucked up,” he said. “We were all allowed to be slaughtered.” The soldier’s wife declined to comment when approached by this newspaper.
They are just three of thousands of calls between soldiers in the trenches or advanced positions that Ukrainian experts have eavesdropped, pored over for snippets of intelligence and then, where there is propaganda value, made public.
“There is simply no discipline and it will only get worse now that they have mobilised 300,000 people who will be barely trained. Mobilised soldiers will be terrified of being in a war zone, and naturally, they will try to call home.”
The former Kremlin official said Putin was learning the hard way that his army was in dire need of modernisation and that the top-down Soviet style model was not fit for purpose.
“The army doctrine is based on punishment, so soldiers get penalised if they mess up, but no one is trying to prevent them from giving away information in the first place,” the source said. “Screw-ups will happen until they change the whole philosophy.”
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent.
That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ukraine has been willing to negotiate the whole time. Putin has refused. What you read in Russian propaganda, is not true. MINSK I Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015. It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.) YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West. The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@peace20241 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people.
In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents.
Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war,
The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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- During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported.
The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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No insurance?? Have you ever heard of the Budapest Agreements?
The Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances comprises four substantially identical political agreements signed at the CSCE conference in Budapest, Hungary, on 5 December 1994, to provide security assurances by its signatories relating to the accession of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The four memoranda were originally signed by four nuclear powers: Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom and France.
The memoranda, with U.S. Ambassador Donald M. Blinken amongst others in attendance, prohibited Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom and France from threatening or using military force or economic coercion against Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, except in self-defence or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@mysticone1798 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@havanascp9602 Some of the Soviet/russian wars: Turkestan, Yakutia, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Tuva, Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
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Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), which monitors civilians killed or injured by explosive weapon use, reported that 94 percent of civilian casualties in Ukraine since the start of the conflict occurred in populated areas – a figure consistent with the pattern of harm to civilians recorded over the last decade.
The true extent of civilian harm in Ukraine is more severe, as the impacts of conflict and the use of explosive weapons extended beyond death and injury of civilians. A significant proportion of civilian harm was caused by damage to civilian infrastructure and the disruption of essential services.
As of December 2022, the Kyiv School of Economics reported that civilian infrastructure damaged or destroyed during the conflict included, approximately:
149,300 residential buildings
150 bridges or overpasses
900 cultural facilities
95 religious facilities
3,000 commercial shops
14,400 publication transportation units
The impacts of armed conflict and explosive weapon use have deprived civilians of access to healthcare in Ukraine. Between the beginning of the conflict through the end of 2022, Insecurity Insight and its research partners documented more than 700 attacks on Ukraine’s health care system. These included:
292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics (many health of which were attacked more than once)
65 attacks on ambulances
181 attacks on other health infrastructure (for example, pharmacies, blood centers, dental clinics, and research centers)
86 attacks on health care workers (at least 62 health workers were killed and 52 injured)
Energy infrastructure was often targeted by Russian forces’ use of explosive weapons throughout the conflict. Between the beginning of the conflict and November 2022, PAX identified 213 reported incidents of military actions on energy infrastructure (and verified 63 of those incidents), the largest of which occurred in October 2022, which damaged 40 percent of Ukraine’s electricity generation and transmission facilities. According to Human Rights Watch, these missile and drone attacks in October killed at least 72 civilians and injured 272, and left millions of Ukrainian civilians temporarily without access to electricity, water, heat, and other essential services.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@OshinNatasha-c5u Zelensky is not a multi billionaire, not even a billionaire! Where do you think his wealth come from, his salary is USD 180 000 a year?
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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UN Secretary-General in remarks to the Security Council debate on Maintenance of Peace and Security of Ukraine, 20 September ’23 : "Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, in clear violation of the United Nations Charter and international law, is aggravating geopolitical tensions and divisions, threatening regional stability, increasing the nuclear threat, and creating deep fissures in our increasingly multipolar world."
March, 2023: 141 countries backed the resolution calling for a “comprehensive, just and lasting peace” in Ukraine. 32 countries abstained from voting, while 7 countries, including Russia, voted against.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory.
El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
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Volga_149.20_kHz No, they hadn't. It was part of the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, the word WAS is the clue. When SU broke up, Ukraine became a sovereign state (just like Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekista).
Do you mean those countries also belong to russia???
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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You forgot to mention that the man without hands was dismissed when he showed up.
Russian authorities forcibly drafted disabled people into the army in the occupied Horlivka:
Forced mobilisation continues in the territories occupied by Russia. On January 10, Suspilne News journalist Alexander Papin reported, citing the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, that in Horlivka, Donetsk region, up to 30 people were forcibly mobilised during a regular raid, four of them with disabilities. “After 2 days of so-called training at the Vostochny training ground, they were sent to one of the military units of the Russian occupation forces,” the General Staff officer explained.
Earlier it was reported that in the Russian regions, people with disabilities received conscription notices. In the fall, a 43-year-old resident of the Nizhny Novgorod Oblast with a disability of the 3rd degree was sent to the collection point, and in Adygea a wheelchair user received a conscription notice. However, in both cases, the conscription notices were withdrawn.
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When Arakhamia was asked why Ukraine did not agree to the offer, he stated that Ukraine "had no confidence" in the Russians since they were ready to promise anything for Ukraine to agree.
Speaking further and explaining Kyiv's refusal to accept the proposal, Arakhamia added as well that the delegation he led did not have the legal right to sign any agreement. He said that it would require a constitutional change, given that Ukraine’s Constitution states its intention to become a NAT0 member.
Additionally, he emphasized a lack of trust in the Russian position.
"There is no, and there was no, trust in the Russians that they would do it. That could only be done if there were security guarantees." And there were none.
Arakhamia clarified that signing such an agreement without guarantees would have left Ukraine vulnerable to a second incursion.
"We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance," he said. "Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty."
But discussions were interrupted after Russian troops withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of crimes committed, notably the Bu cha mass acre. The to rtu re and mur der of innocent civ'lians.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians.
On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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If Putin wanted peace, why didn't he respect the Minsk agreement?
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@karenbartlett1307 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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The terror in Moscow shows that an offshoot of IS poses a growing danger. But it does not fit into Putin's narrative.
Putin waited a long time to comment on the horrific attack on civilians in the concert venue on the outskirts of Moscow on Friday night. The Kremlin had an explanation problem.
In Putin's false narrative, it is neo-Nazis in Kyiv, supported by Western Russophobic countries, who threaten Russia. If something goes wrong in Russia, the malicious West is to blame. When Putin first spoke, he did not mention the so-called Islamic State (IS) or Islamist terror. He claimed instead that the terrorists tried to flee in the direction of Ukraine, instead of Belarus..
The Kremlin's propaganda apparatus followed up by directly accusing the neighboring country.
On Monday night, the tone had changed. Putin said the terrorist attack had been carried out by radical Islamists.
It was no longer possible to explain away the obvious. The Islamic State in Khorasan (IS-K) already claimed responsibility for the attack late on Friday. They published photos that had previously been taken of the four perpetrators in front of the black IS flag. They published a video that will show the terrorists' bloody misdeeds in the concert venue.
On March 7, the United States warned of a high risk that extremists had immediate plans to attack large gatherings of people in Moscow, including concerts.
Putin called the warning a provocation. He said the Americans' intention was to frighten the Russians and destabilize society.
The regime was locked in an image of the enemy and did not see the real threat.
And still Putin says, without any evidence whatsoever, that the terrorist attack is connected to the war in Ukraine.
All terror must be condemned, which Western countries also did in strong terms after the attack in Moscow.
IS regards both Russia and Western countries as enemies and targets, something we have painfully experienced in Europe.
In order to combat terrorist movements, international cooperation is very important. A few years ago, Russia wanted to participate in the fight against terror, but now the distance to the West has become greater than at any time since the Cold War. Russia has burned all bridges with their aggressive war against Ukraine. There should also be an investigation into whether the preparedness was good enough and whether the terrorist plans could have been revealed.
In authoritarian regimes, such as the Russian one, different rules apply. The perpetrators must fit into the official narrative of who threatens the nation. And by all means, a critical spotlight must be avoided on the regime's own handling of security.
The responsibility must be placed elsewhere. It must fit into Putin's narrative about who are Russia's enemies.
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@KK-bs8ug UK: The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), which distributes aid, sent India £33.4 million in aid cash in 2022/23.
But the FCDO’s annual report, published this week, reveals that the total is set to rise to £57 million in 2024/25.
This will be topped up by an as-yet-unknown amount from the business department, which usually gives more than £10 million.
USA: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) compiled and published a data in 2015 indicating that from the period 1946-2012, India has been the recipient of highest aid from United States. The amount of economic aid, adjusted to inflation then, was reported to be USD 65.1 billion.
Ther are also Japan, Russia and France for instance.
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Soviet/Russian involvement in wars since WW2:
1945 – 1960s: Ukraine, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Hungary, Germany.
1946 – 1954: First Indochina War
1950 – 1953: Korean War.
1955 – 1975: Vietnam War.
1953: East Germany.
1956: Hungary.
1961 – 1968: Albania.
1968: Czechoslovakia.
1969: China.
1969 – 1970: Israel.
1974 – 1991: Eritrea.
1975 – 1991: Angola.
1977 – 1978: Somalia.
1979 – 1989: Afghanistan.
1991 – 1992: Georgia/South Ossetia.
1991 – 1993: Georgia.
1992 – 1993: Georgia/Abkhazia.
1992: Transnistria/Moldova/Romania.
1992: North Ossetia.
1992 – 1997: Tajikistan.
1994 – 1996: First Chechen War.
1999: Dagestan.
1999 – 2009: Second Chechen War.
2008: Georgia.
2009 – 2017: North Caucasus.
2014 - : Ukraine
2015 - : Syria.
2018 - : Central African Republic, Libya, Sudan, Mali, Congo, Cameroon, Zimbabwe, Madagscar
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
2
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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Here's what Obama REALLY said:
Former President Obama defended his response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 on Thursday, saying that circumstances were different then compared to Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine last year.
“Ukraine of that time was not the Ukraine that we’re talking about today,” Obama said in an interview with CNN on Thursday “There’s a reason there was not an armed invasion of Crimea, because Crimea was full of a lot of Russian speakers and there was some sympathy to the views that Russia was representing.”
Russia ILLEGALLY HELD AN ELECTION and annexed the Crimean peninsula of Ukraine in 2014. In response, the U.S. and European allies led a sanctions campaign which fell far short of its goals in weakening Russia and preventing further action in Ukraine.
WESTERN ALLIES DID NOT PROVIDE UKRAINE WITH ANY MATERIAL SUPPORT to fight Russia, or object to the annexation beyond economic or diplomatic means, the former president argued.
Instead, Russia claimed Crimea as a rightful part of the country given that a majority of the population in the region was ethnically Russian and spoke Russian, a view that had some understanding in Europe, Obama said.
“Part of what happened was, both myself and also [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, who I give enormous credit for, had to pull in a lot of other Europeans kicking and screaming to impose the sanctions that we did and TO PREVENT PUTIN FROM CONTINUING THROUGH THE DONBASS AND THROUGH THE REST OF UKRAINE,” he added.
Obama said that the sense of identity and ability to push back against Russia developed in Ukraine after the 2014 annexation, and that identity and ability is what led to the fierce resistance now.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence.
And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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Numerous war crimes were committed by Russian forces during the siege. Some media outlets described the crimes that occurred as the worst seen in the 21st century.
In March, Russian Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev was accused by Ukrainian authorities of ordering the bombings of both the Mariupol Children's and Maternity Hospital and the city theatre where 1,200 civilians were sheltering. Mizintsev was nicknamed the "Butcher of Mariupol" by western and Ukrainian sources as a result of his alleged role in the siege.
Maternity and children's hospital bombing
Consequences of the bombing of the children's hospital and maternity hospital in Mariupol, 9 March 2022
On 9 March, after an airstrike damaged a maternity ward and children's hospital, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted that the attack was an "atrocity" along with a video of the building's ruins. The hospital was destroyed. Three people were killed, including a young girl and at least 16 were injured; authorities stated that many more patients and hospital staff were buried under rubble from the blast.
Then, on the afternoon of 10 March, the Russian Embassy to the UK said in a tweet that two injured pregnant women seen being evacuated after the attack were actually played by actresses wearing "realistic make-up", that the maternity ward was occupied by the Azov Regiment and that no women or children had been present since the facility was "non-operational". The tweet was later removed by Twitter for violating their rules on disinformation. Dmitry Peskov, the press secretary for the Russian President, stated soon after the bombing that the Russian government would investigate the incident.
The accusation by Russia then began trending online in Russia, including on Russian Telegram social media, which has hundreds of thousands of followers. Twitter then took down the embassy's posts.
The pregnant woman videotaped being carried out wounded on a stretcher (accused by Russia of being an actress) was moved to another hospital and then died on 13 March, after her child was stillborn. She had suffered numerous injuries in the bombing, including a crushed pelvis and detached hip, which contributed to the stillbirth of her child. Seeing that she had lost her baby, medical workers said that she cried, "Kill me now." Thirty minutes later, she also died.
In March, the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre of the city was struck and largely destroyed by an airstrike. The Mariupol city council accused Russia of targeting the drama theatre, where at least hundreds of civilians had been sheltering. Human Rights Watch stated that the theatre was sheltering at least 500 civilians. Serhiy Taruta, the former governor of Donetsk Oblast, stated that 1,300 were sheltering inside.
A satellite image taken by Maxar Technologies on 14 March showed that the Russian word for "children" was written in large white letters on the pavement in both the front and the back of the theatre, which would make it clear that civilians were sheltering inside.
The Associated Press reported that 600 civilians were killed during the airstrike, double the official number given by the Ukrainian government.
The government of Mariupol said on 28 March that 90% of all buildings in Mariupol had been damaged by shelling, with 40% of all structures inside the city destroyed. The statistics released also counted that 90% of Mariupol's hospitals had been damaged, and that 23 schools and 28 kindergartens had been destroyed by Russian shelling.
Shooting of evacuation checkpoints.
On 7 March, U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Michael Carpenter, described two incidents that occurred in Mariupol on 5 and 6 March as war crimes. He stated that on both dates, Russian forces bombed agreed-upon evacuation corridors while civilians were trying to use them.
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Aljazeera April 2022: The shielding accusation
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@dwl3006 Yes, like i said, it's easy to check. And that info tells you are wrong.
Kuleba, November 2023: "To those with short memories: Between 2014 and 2022, Ukraine held about 20 0 rounds of talks with Russia. During this period, 20 cease fire agreements were reached, all of which were quickly vio lated by Russia," he wrote.
"Those who argue that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia now are either uninformed or misled, or they side with Russia and want P utin to take a pause before an even larger aggression," the minister said.
Only after those hundreds of talks and rus sian li es, Zelensky ended the direct negotiation with the invader.
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@dwl3006 Arakhmia about the Istanbul talks: "When Moseichuk asked the party leader why Ukraine did not agree to the offer, he stated that Ukraine "had no confidence" in the Rus sians since they were ready to promise anything for Ukraine to agree.
Speaking further and explaining Kyiv's refusal to accept the proposal, Arakhamia added as well that the delegation he led did not have the legal right to sign any agreement.
Additionally, he emphasized a lack of trust in the Russian position.
"There is no, and there was no, trust in the Russ ians that they would do it. That could only be done if there were security guarantees."
Arakhamia clarified that signing such an agreement without guarantees would have left Ukraine vulnerable to a second incurs ion.
"We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [inv ade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance," he said. "Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty."
But discussions were interrupted after Ru ssian troops withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of crimes committed, notably the Buc ha mas sacre. The torture and murder of innocent civilians."
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@dwl3006 And you believe all the ruzzian li es and pr opa ganda. THAT is really pathetic!!
Ruzzia quickly broke the Minsk agreements: It set out mil itary and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Ru ssia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point ten, for example, calls for the withdra wal of all foreign armed formations and milit ary equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Ru ssia, but Mos cow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Sig ning of the first documents in Sept ember 2014 followed direct incur sion of the Russian regular troops in Don bas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilo vaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, com mitted by the Russian Arm y in Donbas.
At least 360 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 420 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troo ps. In viol ation of the Minsk Memor andum, Russian troo ps and Rus sia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1700 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Another example of russian violation of the agreements is Debaltseve. Combined Rus sian-ter rorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@robertoorsi5771 LOL, «Ukrainian-jewish plot» Congratulation, already in the first line you managed to torpedo the Russian excuse of invading. The Nazis!
Maidan wasn’t started by Nuland, but the Ukrainian people.
("They put outlow als ukrainian parties that was not nationalist. So the elections not given the possibility to vote for parties that were not nationalist one. In ukrainian parliament there are only nationalist (nazi) parties who are for war.”)
No parties were banned in the elections in neither 2014, nor 2019.
In Ukrainian parliament there is exactly ZERO Nazi parties. All the far right parties joined hands before the 2019 election, but only managed to get 2% of the votes.
In Russia on the other hand, Putin has made all opposition impossible. Those who are not killed or imprisoned by false charges, are to scared to say something.
By the way, you don’t have to be sorry for your scholastic English, but for your lack of humanism! All you have managed to do, is make people see what you really are, a true Jew hating fascist/Nazi!
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@@alextim6961 "Nazism must be crushed, whether you like it or not"
Then why don't you do it?? nazism flourish in russia!
What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@stststefan Alj azeera: Pu tin targets Ukrainian civiIians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine w ar is no coincidence. Rus sia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russ ia began its miIitary intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organizations, documented w ar cr ime s with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiIes destroying hospitaIs or mut ilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of w a r cr ime s in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Na zis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal ag gressor that justifies att acking civiIians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave P utin the green light to start another brutal wa r to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
The Minsk Agreements (Protocol of 5 September 2014, Memorandum of 19 September 2014 and Package of measures of 12 February 2015) are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”.
Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote.
While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia's lie machine:
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity.
From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…” The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3.. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48: India: 2,389
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@PerceivedREALITY999 An extensive investigation by Amnesty International has concluded that Russian military forces committed a war crime when they struck the Mariupol drama theatre in Ukraine in March, killing at least dozen people and likely many more.
In a new report, ‘Children’: The Attack on the Donetsk Regional Academic Drama Theatre in Mariupol, Ukraine, the organization documents how the Russian military likely deliberately targeted the theatre despite knowing hundreds of civilians were sheltering there on 16 March, making the attack a clear war crime.
Amnesty International’s Crisis Response team interviewed numerous survivors and collected extensive digital evidence, concluding that the attack was almost certainly carried out by Russian fighter aircraft, which dropped two 500kg bombs that struck close to each other and detonated simultaneously.
“After months of rigorous investigation, analysis of satellite imagery and interviews with dozens of witnesses, we concluded that the strike was a clear war crime committed by Russian forces,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.
“Many people were injured and killed in this merciless attack. Their deaths were likely caused by Russian forces deliberately targeting Ukrainian civilians.
“The International Criminal Court, and all others with jurisdiction over crimes committed during this conflict, must investigate this attack as a war crime. All those responsible must be held accountable for causing such death and destruction.”
The theatre, in the city’s Tsentralnyi district, was a hub for the distribution of medicine, food and water, and a designated gathering point for people hoping to be evacuated via humanitarian corridors. The building was clearly recognizable as a civilian object, perhaps more so than any other location in the city.
Locals had also written the giant Cyrillic letters “Дети” – Russian for “children” – on forecourts on either side of the building, which would have been clearly visible to Russian pilots and also on satellite imagery.
Nevertheless, Russian bombs struck the theatre shortly after 10am on 16 March, producing a large explosion which caused the roof and huge portions of two main walls to collapse. At the time of the attack, hundreds of civilians were in and around the theatre.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis.
Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes.
According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol.
While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible.
Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Remember the incident last year?"
- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@linqualinqua6552 BS!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@alitatunertc1775 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@stanspb763 There was no coup, let alone a Western-sponsored coup, in Ukraine; this is a longstanding pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about Ukraine's Euromaidan. The spontaneous onset of the Euromaidan protests was a reaction by numerous segments of the Ukrainian population to former president Viktor Yanukovych’s sudden departure from the promised Association Agreement with the European Union.
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
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@MGB2408 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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@naas699 Ukraine didn't kill 14000 in Donbas. How mant times are you going to tell that lie?? You f..king a..holes doesn't care about the truth! Russia is all about lies and disinformation.
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@naas699 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@rinakamenova3382 Lindsey Graham: "As long as we way up Ukraine with the weapons they need and economic support, they will fight to the last person, I’m sure."
Graham said he was visiting on the 457th day of a war that Russia had assumed would be completed within three days and Graham said Ukrainians resisting the invasion reminded him of "our better selves in America. There was a time in America that we were this way, fighting to the last person, we were going to be free or die."
"Now you are free," Zelenskiy responded in the encounter. "And we will be."
Graham replied: "And the Russians are dying."
Zelenskiy then added: "Yes, but they came to our territory. We are not fighting on their territory."
(Initial extracts of the conversation released by Zelenskiy's office had not made clear that the two remarks were made in different parts of the conversation. )
Peskov castigated the senator in comments to the Shot Telegram channel, saying: "It is difficult to imagine a greater shame for a country than having such senators."
Graham shot back at the criticism.
"As usual the Russia propaganda machine is hard at work," Graham told Reuters in an emailed statement on Sunday, referring to Medvedev's comments about his Kyiv visit, which he had used to urge Washington to send more weapons to Ukraine.
Graham said he had mentioned to Zelenskiy "that Ukraine has adopted the American mantra, 'Live Free or Die.' It has been a good investment by the United States to help liberate Ukraine from Russian war criminals."
He added, "Mr. Medvedev, if you want Russians to stop dying in Ukraine, withdraw. Stop the invasion. Stop the war crimes. The truth is that you and (President Vladimir) Putin could care less about Russian soldiers," he said.
By the way, Graham is in the opposition in the US, not in charge. He is in the same party that Russia helped win the election in 2016.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv.
The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations.
Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who didn't want peace? Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April?" That one is easy to answer: PUTIN!!!
There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 LOL, "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians.
On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories. “The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months.
LET US BE CLEAR: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.” Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared.
The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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There is NO real opposition in Russia. They are either poisoned, in jail or killed.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.” “I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”:
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the RUSSIANS. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets.
Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of RUSSIANS and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections.
The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military.
Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@MatchSmith It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations.
Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military.
Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@brendasavini7786 There have been over 200 peace talks with russia. putin doesn't want peace, he wants Ukraine.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@brendasavini7786 - On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@@alextim6961 You are lying as usual!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@@alextim6961 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@zehrag3781 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@adenubipeace2394 Diplomat W. Sporrer (who participated):
The main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
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Are you joking!??
Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), which monitors civilians killed or injured by explosive weapon use, reported in December 2022, that 94 percent of civilian casualties in Ukraine since the start of the conflict occurred in populated areas – a figure consistent with the pattern of harm to civilians recorded over the last decade.
The true extent of civilian harm in Ukraine is more severe, as the impacts of conflict and the use of explosive weapons extended beyond death and injury of civilians. A significant proportion of civilian harm was caused by damage to civilian infrastructure and the disruption of essential services. As of December 2022, civilian infrastructure damaged or destroyed during the conflict included, approximately: 149,300 residential buildings 150 BRIDGES or overpasses 900 cultural facilities 95 religious facilities 3,000 commercial shops 14,400 publication transportation units.
The impacts of armed conflict and explosive weapon use have deprived civilians of access to healthcare in Ukraine. Between the beginning of the conflict through the end of 2022, Insecurity Insight and its research partners documented more than 700 attacks on Ukraine’s health care system. These included: 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics (many health of which were attacked more than once) 65 attacks on ambulances 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (for example, pharmacies, blood centers, dental clinics, and research centers) 86 attacks on health care workers (at least 62 health workers were killed and 52 injured) Energy infrastructure was often targeted by Russian forces’ use of explosive weapons throughout the conflict.
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@charlesaneks8321 There wasn't any deal.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@charlesaneks8321 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, Putin decided to reject the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine. We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime. It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights.
The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion. It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.”
The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names. Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@lilacer6841 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation, and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you. @PerceivedREALITY999
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Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. @PerceivedREALITY999
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine.
Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
- Putin is on a mission. That is to reestablish the soviet Union as "Great Russia", no matter the cost!
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@grobanfan100 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets.
Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press:
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…” The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 RUSSIAS LIE MACHINE: It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa.
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity.
From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset.
All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks. Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich It's not my words, It's from Human Rights Watch. Here are some more:
Russian forces have used antipersonnel mines in multiple areas across Ukraine, including victim-activated booby traps, since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Human Rights Watch previously published three reports documenting Russian forces’ use of antipersonnel landmines in Ukraine in 2022.
The Russian military seized Izium and the surrounding areas by April 1 and exercised full control there until early September when Ukrainian forces began a counteroffensive. During their occupation, Russian forces arbitrarily detained, interrogated and tortured residents, and in some cases forcibly disappeared and killed civilians.
Human Rights Watch conducted research in the Izium district from September 19 to October 9, interviewing over 100 people, including witnesses to landmine use, victims of landmines, first responders, doctors, and Ukrainian deminers. Everyone interviewed said they had seen mines on the ground, knew someone who was injured by one, or had been warned about their presence during Russia’s occupation of Izium.
Human Rights Watch documented PFM mine use in nine different areas in and around Izium city and verified 11 civilian casualties from these mines.
Healthcare workers said that they treated nearly 50 civilians, including at least five children, who were apparently injured from antipersonnel mines in the area during or after the Russian military occupation. About half of the injuries involved traumatic amputations of the foot or lower leg, injuries consistent with PFM blast mines.
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich Who We Are
Human Rights Watch investigates and reports on abuses happening in all corners of the world. We are roughly 550 plus people of 70-plus nationalities who are country experts, lawyers, journalists, and others who work to protect the most at risk, from vulnerable minorities and civilians in wartime, to refugees and children in need. We direct our advocacy towards governments, armed groups and businesses, pushing them to change or enforce their laws, policies and practices. To ensure our independence, we refuse government funding and carefully review all donations to ensure that they are consistent with our policies, mission, and values. We partner with organizations large and small across the globe to protect embattled activists and to help hold abusers to account and bring justice to victims.
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich Возможная причастность белорусских спецслужб
4 января 2021 года EU Observer сообщил, что в связи с убийством Шеремета были обнаружены новые доказательства, в том числе документы и аудиозаписи. Аудиофайл, предположительно являющийся записью прослушиваемой встречи в 2012 году, показывает, как Вадим Зайцев, в то время председатель КГБ, обсуждает заговор с двумя офицерами из группы КГБ «Альфа», элитного подразделения по борьбе с терроризмом. В переводе с русского один из голосов на записи говорит: «Мы должны работать с Шереметом, который является огромной занозой в заднице [неразборчиво]. Мы заложим [бомбу] и так далее, и эта гребаная крыса будет разобран на хрен куски, ноги в одну сторону, руки в другую. Если все [похоже] на естественные причины, то в сознание людей так же не влезет». также обсуждают отравление Шеремета.
У меня нет самостоятельной учебы. Я полагаюсь в основном на международные отчеты. Вы можете прочитать 51-страничный отчет УВКПЧ о проблемах, с которыми вы столкнулись. Большинство из них упоминаются в этом отчете. (и заметьте, в России эти расследования никогда бы не прозвучали вслух)
Большинство этих инцидентов вызвано вторжением агрессора в соседнюю страну. А уследить за всем в военное время сложно.
Результаты всех этих расследований, которые вы упускаете, наверное, будут видны, когда оккупанты уберутся из Украины.
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@popozz "Banning opposition parties". No, Ukraine is suspending obvious Russian 5th colonist parties during wartime. It is perfectly legal under martial law.
By the way, Putin's method is to either poison, kill or jail them.
"Banning critical media". Again, some 5th colonist media are imposed sanctions. Its supporters argue that Ukraine needs a strong regulator to fight Russian propaganda and resist Russian aggression. Zelenskiy's spokeswoman Iulia Mendel said: "These media have become one of the tools of war against Ukraine, so they are blocked in order to protect national security," adding that evidence had emerged of their being funded from Russia.
Putin has taken much more dramatical steps. The opposition media is totally closed and both their journalists and owners risk several years in jail.
"Banning critical religion". There has been taken steps against religious groups with links to the Russian Ortodox Church and leader Patriarch Kirill, who is one of the strongest cheerer of the war against Ukraine.
BTW, several priests is being jailed in Russia for saying that the war is not Gods will.
"Postponement of elections". It is wartime, no sensible countries would have an election when the country is under an invasion.
"Legal compulsory conscription". So what, Ukraine need man power. Russia has also changed their conscription.
"Banning peace talks with Russia". There has been several peace talks with Russia. Putin breaks them all or comes up with new demands.
Zelensky's 10-point peace plan: 1. Radiation and nuclear safety, focusing on restoring security around Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Zaporizhzhia in Ukraine, which is now Russian-occupied. 2. Food security, including protecting and ensuring Ukraine’s grain exports to the world’s poorest nations.
3. Energy security, with a focus on price restrictions on Russian energy resources, as well as aiding Ukraine with restoring its power infrastructure, half of which has been damaged by Russian attacks. 4. Release of all prisoners and deportees, including war prisoners and children deported to Russia.
5. Restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity and Russia reaffirming it according to the UN Charter. 6. Withdrawal of Russian troops and the cessation of hostilities, the restoration of Ukraine’s state borders with Russia. 7. Justice, including the establishment of a special tribunal to prosecute Russian war crimes.
8. The prevention of ecocide, and the protection of the environment, with a focus on demining and restoring water treatment facilities. 9. Prevention of an escalation of conflict and building security architecture in the Euro-Atlantic space, including guarantees for Ukraine.
10. Confirmation of the war’s end, including a document signed by the involved parties.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@ravenblack7052 It is you who are playing with numbers. And I don't give a sh.. if you are sick of hearing the truth! If you rather will rely on Russian propaganda, be my guest!
By the way, you forgot to quote this line from your rant: "With more than 50% of world trade, it (Ukraine) is also the main player on the sunflower oil market."
The numbers I gave is from the "GRAIN DEAL", not from the entire world export. You ought to know that, it's not rocket science!
I can present another source if you like: "According to the UN's Joint Coordination Centre, 57% of the foodstuffs exported from Ukraine over the past year went to developing countries and 43% to developed countries."
Almost 33 million tonnes of grain were shipped from Ukraine under the deal, and world food prices declined by roughly 20% as a result, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization.
The UN says that Ukraine has supplied 725,000 tonnes of grain to the World Food Programme (WFP), which was sent as humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
The EU says that over the past year, Ukraine supplied the WFP with more than 80% of all its grain, compared to 50% before the war.
It is estimated that more than 50 million people across Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Sudan are currently in need of food aid because of successive years of failed rains.
The grain deal expired on 17 July.
Since then, Russia has launched a series of air attacks on Ukraine's ports, destroying an estimated 60,000 tonnes of grain.
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@julwiezdeghorz5089 And again: THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict.
Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@globalpower6967 Since being signed in July last year, the U.N. says the Black Sea Grain Initiative has allowed more than 32 million metric tons of food commodities to be exported to 45 countries worldwide.
It is for this reason that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had described the deal as playing an “indispensable role” in global food security.
Guterres said in early July that the agreement “must continue” at a time when conflict, the climate crisis, energy prices and other factors roil the production and affordability of food, while 258 million people face hunger in 58 countries worldwide.
As of June 2023, over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
In 2021, Ukraine exported $5.87B in Wheat, making it the 5th largest exporter of Wheat in the world. At the same year, Wheat was the 3rd most exported product in Ukraine. The main destination of Wheat exports from Ukraine are: Egypt ($851M), Indonesia ($640M), Pakistan ($594M), Nigeria ($490M), and Ethiopia ($440M).
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@FirstLast-zk5ow
"Do you know anything about the Feb 2014 coup or the Minsk Agreements?"
Feb -14 “coup”:
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 “HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why do you feel you need to lie about what Poroshenko said? Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars.
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@0x0NoFear0x0 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine.
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@0x0NoFear0x0 Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@thebeatcreeper Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@thebeatcreeper There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
About Donbas, Ukraine defended their country against russian soldiers (50.000 of them in 2014-2015) and a few Ukrainian separatists.
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It's a huge difference between wanted and unwanted interference. Russia is NOT wanted in Ukraine, USA is wanted in Nigeria. (You asked about Nigeria, but I guess you meant Niger. Nevertheless, my answer is about Nigeria)
Bilateral relations between the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the United States of America were formally inaugurated when Nigeria attained its independence from Britain in 1960.
Nigerian–U.S. military cooperation under George W. Bush's administration was centred on the Africa Center for Strategic Studies and the Africa Crisis Response Initiative. In 2007, Bush's administration established the Africa Partnership Station, which has been a hub for cooperation against piracy, drug trafficking, oil theft, and border fraud in the Gulf of Guinea. Currently, Nigeria is a member of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS (D-ISIS), and the U.S. and Nigeria co-hosted a virtual D-ISIS conference in October 2020. It also receives U.S. military support as a member of the Africa Military Education Program and as a member since 2005 of the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership; and in 2020 it bought over $1.2 million in defense equipment from the U.S. In addition, a member of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been stationed permanently at the Kainji Airbase in Nigeria, to oversee key U.S. Africa Command projects there.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ukraine has been willing to negotiate the whole time. Putin has refused. What you read in Russian propaganda, is not true.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia
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More clearly about the russian tactics:
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings.
By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote.
While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military.
Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russian lie machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks. Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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"all Zelensky does is target civilians"
Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on.
"It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes.
Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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"all Zelensky does is target civilians"
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable.
Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@naas699 "90% of the times it is his own missiles". LOL, you can't seriously mean that!!??
Weapon systems in schools and hospitals? You are delusional and believe everything that comes from the Kremlin!
And no, you definitely cannot find as many reports of war crimes committed by Ukraine as by Russia!
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported.
The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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Rus sian attacks across Ukraine over the past day killed at least four people and injured at least 17, including children, regional authorities said early on July 24.
Russia launched a missile attack against Kharkiv on July 24, hitting the office of a humanitarian organization, Governor Oleh Syniehubov said.
"Today at 5 a.m., the Rus sians hit the office of the Swiss (Foundation) for Mine Action FSD with a ballistic missile," Syniehubov said on Telegram.
An industrial building, five cars, and a house were also damaged. Mayor Ihor Terekhov initially reported one person killed but later said the information could not be confirmed.
The attack was carried out with an Iskander-M ballistic missile and another missile of an unknown type, the Air Force said.
Two men aged 41 and 18 were reportedly injured in a Russian drone attack against the Lisne village around the same time.
Three children were injured during a Rus sian drone attack against Marhanets in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast on July 23, Governor Serhii Lysak said.
Residential buildings, energy infrastructure, and other property were damaged in Russian attacks against the Nikopol district over the past day, he said.
In Donetsk Oblast, three people were killed and three injured during a Rus sian attack against Lyman, Governor Vadym Filashkin reported.
Three others were injured during attacks against Marynivka, he said.
Ru ssian attacks against Kherson Oblast killed one person and injured two, Governor Oleksandr Prokudin said.
The body of a 77-year-old woman was found in the rubble in Kherson following a Ru ssian attack after midnight, he said.
Russian drones attacked a port in the Izmail district of Odesa Oblast overnight, injuring three people and causing damage, Governor Oleh Kiper said.
The initial strike against the city targeted the industrial zone within one of Kharkiv's districts. The second strike impacted a residential area, causing a fire to break out in one of the houses.
Local governor Oleh Syniehubov said at around 7 a.m. that two men were injured in the drone attack on the Malodanylivska community, located approximately 15 kilometers north of Kharkiv. Horse stables were set on fire.
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@JohnAkaSB During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
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@JohnAkaSB Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
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@JohnAkaSB On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
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@JohnAkaSB Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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@lassel1344 It is not true!
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
So there wasn't any real peace deal in Turkey.
J
ohnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@lassel1344 As for the Bennet interview:
Businessinsider:
As recounted in the interview, Bennett visited Russia a few months before the war, where he then relayed to Putin a request from Zelenskyy to meet. "They're Nazis, they're warmongers, I won't meet him," Putin responded, in Bennett's telling.
After the war began in February 2022, Bennett said he tried again to work as an intermediary between Putin and Zelensky, acknowledging that his primary interest was his own country's security.
Bennett, who left office in June 2022, was also concerned about the fate of Jews in Russia and Ukraine, he said.
In the weeks following the invasion, Bennett said he spoke with both Putin and Zelenskyy, and even made a secret trip to Moscow, in an effort to negotiate an end to the conflict. At the time, Zelenskyy himself noted that the Israeli prime minister was "trying to find a way of holding talks," a fact for which "we are grateful."
After his interview drew the attention of Musk, the former Israeli prime minister himself went on Twitter to correct some of the commentary.
"It's unsure there was any deal to be made," Bennett said in response to Musk. "At the time I gave it roughly a 50% chance. Americans felt chances were way lower. Hard to tell who was right."
He continued: "It's not sure such a deal was desirable. At the time I thought so, but only time will tell."
In the interview, Bennett himself notes that it was not the US, France, or Germany that put an end to any peace talks. Rather, it was Russia slaughtering hundreds of civilians in a town outside the Ukrainian capital, a war crime discovered just about a month after the full-scale invasion began.
"The Bucha massacre, once that happened, I said: 'It's over,'" Bennett recalled.
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@walterbrunswick Since you are a bit slow, i will post this again:
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@edward6438 - Have you heard about Stalin's pact with Hitler in 1939? Hitler should get West Europe and Russia should get the East. Russia attacked Poland and the Baltic states. Only when Hitler broke the pact, Russia fought against the nazis.
- Have you heard about the Arctic/Murmansk Convoys? Stalin called Churchill for help in 1941. US and UK organized 1400 ships to transport millions of tons of supplies and munitions to help Russia fight Hitler.
- Have you heard about D-day in Normandy?
At the time, the D-Day invasion was the largest naval, air and land operation in history, and within a few days about 326,000 troops, more than 50,000 vehicles and some 100,000 tons of equipment had landed. By August 1944, all of northern France had been liberated, and in spring of 1945 the Allies had defeated the Germans. Historians often refer to D-Day as the beginning of the end of World War II.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@lucasholy7821 Metro,uk: Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
Since then Russia has gone on to suffer as many as 200,000 casualties as well as a number of humiliating defeats, including losing Black Sea flagship the Moskva and the partial destruction of the Kerch Bridge, which links Russia to occupied-Crimea.
Meanwhile Zelensky remains in power and has seen his approval ratings amongst Ukrainians skyrocket to over 90% since the conflict began, rising from a pre-war nadir of just 27%.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy.
But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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HT is lying again!
BUCHAREST – Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said on Tuesday that attacks in neighbouring Ukraine happened “very, very close” to its border, with Russia repeatedly launching drone strikes on Danube infrastructure in southern Ukraine.
“We had attacks... which were verified at 800m from our border. So very, very close,” Mr Iohannis told a joint press conference with Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel.
On Monday, the Nato member country denied claims by Kyiv that Iranian-made Russian drones fell and detonated on Romanian territory during a strike on the Ukrainian port of Izmail.
“There was no piece, and no drone and no other part of any device that made it to Romania,” Mr Iohannis said at Tuesday’s press conference, echoing comments made on Monday by the Defence Ministry.
“But yes, we are concerned because these attacks are taking place within a very short distance from the Romanian border,” Mr Iohannis added, speaking from the Cincu military base in central Romania.
“But we are alert,” he said.
Bucharest has strongly condemned the Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Danube infrastructure.
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@Emma.Ari123 Bullshit, you are lying!
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who has Nazi tattoos?"
The Russian nationalist Aleksei Milchakov for instance. Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies. The group, and Milchakov himself, have been credibly linked to atrocities in Ukraine and in Syria.
Less attention has been paid over the years to right-wing Russian militias fighting on behalf of Russia, not just in Ukraine but also in Syria.
While some fighters are believed to have joined the ranks of Russian private mercenary companies -- Wagner is the best known -- an unknown number of fighters joined, and trained under, Rusich, as well as the Russian Imperial Movement and its paramilitary unit, the Russian Imperial Legion.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the founders of Wagner is openly a nazi.
Percievedreality, do you need more?
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@gbadamositimilehin9467 Since you're not that smart:
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@esense9602 In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
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@babuvangu7220 Nuland interview with Novaya Gazeta:
NG: My first question is, what do you think about this suspending of New START treaty by President Putin? Will the United States somehow answer on this?
Nuland: I’d like to remind that this suspension is frankly not new. It’s new that President Putin announced it to the country. But in fact, Russia has not allowed inspections, nor has it come to inspect us since 2020, and it has not agreed to sit down at the table for the bilateral commission to go over mutual implementation. We tried very hard in ‘23 to reestablish that contact and to allow for Russian inspections, and it was the Kremlin that said no.
So we think it’s highly irresponsible for us not to be implementing the New START treaty. We do not plan any changes to our posture. We are not planning to test, we are not planning to build new weapons. But the U.S. and Russia have a responsibility to the world to be good stewards of nuclear weapons. So we urge Russia to reconsider and allow the implementation of the treaty fully.
NG: Okay. Thank you so much. Putin insists that, you know, that the United States want to strategically defeat Russia, and that is why he needs to raise stakes with the nuclear weapons. Is, well, do United States really have such kind of plans against Russia’s, kind of strategical defeating?
Nuland: The only thing we want is for Russia to get out of Ukraine and allow Ukraine to be a free, independent country, a good neighbor to everybody. This war is completely Putin’s decision and it’s based on his own vain ideas of conquest. And it’s tragic. It’s tragic for Ukraine, obviously, but it’s equally tragic for Russia. 200,000 of Russia’s sons dead or wounded in this war.
A million of the best and brightest, including yourself, have fled Russia because they don’t want to participate in this. And sanctions that we’ve had to put on are mortgaging Russia’s future. The complete end to your energy and economic relationship with Europe. It really is sad. I want to ask President Putin, what are the Russian people getting out of this? Nothing.
NG: Thank you so much. How do you think what is the main result of this, of the year of the war, including Europe, Ukraine, Russia, the United States?
Nuland: Well, obviously, you know, for Ukraine, it has been the most difficult year in her history, or at least since World War Two. But the response from the Ukrainian people has been unbelievable. You know, I remember those first weeks of war where we really thought a hundred battalions of Russian forces encircling Ukraine would conquer Kiev, would topple the government, and the Ukrainians’ brave resistance on the battlefield.
But also every Ukrainian family that has worked to sustain the country, including in the context of brutal attacks on the heating system, the water system. So their ability to stay united and to fight back has been truly amazing. I will say that this war has also united the allies and partners of the Western nations. It’s made NATO’s stronger.
Putin thought he would break NATO, but instead we have more money, more troops, more unity than before this war. I think the saddest part, apart from the destruction of Ukraine itself and its difficulty, as I said, has been what’s happened to Russia from Putin’s choices. You know, he’s been in power for 20 years. He could have spent that time building his own country, its economy, its education, its technology, its integration with us moving from being simply an energy and weapons power to being the diverse power that that Russia should be.
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@EdC-x9j Russia did also agree to the Minsk, but they broke it anyway!
NATO is not expanding (wasn't even a promise, according to Gorbachev, he should know) . Those countries seek to NATO because they know Russia will hurt them.
I understand that you don't know what I'm talking about. Your country have fuc... you over with lies and propaganda for decades, you probably don't know better!
The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,”
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@chrisyarnold6205 Russian lies and propaganda!
Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.)
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@chrisyarnold6205 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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April 20, 2024: Russia is still determined that Ukraine must become Russian, and that Russia has the right to rule over its neighbour, says Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. It is only the westernmost part of Ukraine that is still unclear, said Sergey Lavrov in an interview with several broadcasters in Moscow on Friday. Otherwise, there will only be "one Ukraine, which is through Russian, which will be part of Russia, which will speak Russian, and which will educate its children", he said further and determined that there are no other alternatives.
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@aliklili 1. (it is a collection of imperialist (!!!!) European countries!!!!)". Can you give some examples of which countries have been taken over by European NAT0 members??
We only have one im perial'st state in the world for the last decades, and that state is Ruz zia.
2. You're not very good at geography either, are you?
3. "Europe is heavily influenced by the US". BS!!
"Since Washington regarded Moscow as its enemy and rival". Why didn't you say: since Moscow regarded Washington (and the rest of the free world) as its enemy and rival???
"it used many European countries to contain and control Moscow with their help!!!". Now you are just ridiculous!🤣Are you a well known conspiracy theorist, BTW?
"and in response several countries promised to raise spending to 2%". A response to what????🤔
"In addition, the US has taken advantage of the UA crisis to sell more weapons to Europe and increase its military deployment against RU". It's against ANY threats, but yes, you are quite right, Ruz zia is the most aggressive state. You reap what you sow!!
"The current RU-UA crisis has also strengthened Washington's control over N@TO members in Europe." Again, BS! It's the opposite.
And you keep calling the ruz zian im perial'st war "The current RU-UA crisis". How come? If Ruz zia had kept those kleptomaniac fingers out of Ukraine, you wouldn't be in this mess!!! Again, you reap what you sow!!
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@hernandocortez6351 Trump consistently added fuel to the fire, increasing troop levels, deepening reliance on private contractors, and dramatically scaling up aerial warfare. Where an end to endless war requires repealing the 2001 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force, Trump expanded conflicts under both. His term saw four consecutive years of growth of an already out-of-control Pentagon budget. And loosening even the minimal restrictions that were already in place, he expanded the US deadly and unaccountable drone wars.
Not only did Trump not end the wars he promised to, he worsened them, dropping more bombs, stoking further conflict, undermining the prospects of peace, and massively increasing the rate of civilian deaths.
All in on Yemen — U.S. support for the Saudi- and UAE-led intervention in the war in Yemen is one of the most egregious examples of destructive militarist foreign policymaking in years. Not only did Trump do nothing to end U.S. complicity himself, he repeatedly used his veto power to override bipartisan majorities in Congress that tried to stop U.S. military involvement and block the flow of arms to the conflict.
He assassinated an Iranian general and supported Jerusalem as Israels capital. Both cases worsened the conflict in the Middle east. He held military operations against Syria.
Trump shredded the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, withdrew from the Open Skies Treaty that ensured transparency between the U.S., much of Europe, and Russia, and failed to extend the critical New START Treaty with Russia. He took an inconsistent, self-serving, and often antagonistic approach to negotiations with North Korea that nearly took us to nuclear war. Oh, and he wanted to nuke hurricanes. In short: the world is closer to nuclear war than it was before Trump took office.
Selling weapons to dictators, to trying to launch a new drone war in Kenya, to stoking a Cold War with China, the list of reasons Trump is undeserving of the “anti-war” title is endless.
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@ruiddd956 You are lying! The snipers where under the command of the russian friendly Yanukovych, probably Spetnaz snipers.
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@GeneSlasten Sorry, but you have fallen for the russian propaganda!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@hopetonedwards3038 Official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, 2westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a 2Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia's lie machine:
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology".
Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative.
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication:
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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China praises Ukraine talks in Saudi that Russia said were ‘doomed to fail’
Beijing on Monday praised ongoing talks aimed at finding a formula for peace in Ukraine, after a Chinese envoy attended a weekend summit in Saudi Arabia that was slammed by Russia as “doomed to fail.”
China said the two-day meeting, which took place in the Gulf kingdom’s port sea city of Jeddah, helped “to consolidate international consensus” on finding a peaceful solution to the conflict, Reuters reported, citing a Chinese foreign ministry statement.
The talks brought together more than 40 nations, including Ukraine, the United States, European states, and the BRICS group of countries – perhaps none as closely watched as China, Russia’s most powerful ally.
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internetresearchagency2238 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@JohnAkaSB In a report published in November based on Russian media reports, the Institute for the Study of War, a U.S. think tank, said hundreds of soldiers were believed to have deserted and were hiding in at least seven locations in Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
"The morale and psychological state of Russian forces in the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts are exceedingly low," the report said. "Significant losses on the battlefield, mobilization to the front lines without proper training, and poor supplies have led to cases of desertion."
Viktoria, the wife of another soldier who appeared in the video, says her husband, Ivan, was sent to the front line with little or no preparation. After he received his orders to report for duty on October 23, she says they began quickly buying personal equipment for him: clothing, first-aid kits, berets. He was issued a sleeping bag and a uniform at the recruitment office.
Ivan told her that commanders ordered them to start attacks, but Ukrainian artillery opened up, and they ran for 7 kilometers, she says. "'We don't even have anything to defend ourselves with; no equipment, nothing, just the guns in our hands,'" she quoted him as saying.
After that, Viktoria says, the unit began refusing orders to return to the front line. "They want to charge them with desertion for this. And they say: 'We have nothing to fight with. Why should we go up against tanks with only machine guns?'" she said.
"There are quite a lot of guys, and they all seem to be sticking together" as a unit, she said. "But now they are trying to split them up so that they can't resist."
After they were taken out, she said, the unit told its commanders: "We won't go further. It makes no sense for us to go up against tanks with these weapons. What are we, cannon fodder?"
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@jakagorjan1164 There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimize regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Hopefully someone will write an UNBIASED book, stating facts and allowing the readers to form their own judgments. Everything I said can be fact checked and verified." Here are some more REAL truth:
The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day.
The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what) Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the South-Eastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. They are looting and plunder all over. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia. The Russians in the now occupied Donbass has started indoctrination of children. All history books that mention Ukraine as a nation are forbidden and burned. The children have to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian (both languages was teach before). Also many children are kidnapped/deportet to Russia. Mostly those who the authoroties suspects are pro-Ukrainian. Some of them far East in Russia, where they have small chances for returning home.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There was no foreign backed coup, unless you mean the high pressure from Russia to change course?
Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a series of events began that led to his ousting as president. Amid ECONOMIC PRESSURE FROM RUSSIA, YANUKOVYCH SUDDENLY CHANGED HIS MIND and withdrew from signing an association agreement with the EU, instead accepting a Russian trade deal and loan bailout. This sparked mass protests against Yanukovych, dubbed the "Euromaidan", which met a harsh response from authorities. The civil unrest peaked in February 2014, when almost 100 protesters were killed by police. Yanukovych signed an agreement with the opposition, but he secretly fled the capital later that day. The next day, 22 February, Ukraine's parliament voted to remove him from his post and schedule early elections on the grounds that he had withdrawn from his constitutional duties, rather than through the impeachment process.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who has Nazi tattoos? Answer me honestly." You have had this answer many times, but you don't listen!
- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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You are lying as usual!
Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine. We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime. It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights.
The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion. It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.”
The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names. Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russian lie machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ukraine has been willing to negotiate the whole time. Putin has refused. What you read in Russian propaganda, is not true. MINSK I Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015. It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West. The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
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In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@73chengosaro4 You must be joking! Russian use of cluster munitions is widely known.
The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–present) has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations. In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion. As of July 1, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported. Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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albinvega7008 The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
There are many more examples, but I think I'll stop here. Everyone will see that RUSSIA ARE USING cluster bombs!
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@bumperbrown8226 Hmm, another denier who won't face the truth. What's wrong with you people? Are you ashamed, or are you really so brain washed by the Kremlin propaganda?
UN report: As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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The most shameful thing is to accuse others of what you yourself are. Typical russian behavior!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Every opposition politician in Russia are either killed or in prison on fabricated charges!
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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"Poroshenko said, “Our children will go to schools and kindergartens—theirs will hide in the basements”. YOU LIE AS USUAL!
Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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@alphabogeyman7462 "how many priests have been arrest by Putin?."
Ioann Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Furthermore, the priest did not want to comment on the speech of the Russian Patriarch Kirill. Burdin: "I will die and stand before God. The Patriarch will not answer God for me. I will answer for myself, for what I did and said. The same applies to the Patriarch: he will appear before God, and I will not be responsible for him, but he himself."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
@alphabogeyman7462 , do you need more examples??
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@neverknowsbest2879 So all these cases are a bluff?: Do you guys really know nothing??
F.Times: Russian law bans journalists from calling Ukraine conflict a 'war' or an 'invasion'.
In order to control what the Russian public knows about invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin has signed a law that imposes stiff sentences on journalists who air "false information."
Journalists could be jailed for up to 15 years.
Standing in the metal cage of a Siberian courtroom, Russian journalist Maria Ponomarenko this week closed her trial, triggered by a social media post about the war in Ukraine, by dismissing the entire process as a sham.
“What is happening to our country? If there’s a war, call it a war,” she told the judge. The next day, Ponomarenko, a mother of two, was sentenced to six years, becoming the first journalist imprisoned under Russia’s tough new censorship laws, which include a ban on the word “war”.
Across Russia, hundreds of other cases related to antiwar speech and protests are now going through the courts, making the past 12 months the worst period for political repression in the country’s modern history.
Around 20,000 people were detained for political and antiwar protests last year, according to human rights group OVD-Info. Most were held only for short stints and issued a minor offence, but receiving a second leaves them open to as much as a five-year jail term.
At least 440 people — artists, priests, teachers, students and doctors — have had criminal cases opened against them, according to OVD-Info. Many are awaiting trial in jail, and some face sentences of up to 15 years. Others have fled the country.
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@saiscrypto9520 Here are the 10 poorest countries in Europe (PPP GNI):
1. Ukraine: $13,360
2. Kosovo: $15,260
3. Moldova: $15,310
4. Albania: $18,210
5. North Macedonia: $19,290
6. Bosnia And Herzegovina: $20,220
7. Belarus: $21,800
8. Serbia: $22,720
9. Montenegro: $27,530
10. Bulgaria: $32,520
11. Russia: $35,770
Then follows 34 other countries in the list
45. Luxembourg: $142,490
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The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
Leak from the Kremlin
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". - Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers.
Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy.
But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky banned all opposition and recently arrested a leading priest."
All opposition in Russia are poisoned or in jail.
Priest arrested in Russia:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 “HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA.
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks. Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
- Between April 17 and May 31, 2022, Human Rights Watch interviewed 54 civilians in the towns and villages of Mykhailo-Kotsiubynske and Yahidne in the northern Chernihiv region; Malaya Rohan, Pokotylivka, Selekstiine, and Yakovlivka in the eastern Kharkiv region; and from Polohy in the southern Zaporizhzhia region. Researchers visited all of these locations except for Polohy due to ongoing fighting but interviewed residents who had fled the village.
In Yahidne, Russian forces unlawfully held nearly 350 civilians for a month in the basement of a schoolhouse near the front lines that the Russians used as a military base. Ukrainian attacks in those areas damaged homes and other structures.
In Malaya Rohan, Russian forces set up a base at a farm, where they parked dozens of military vehicles. The soldiers unlawfully prevented civilians from leaving the area. On March 26, an exchange of artillery fire resulted in damage to a nearby farm and the death of 140 livestock.
Russian forces took control of Malaya Rohan village, five kilometers east of Kharkiv, on February 27. Human Rights Watch researchers visited the village on May 24 and interviewed eight residents.
Vasyl Osmachko, 74, said that Russian forces set up a checkpoint near his home soon after they arrived, and that tanks regularly drove up and down his street. He and his neighbors said Russian forces never took any steps to evacuate the civilian population as the Russians set up their military presence in the village, and they did not let civilians through their checkpoints, preventing them from leaving the village or going to other neighborhoods.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
Reports on the use of cluster munitions raised concerns about the high numbers of civilian casualties and the long-lasting danger of unexploded ordnance. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, weapons equipped with cluster munitions have been used both by Russian armed forces and pro-Russian separatists, as well as to a lesser degree by Ukrainian armed forces.
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@JocoMarkovic-gf1eh How do you explain this, wiseguy:
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements (Protocol of 5 September 2014, Memorandum of 19 September 2014 and Package of measures of 12 February 2015) are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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«Дружелюбная, честная Россия»🤣
«Я думаю, что в ЕС много правых партий, откуда и идет этот хаос и ненависть к, на мой взгляд, дружественной, честной России».
Посмотрите повнимательнее, какие партии поддерживают фашистскую Россию. Да, именно правые партии!
Кстати, постарайтесь не убивать все, что стоит на пути вашей злобы. Может быть, не было бы к вам столько ненависти.
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@basook6116 That's what I thought, you know nothing!
Diplomat Wolfgang Sporrer:
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
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@basook6116 The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
The third reason for the failure — and this may sound banal now, but it is true — is that it has not been possible to meet in person since the end of 2019 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. As little as the Minsk agreements were actually implemented in practice, they did help to build trust.
The very fact that the parties were sitting around a table had a de-escalating effect. You don’t get the same sort of benefit online. For that, you need coffee breaks, shared meals, unofficial contacts and the like. If you lose the seemingly ancillary aspects of diplomatic talks, such a process is doomed to failure. With the Minsk process, therefore, an early-warning instrument pointing to a possible escalation of the conflict was also lost.
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@alexanderg-p3z Metro,2022: Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
Since then Russia has gone on to suffer as many as 200,000 casualties as well as a number of humiliating defeats, including losing Black Sea flagship the Moskva and the partial destruction of the Kerch Bridge, which links Russia to occupied-Crimea.
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@sandrama22 Russia doesn't bomb innocent people?? They have let it rain bombs and missiles over innocent people for nearly two years now.
During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
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@sandrama22 Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv.
There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity. When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education. "Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools.
To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total." "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots
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@DebrajMondal-q4o You are not interested in the truth?
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@DebrajMondal-q4o - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@DebrajMondal-q4o What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@Independent_Voices uhhh, you did READ my posts?? Here's one more:
Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@ceroid3752 Why do you tell lies that is easily debunked by a google search? Ukraine fought russian soldiers in Donbas!
The Revolution of Dignity:
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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From wiki: The Wagner Group, officially known as PMC Wagner, is a RUSSIAN STATE FUNDED paramilitary organization. It is a private military company composed of mercenaries, and has been described as a de facto private army of Russian President Vladimir Putin's former close ally Yevgeny Prigozhin. The group operates beyond the law in Russia, where private military companies are officially forbidden. There is evidence that Wagner was used as a proxy by the Russian government, allowing the Russian state to have plausible deniability for military operations abroad, and allowing it to hide the true casualties of Russia's foreign interventions. Wagner used Russian Armed Forces infrastructure and was secretly funded by the Russian state until 2023. While the group is not ideologically driven, elements of Wagner are linked to NEO-NAZISM and far-right extremism.
The group was founded in 2014 by former GRU officer Dmitry Utkin and businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin. It came to prominence during the Donbas War in Ukraine, where it helped pro-Russian separatist forces from 2014 to 2015. Its contractors have reportedly taken part in conflicts around the world, including the civil wars in Syria, Libya, the Central African Republic and Mali, often fighting on the side of forces aligned with the Russian government. Wagner operatives are accused of committing war crimes including murder, torture, rape and robbery of civilians, as well as torturing accused deserters.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 On the first of march 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement.
Putins wet dream of reestablish the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbass.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. Germany was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted).
As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe. They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion. Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely. Back to its historical boundaries, e.g. from 1460 (small area around Moscow).
The world must prepare for an armed peace, with EU and NATO membership for Ukraine as the only credible guarantee against new adventures from the Gremlins. What happens inside the remnants of Muscovia and North Korea is their own problem. After a certain point there is no point in trying to help a mafia regime. Too bad for the population, but then they'd rather get rid of the regime themselves.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst
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"I'm a Nazi. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
“You have to understand that when you kill a person, you feel the excitement of the hunt. If you’ve never been hunting, you should try it. It’s interesting,” he said.
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies. The group, and Milchakov himself, have been credibly linked to atrocities in Ukraine and in Syria.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group Rusich, is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
According to a confidential report by Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service, which was obtained by Der Spiegel and excerpted on May 22, numerous Russian right-wing extremists and neo-Nazis are fighting in Ukraine.
German analysts wrote that the fact that Russian military and political leaders have welcomed neo-Nazi groups undermines the claim by Putin and his government that one of the principal motives behind the invasion is the desire to “de-Nazify” Ukraine, Spiegel said.
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@bettiromani2912 Most Russians get their information from state TV, so they accept the absurd notion that the Russian help and presence in Eastern Ukraine are necessary in order to defend the local population from Ukrainian Nazis, who are in turn controlled by Americans.
Meanwhile, Russian and Ukrainian Internet lately presents a lot of material showing Russian nationalists – extremists and neo-Nazis – fighting in the Eastern Ukraine on the side of the separatists and against the Ukrainian army.
Among fighters for the Russian ideas are activists supported by the Russian government and criminals wanted by Russian police.
Some of them are just ordinary young hoodlums, some are well known politicians.
The most famous Russian fighting in Donbas is Alexander Barkashov, the creator and leader of “All-Russian civic patriotic movement Russian National Unity” (RNU).
The RNU was founded in October 1990. At the peak of its popularity in 1999, RNU was estimated to have 100,000 active members all over Russia. Members wear black and camouflage uniforms; the group adopted a red and white modified swastika emblem, openly expressed admiration for German national socialism and publicly celebrated the rise of the Nazis.
In 2014, when the war in Donbas started, many of RNU members joined pro-Russian forces in Ukraine. Back then the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense claimed that a telephone conversation of Barkashov and a local Donetsk activist Boitsov was intercepted. Reportedly Barkashov said to Boitsov that he could call off the referendum on independence of the territory. Barkashov said that it is not necessary to perform referendum the legit way. He said that in the end no one would care about it. All that Boitsov has to do is to write whatever he finds suitable. If he wants, he can say that 99% of people voted for joining Russia.
One of the other fighters is Alexei Milchakov from a neo-Nazi St. Petersburg organization “Rusich”.
The separatists’ poster presents Milchakov as “The pride and the glory of Russia”.
Milchakov is indeed ‘famous’. One can find a lot of his pictures self published on the Internet.
Living in Russia prior to his coming to Ukraine, he entertained himself by killing puppies, and publishing photos of the activity.
The terrorist group, in which he was fighting in Donbas used to have a SM account (not active at this moment) administered by Milchakov. On June 29, 2015, he posted pictures of Ukrainian prisoners of war with mutilated faces.
Another picture, made near Luhansk in September 2014, shows an ear, which was cut off from a Ukrainian soldier.
Among Donbas militants there are those recognized as criminals even by Russian law. Paradoxically many of them became what they now are with the help of Russian state grants.
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@skr50291
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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herbertfuchs3599 You lie again! Gorbachev said that it was never a promise. I'll take his word over your any day!
Besides, NATO is not "expanding". Those countries seek to NATO for protection against the neighborhood bully.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. Germany was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted).
As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe. They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion.
Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely. Back to its historical boundaries, e.g. from 1460 (small area around Moscow). The world must prepare for an armed peace, with EU and NATO membership for Ukraine as the only credible guarantee against new adventures from the Gremlins. What happens inside the remnants of Muscovia and North Korea is their own problem. After a certain point there is no point in trying to help a mafia regime. Too bad for the population, but then they'd rather get rid of the regime themselves.
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Hmm, which God do you follow: A Waiheke Community Board member has been found guilty of assaulting a 14-year-old boy who wandered on to his property looking for a lost dog.
N. Ceramalus hit the boy, who cannot be identified, on the head with a branch that was described as "two inches wide" and "two or three feet long" on the afternoon of May 25.
The boy and his friend had been walking two family dogs through a section of bush when one of the pets, a 3kg chihuahua dressed in a little jacket, ran away after hearing a noise.
The boys chased the dog and found themselves in Ceramalus' section, which is also surrounded in bush.
"I went to pick up [the dog] to leave because I knew it wasn't our property," the boy, who is now 15, told the court yesterday. "Mr Ceramalus walked out of the house. He yelled at us and asked us what we were doing on his property.
"I apologised and was trying to leave his property and he started waving [his arms] around saying 'get off my property'.
"I saw him pick up a stick and I started to walk faster and he whacked me on the head with a bit of wood.
"I turned around and said 'you can't hit a child on the head with a stick'. He said 'it doesn't matter because it will never hold up in court'."
But, after a day-long hearing in the Auckland District Court yesterday, the charge did stick when Judge Greg Davis found Ceramalus guilty of assault.
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Putin has robbed his country for over 20 years now.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
Corruption index 2022: 1. Denmark 2. Finland 9. Germany 18. UK 24. USA 85. India 101. Serbia 116. Ukraine 137. RUSSIA 171. North Korea 180. Somalia
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We just saw what Putin's word is worth. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! He made peace with Prigozhin, but .......
And there have been numerous peace talks between Ukraine and Russia. Putin doesn't want peace!
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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War Tears as a credible source?? A kremlin information warfare site!🤣
July, 2023: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
August, a leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@meledus3852 Try reading something else than russian propaganda!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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As of May 2023, over 30 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
Since being signed in July last year, the U.N. says the Black Sea Grain Initiative has allowed more than 32 million metric tons of food commodities to be exported to 45 countries worldwide.
It is for this reason that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had described the deal as playing an “indispensable role” in global food security.
Guterres said in early July that the agreement “must continue” at a time when conflict, the climate crisis, energy prices and other factors roil the production and affordability of food, while 258 million people face hunger in 58 countries worldwide.
In 2021, Ukraine exported $5.87B in Wheat, making it the 5th largest exporter of Wheat in the world. At the same year, Wheat was the 3rd most exported product in Ukraine. The main destination of Wheat exports from Ukraine are: Egypt ($851M), Indonesia ($640M), Pakistan ($594M), Nigeria ($490M), and Ethiopia ($440M).
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@72marshflower15 Why should I look up "a Night ....." for proof? What proof is that?? And what's that got to do with anything? I'll tell you, absolutely nothing!!
There are far right groups in every country on the planet. And RUSSIA is one of the countries with the biggest problems with Nazis. So what's your point!? Putin himself is an authoritarian leader with fascist elements.
And why are you bringing up the US in the first place? It is Russia that cowardly has attacked it's neighbor. Every democratic and civilized nation have a duty to help the victim for such an aggression. It is you that need a reality check!
"The U.S. backed the Nazis in Germany to harm yesterday’s USSR just as the U.S. is backing the Nazis in Ukraine to harm todays Russia."
This nonsense is the most idiotic thing I've read in here! Brain damage level 10.
I trust these guys a lot more than a stoned guy on HT: A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media.
According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Putin has arrested all of his political opponents. Those are the lucky ones, the rest is poisoned/killed.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers.
Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russian lie machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed.
Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset.
All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks. Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa
‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”. Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers).
More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations.
That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@wolfswinkel8906 "They didn't even touch ukraine's infrastructure until the Kerch bridge was hit the first time." 🤣Djeezes what a liar!
During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at.
Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances.
There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@wolfswinkel8906 "They didn't even touch ukraine's infrastructure until the Kerch bridge was hit the first time." Some more facts for you:
December 2022: The largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion!!!
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group.
Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, 2westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a 2Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
Putin was never gonna respect the Minsk agreements, in fact he has never held any agreements. It was just a game to fool Ukraine and the rest of the world.
He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
By the way, what do you think will happen to a potential separatist group working inside Russia? How long do you think they will live? One day? Two days? On the first of march 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putins wet dream of reestablish the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". - Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers.
Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. -
That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia is arresting priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@kleanthisxanthopoulos4697 An investigation by the Associated Press and FRONTLINE has found the Laodicea, owned by Syria, is part of a sophisticated Russian-run smuggling operation that has used falsified manifests and seaborne subterfuge to steal Ukrainian grain worth at least $530 million — cash that has helped feed President Vladimir Putin’s war machine.
AP used satellite imagery and marine radio transponder data to track three dozen ships making more than 50 voyages carrying grain from Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine to ports in Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and other countries. Reporters reviewed shipping manifests, searched social media posts, and interviewed farmers, shippers and corporate officials to uncover the details of the massive smuggling operation.
Meanwhile, the Russian military has attacked farms, grain silos and shipping facilities still under Ukrainian control with artillery and air strikes, destroying food, driving up prices and reducing the flow of grain from a country long known as the breadbasket of Europe.
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@csking6377 Russia blew up the dam to prevent the Ukraine forces advancing. The explosion must have come from inside the dam. No explosions from the outside would have been strong enough to do that kind of damage. And the Russians had full control of the dam. And because the dam was built during Soviet times, Moscow had every page of the engineering drawings and knew where it was.
The dam was built with an enormous concrete block at its base. A small passageway runs through it, reachable from the dam's machine room. It was in this passageway, the evidence suggests, that an explosive charge detonated and destroyed the dam. In the chaotic aftermath, with each side blaming the other for the collapse, multiple explanations are theoretically possible. But the evidence clearly suggests the dam was crippled by an explosion set off by the side that controls it: Russia.
Ihor Strelets, an engineer who served as the deputy head of water resources for the Dnipro River from 2005 until 2018, said that as a Cold War construction project, the dam’s foundation was designed to withstand almost any kind of external attack. Mr. Strelets said he, too, had concluded that an explosion within the gallery destroyed part of the concrete structure, and that other sections then were torn away by the force of the water. “I do not want my theory to be correct,” Mr. Strelets said. A large explosion in the gallery might mean the total loss of the dam. “But that is the only explanation,” he said.
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@Faiez-rh1gm If Russia is so concerned over poor countries, why do he only give 25.000 - 50.000 tons of grain to Africa? Last year Ukraine exported 19.000.000 metric tons of grain to developing countries. And why don't he offer grain to the World Food Program, who delivers grain to the most needed countries?
Since 2021, the U.S. Government has helped close more than 900 deals across 47 African countries for a total estimated value of $22 billion in two-way trade and investment. As the Administration’s flagship infrastructure initiative, the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII) is helping to advance and scale several of these public and private investments across the continent.
U.S. national security adviser: "The U.S. will commit $55 billion to Africa over the course of the next three years, across a wide range of sectors, to tackle the core challenges of our time," Sullivan said. "These commitments build on the United States' long-standing leadership and partnership in development, economic growth, health and security in Africa."
So far in 2023, The U.S. has provided more than 4 billion USD on humanitarian aid to Africa.
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Russians do what Russians do best, kill civilians!
During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion.
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@fred4687 Amnesty International:
One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months.
LET US BE CLEAR: the hands of Vladimir PUTIN and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II.
And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defense when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them.
It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@jimmyc974 Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@brownpleasure9320 Are you talking about the restaurant in Kramatorsk?
The pizza restaurant which housed up to 80 customers and staff at that time, were hit by a missile strike. Thirteen people (4 children) were killed, a 17-year-old girl, a pair of 14-year old twin sisters, while 61 were injured in the explosions.
Several photographers and correspondents were having dinner when the missiles struck. They included three Colombians: novelist and journalist Héctor Abad Faciolince, Catalina Gómez Ángel, a correspondent for France 24 and Sergio Jaramillo Caro, who recently served as the country’s high commissioner for peace. “Russia has attacked three defenseless Colombian civilians, violating the protocols of war,” said Colombian president Gustavo Petro, adding that the country would lodge a diplomatic complaint.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.)
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@hadinapokalix7329 In August 2023: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@RustedCroaker In just one year, nearly 3,000 cases have been brought before Russian military courts involving soldiers who have defied President Vladimir Putin's orders to fight.
Now, for the first time, a woman has been sentenced. Madina Kabalojeva, who is pregnant, was sentenced to six years in a penal colony by a military court in Vladikavkaz for defying Putin's 'partial' mobilization orders, according to various Russian and international media outlets, including Kommersant and DOXA.
The sentence will be postponed until 2032, when her eldest child turns 14. Kabalojeva claims that a military doctor advised her to leave the service due to her pregnancy and having a five-year-old child, but the prosecution did not accept this.
Her lawyer, Roman Rabadanov, believes the court's decision is illegal and plans to appeal.
After Putin ordered mobilization, sanctions were tightened. What previously resulted in a maximum of five years in prison was suddenly doubled.
New sanctions were also added, making 'unauthorized surrender' punishable by up to ten years in prison. According to Mediazona, three times as many people have already been sentenced since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"It's not surprising that Russian men don't want to die at the front. When you see that convicts are being taken out of prison to serve as soldiers, it also shows how far Russia is willing to go to find soldiers and that there are recruitment problems."
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@rickyjensen9088 Minsk -91 was about dissolution of the Soviet Union. I'm sure you saw that I commented on Minsk from 2014 -2015.
The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared.
The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed, in jail on false charges, or had to flee the country.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties." BULLSH.T!
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@tia904 - During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at.
Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured.
“Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@johnwi-l_l-iamsf3763 Numbering 12,556 tanks, the Russian Federation has the largest fleet in their arsenal by far, from the workhorse T-72 series to the ultra-advanced T-14 Armata.
But the headline number misses nuances in the composition of the Russian tank fleet.
Of Russia’s nearly 13,000 active combat tanks, only a fraction are main battle tanks. A 2021 Russian source estimated that their operational main battle fleet was closer to 2,600 tanks, made up of T-72s, T-80s, and T-90s, with another 400 T-72 variants used as range tanks.
On top of that, only one-quarter of those are considered modern tanks—T-72B3/B3M, T-80-BVM, and T-90A/M—that is, fitted with up-to-date fire control systems and sighting. That’s why, on top of poor morale, inadequate logistics, and inflexible tactics, Russia has struggled to perform on the Ukrainian battlefield despite having more than six times the number of tanks (12,556 vs. 1,890).
The Military Balance 2023, an annual report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank, said Russia began the war in February 2022 with 3,417 available tanks, compared to Ukraine's 987. Heavy Russian losses coupled with a steady stream of donations from Ukraine's Western allies, though, have helped even the score in intervening months.
The most recent estimates from Bloomberg put Ukraine's tank count at 1,500 active tanks, compared to about 1,400 for Russia. But Russia has many more in storage of older tanks.
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One word: Syria.
“On one hand, Iran provides Russia with drones, but at the same time, Russia has allowed Israel to face Iran and Hezbollah in Syria,” said RAFFAELLA DEL SARTO, a professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.
That arrangement would be in danger if Israel helped Ukrainians kill Russians, which is why BENJAMIN NETANYAHU and his team are unlikely to shift course. “There’s no change in the Israeli policy vis-a-vis Ukraine,” an Israeli official said.
Experts believe Israel would be more supportive of Ukraine if Washington provided some incentives, namely curbing criticisms of Israeli abuses of Palestinians. But the Biden administration has committed to calling out human rights violations perpetrated by Israelis, so that’s a no-go.
Israel are providing some weapons through third countries, but not officially.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@WorldCommentor Seems like you don't "remember". So here's the truth:
In March 2022, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian officials falsely claimed that public health facilities in Ukraine were "secret U.S.-funded biolabs" purportedly developing biological weapons, which was debunked as disinformation by multiple media outlets, scientific groups, and international bodies. The claim was amplified by China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Chinese state media, and was also promoted by followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory and subsequently supported by other far-right groups in the United States.
Russian scientists, inside and outside Russia, have publicly accused the Russian government of lying about evidence for covert "bioweapons labs" in Ukraine, saying that documents presented by Russia's Defense Ministry describe pathogens collected for public health research. The "bioweapons labs" claim has also been denied by the US, Ukraine, the United Nations, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
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@Vladimir0809 Февраль 2023 года: С начала конфликта Amnesty International задокументировала военные преступления, включая нацеливание на критически важную гражданскую инфраструктуру, блокирование помощи гражданскому населению и незаконные убийства, совершенные в больших масштабах путем обстрелов городов. Гражданское население в районах, затронутых конфликтом, подвергалось постоянным нападениям и часто было отрезано от воды, электричества и отопления. Многие люди, живущие на оккупированных Россией территориях, по-прежнему остро нуждаются в гуманитарной помощи или медицинской помощи, однако им отказывают в праве на поездки на контролируемые правительством Украины территории. «Народ Украины пережил невообразимый ужас во время этой агрессивной войны за последние 12 месяцев. Давайте будем честны: руки Владимира Путина и его вооруженных сил обагрены кровью. Выжившие заслуживают справедливости и возмещения за все, что они перенесли. Международное сообщество должно стоять твердо, чтобы довести это до конца, чтобы справедливость восторжествовала. Спустя год стало совершенно ясно, что нужно сделать больше». Были возбуждены десятки тысяч дел о военных преступлениях, включая сексуальные и гендерные преступления, но число жертв продолжающегося конфликта будет намного больше.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
The Revolution of Dignity: First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@Why_did_YouTube_add_handles "I stand with objective truth unlike you." 🤣 And how did you come to that conclusion?
"you would never say russia is the aggressor," Yes I would, and so do the majority of sane people!
"I'm not sick in any way" Oh yes, you are! And a shame to humanity!
"america provoked russia into this war." No, they didn't. Taking Ukraine has long been a dream for little putler.
"stop chanting genocide since war". The goal for russia is to eradicate all Ukrainian characteristics and culture, so the country will become russian. They bomb cities long away from the front line. They are bombing churches, schools, hospitals, residential buildings, train stations and many more civilian infrastructure. They kidnap Ukrainian children to raise them in a russian way. They are sending russian citizens to the occupied areas so they can claim russian majority, and so on. This has always been the russian way to colonize other areas.
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@mark4371 OK, here are some:
- Ochakov — The Kara-class cruiser was scuttled in the Donuzlav Bay, Crimea, Ukraine, on 6 March 2014
- VM-416 — The Yelva-class diving support vessel was scuttled next to Ochakov on 7 March 2014.
- Izumrud — The patrol boat was damaged during the Kerch Strait incident of 25 November 2018 after colliding with the Russian tug Don.
- 1 unidentified vessel was damaged the same day while ramming the Ukrainian tugboat Yany Kapu
-5 Raptor-class patrol boats — On 22 March 2022
- On the first week of May 2022, Ukrainian forces using Bayraktar TB2 drones attacked four Raptor-class boats near Snake Island.
- Saratov — On 24 March 2022, a Russian Navy Alligator-class landing ship that was docked in Berdiansk, Ukraine, caught fire.
- Moskva — On 13 April 2022, two Ukrainian officials said that the Slava-class cruiser had been hit by Ukrainian Neptune anti-ship missiles.
- BK-16 high-speed assault boat - In the first week of May 2022
- Serna-class landing craft - On 7 May 2022, a video appeared of a Ukrainian Bayraktar TB2 drone hitting and sinking a landing craft on Snake Island.
- Veliky Ustyug - On 17 June 2022
- Vasily Bekh — On 17 June 2022
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ :
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology".
Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "BUCHA MASSACRE" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation, and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, 2westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what protesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Kyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a 2Western backed coup”.
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@MichaelMoreno.ArMaGeDdoN Other reports: " Other videos show the forced redeployment of the injured to the frontlines. One shows a wounded man dragged by men in fatigues from outside a military hospital in the southern Russian city of Yeysk, in Krasnodar region.
“What the h... are you doing with me, why? I had surgery yesterday, damn it!”, he says. Turning to the camera, he adds: “I… am addressing all residents of Rus si a and I want to show everyone what is happening to one of our worthy soldiers in the Ar med F orces of the RF”
Inside the vehicle he shows his badly wounded leg, where a large injury has recently been operated on, he says. He also holds up his wounded hand. “I don’t have a finger; they also sewed it up yesterday. I can only move using crutches.”
He says he has a painful 8-hour drive on bad roads ahead of him to return to the frontline city of Luhansk, and turns the camera to other passengers, who also show their wounds. “There’s a tube in my stomach,” the other man says.
One soIdier says: “I fought five times, two severe injuries and a severe brain injury.” He says the hospital declared him fit for unarmed service only. “Now they hang the guns on me and take me to the front line without any problems. The 20th Army is **king awesome like this,” he says, putting up his thumbs.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.”
They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”. Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@perceivedreality7933 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties." WHAT A JOKE!
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas.
Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you. @PerceivedREALITY999
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. @PerceivedREALITY999
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@perceivedreality7933 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.) @PerceivedREALITY999
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle. @PerceivedREALITY999
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@perceivedreality7933 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology".
Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner. @PerceivedREALITY999
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@perceivedreality7933 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@perceivedreality7933 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@perceivedreality7933 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha.
Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place. An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers.
Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@perceivedreality7933 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories.
For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war. In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbass since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "They illegally bombed Yugoslavia (a direct violation of the UN Charter). We must never forget what they did to Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria etc."
Are you defending the Serbian war criminals?
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region.
Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
Libya was a UN intervention, not NATO. If Russia was against the intervention in Libya, why didn't they vote against it in the UN Security Council??
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The answer is simple, because they are TARGETING CIVILIANS!
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports.
Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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@rithambhara1689 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner. @PerceivedREALITY999
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.” @PerceivedREALITY999
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings. @PerceivedREALITY999
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You're a pathological liar!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@ The US has NOT given 350 bn! They numbers are between 119 and 175 bn USD, depending on how you do the math (but only $83.4 billion has been sent). And of that total, 75 bn is given to US companies. Only 35 bn is budget support for Ukraine. 69 bn is military support. That means Ukraine has received 76 bn (35 bn budget support and 41 bn as weapons) The U.S has given 0,3 % of their GDP (0,5 when all that is promised is received) Estonia has given 2,5 % Denmark 2,5 % Lithuania 1,8% Norway 1,7 % .
On top of that, the actual value of the weapons and equipment sent to Ukraine by the USA is about 60% lower than they were priced because the price was for new stock. Much of the military equipment and ammunition sent to Ukraine is old and of limited combat effectiveness because it came from aging US stockpiles, some of the ammunition is expired, and a majority of the equipment isn't even used by the US military anymore (and therefore has an effective value of $0 to the USA). Normally, this stock would have to be disposed of, but giving it to Ukraine means there are effectively no disposal expenses. Furthermore, much of the funding for Ukraine is being spent in the USA, such as employing US workers to manufacture the replacement equipment and supplies for refilling US stockpiles.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv.
The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression.
Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations.
That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 I guess you're referring to the Bucha massacre? The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@binoemixtv9395 That's a lie and you know it!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@pisablavatsky-cb3dd The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023:
“After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming.
Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@juliecain4804 During the autumn and winter of 2022–2023, Russia launched waves of missile and drone strikes against energy infrastructure as part of its invasion of Ukraine. The strikes targeted civilian areas beyond the battlefield, particularly critical power infrastructure, which is considered a war crime.
Many civilian areas, apartement buildings, trade squares, hospitals, restaurants, schools etc are bombed intentionally, to weaken the Ukrainian morale.
By the way, do you still call it a SMO? After 230.000 Russians killed and 8 -900.000 wounded?
Failed agreements is Russia in large part to blame.
The attacks on Donbass is on Russian soldiers and Russian armed separatists.
"The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you. "
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@blackadder3570 This only happens in Russia. There is a campaign trying to rewrite history.
This is part of the Kremlin’s campaign for historical revisionism on WWII in order to boost its legitimacy and deny the USSR’s responsibility in the outbreak of WWII. This message is also consistent with the recurring pro-Kremlin propaganda narrative about anti-Russian policies of the aggressive West.
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about WWII that is part of the Kremlin’s policy of historical revisionism in order to boost its legitimacy and deny the USSR’s responsibility in the outbreak of WWII.
It accuses European countries of "rewriting the history of the Second World War". According to this policy, the official Russian historiography is the only “true” way of interpreting the historical events about WWII. The European Parliament called the war the bloodiest tragedy of the century, which resulted in millions of victims of authoritarian regimes both of fascist Germany and the USSR. The European Parliament adopted a resolution, describing the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact of 23 August 1939 as a key element causing World War II. The European Parliament also paid tribute to the victims of Stalinism, Nazism and other totalitarian and authoritarian regimes.
At the same time, the Western historians acknowledge the role played by the USSR in defeating Nazism and do not question the Soviet contribution to the victory in WWII and the status of the USSR as a country that had won in WWII. The policy of the US or the EU is not directed against Russia or any other country.
This is an attempt by the Kremlin to erode the historical role of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact by stating that European countries, especially Poland, "had conspired with fascist Germany", so they should blame themselves for the German-Soviet attack in September 1939. The claim that Poland had conspired with fascist Germany goes against available historical documents. Before WWII, Poland had tense political relations with Nazi Germany, which expressed open territorial claims over Poland (revision of the status of the Free City of Danzig and control over the “Polish Corridor”).
Despite intense political pressure from Hitler, Poland consistently refused to become part of the Nazi block.
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@janlamprecht9229 "It's true, I couldn't believe my eyes." What is true??
"He should be stopped, seriously. " Of course putin should be stopped!
There is nothing romantic about this war and has never been. It's just an imperialistic war of a brutal aggressor and the underdog trying to protect their nation.
BBC: "Nearly 20,000 men have fled Ukraine since the beginning of the war to avoid being drafted, the BBC has discovered."
"Hundreds of thousands of Russians are estimated to have left their country since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The first wave came in March and April last year - new emigres told the BBC they were against the war, and disappointed more Russians did not come out to protest. Feeling isolated and at risk, they felt it was safer to leave."
There are no exact figures on how many people have left Russia - but estimates vary from hundreds of thousands to several million. (incl woman and children)
In May the UK Ministry of Defence estimated 1.3 million people leaving Russia in 2022.
(2022: Kremlin officials reportedly estimated 700,000 men left the country in under two weeks. )
Other estimates of figures from various sources confirm the trend. Forbes magazine cited sources inside the Russian authorities as saying that between 600,000 and 1,000,000 people left in 2022. The Bell and RTVi - popular Russian-language media - published comparable figures.
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@legend9805 Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars.
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 ssia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…” The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group.
Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@avengerpz There hasn't been any ignoring of Russia, Putin has been unwilling to negotiate on realistic terms. Remember, he's goal is to reestablish the Soviet Union as (Great)-Russia.
As for the Nazi's in the Ukrainian government, the number is exactly zero. In the opposition there are a few. They united with all the parties on the far right side, but still got only 2 % at the last election and. (In Italy a far right party got 17 % in comparison)
ADL: As the Russian assault on Ukraine has intensified, the Russian president has escalated rhetoric falsely labeling the Ukrainian government and its leaders as “Nazis.” Putin has claimed that the military action is aimed at the “denazification of Ukraine” and Lavrov called the Ukrainian president “a Nazi and a neo Nazi.”
Earlier this week, I spoke to Dr. David Fishman, a professor of Jewish History at The Jewish Theological Seminary, about how Russian propaganda, including rhetoric linking Ukraine and the Nazis, is being used as part of a campaign of disinformation in an attempt to discredit the democratically elected Ukrainian government.
Dr. Fishman: “This propaganda is an attempt to delegitimize Ukraine in the eyes of the Russian public, which considers its war against Nazi Germany its greatest moment, and in eyes of the Western publics who may not know much about Ukraine except that it’s next to Russia.
This propaganda isn’t new. Russia has for years highlighted the activity of a marginal group of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists as a way of trying to stigmatize all of Ukraine.
We should also not forget that 10 million Ukrainians fought in the Red Army against Nazi Germany and 1.5 million Ukrainians died in combat."
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@JoeJones-kn8sh Why this nazi lie? Don't you guys have nothing else to smear Ukraine with other than those ridiculous accusations?
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering.
“Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins.
Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes. According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol. While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible. Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000.
According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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@SaintLevantine Have IDF raped, mutilated and killed woman and children? I wouldn't call these Hamas terrorists animals, because that would be an insult of the animals.
The Scope of Hamas' Campaign of Rape Against Israeli Women Is Revealed, Testimony After Testimony:
"The aggregation of evidence collected by Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy and her Civil Commission presents a horrifying picture that leaves no room for doubt: On October 7, Hamas terrorists systematically carried out acts of rape and sexual abuse. She has discovered, however, that there is no rush to acknowledge this abroad."
"The body of one woman had “nails and different objects in her female organs.” In another house, a person’s genitals were so mutilated that “we couldn’t identify if it was a man or a woman.”
Simcha Greinman, a volunteer who helped collect the remains of victims of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 assault on Israel, took long pauses as he spoke those words on Monday at an event at the United Nations."
"At the Nova music festival, where more than 350 young people were slaughtered and dozens kidnapped, witnesses hiding in the bushes saw terrorists gang-rape, then murder and mutilate women. A Hamas video from a kibbutz shows terrorists torturing a pregnant woman and removing her fetus. Our forensic scientists have found bodies of women and girls raped with such violence that their pelvic bones were broken. Those of us unlucky enough to have seen video evidence broadcast by the terrorists themselves witnessed the body of a naked woman paraded through Gaza, and another, still alive, in bloodied pants held captive at gunpoint being pulled into a jeep by her hair. This evidence, along with the explicit recorded confessions of captured terrorists, makes abundantly clear that mass rape was a premeditated part of Hamas's plan."
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@bojanvukobradovic2504 The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@bojanvukobradovic2504 So you have to change the topic now, the previous one didn't work?
There was never a ban on Russian language, but Ukrainian is the official language of Ukraine and the state both promotes and prefers it. Other languages spoken in Ukraine are granted constitutional protection, and Russian is recognized as the language of a national minority.
BTW, what do you think the language policy in Russia is like?
An example (The Conversation): In October 2017, when Latvia’s government made Latvian the default language of education, Sergey Zheleznyak, the member of Russia’s State Duma Committee on International Affairs, did not hold back. “The decision to switch educational instruction in Latvian schools for national minorities to the Latvian language is in violation of the European Union’s legal framework and resembles linguistic genocide,” he said.
Yet just three months before Zheleznyak’s furious statement, Russia itself abolished the compulsory teaching of minority languages at schools in its own “ethnic republics” – part of a much larger project to remake the way Russia works, and to turn away from the relatively stable multiculturalism that Russia has maintained for decades. Considering its grandstanding about the rights of ethnic Russians abroad, the pressure the Kremlin is putting on ethnic minorities at home looks like pure hypocrisy.
Since he came to power 18 years ago, Vladimir Putin has overseen a sweeping transformation of Russia’s “ethnic federalism”, where a majority of ethnicities have their own territorial autonomy. That includes the effective abolition of one of the last elements of true federalism in Russia – namely, the status of minority languages in ethnic republics as second official languages with equal status to Russian. The Kremlin is increasingly pursuing a programme of cultural homogenisation, gradually removing support for education in minority languages, curriculums with ethno-regional components, and other cultural initiatives by Russian ethnic minorities. All political activities designed to shore up minority identities are under pressure as well.
And sure enough, the Russian government has now adopted new amendments to an education bill that will make minority languages lessons in ethnic republics optional, and which limit their teaching to a maximum of two hours a week. These measures will only hasten the demise of these languages – and will ensure that the Russian language remains preeminent across the country.
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Burned 40 people in Maidan? Never heard of it! Maybe you are confused again, and refers to the so called massacre in Odesa? (Maidan Square is in Kyiv) I have posted this many times, I'm surprised you've missed it (do you only read Russian propaganda?). But, here we go again:
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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"Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties". That's bullshit and you know it!
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars.
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties". That's bullshit and you know it!
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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DW: Residents in the occupied territories describe how their lives have changed in the past year.
Russia promises prosperity and stability.
In reality, however, an estimated 1 million to 2 million people have fled the Russian-annexed regions of Ukraine this year alone. DW spoke to residents in these regions to learn how their life has changed in the past year.
The Russian currency, the ruble, has now replaced the Ukrainian hryvnia in Donetsk and Luhansk. Maryna, however, worries about the devaluation of the ruble and the resulting inflation.
"Gas has become 70% more expensive, and original replacement parts for foreign cars are no longer available," she complains.
Mariupol residents interviewed by DW complain it is not as easy to get a replacement for a destroyed home as Russian propaganda claims.
"Papers issued by the Russian administration for damaged apartments do not allow for registering ownership for new buildings. Instead, they only provide something like a right to long-term free rent," says Larissa S., a former Mariupol law firm employee.
Teachers forced to take sides
Former teacher Svitlana T. says there were 30 schools in her district before the war, whereas now there are only six.
"There are neither teachers nor pupils in our village," she tells DW. "There are only two families with schoolchildren. They wanted to attend distance learning classes offered by a Ukrainian school, but the Russian occupiers forced the children to attend a 'normal' school in a village 40 kilometers (25 miles) away."
She tried teaching online classes for a Ukrainian school until the spring of 2023, when Russian occupiers in the city began questioning unemployed educators about their sources of income and arrested one of her friends.
Teachers in occupied parts of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhya regions were very cautious about what they told DW. More and more of them are ready to teach the Russian school curriculum. Even though Ukrainian schools continue paying teachers to give online classes, these teachers can no longer buy anything in Ukrainian currency. Meanwhile, Ukrainian teachers who teach at "Russian" schools face up to three years in prison in Ukraine and a 15-year ban from teaching for collaborating with Russia.
"The new Russian textbooks begin spreading propaganda from the very first page, so I prefer being unemployed," says Svitlana T.
Residents DW spoke to say it is extremely tough to live in the annexed regions without a Russian passport, which is often the only way to access health care. Meanwhile, hospital directors appointed by Russia are regularly prosecuted by Ukraine for collaborating with the enemy.
Ukrainian passport holders cannot get a job or a pension. Without Russian citizenship, they also cannot register a car or real estate, cannot get a SIM card, and are not served in banks.
However, it is still possible to leave the occupied territories with a Ukrainian passport, even if this is difficult. Russian occupiers vigorously check and interrogate such individuals, says Serhij O., who owns a small bus company.
"Everyone is scrutinized, men are interrogated and strip-searched," he says.
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@niklaus9678 Here's what NYT wrote 6 months ago: "The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded."
It would be nice if you learned how to read.
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@anadumuakr4054 mafia? I guess you're talking about the putin regime.
And yes indeed, it's runned like a mafia.
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason. 😂
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships.
The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded by grain. Then the local farmers got problems.
As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive.
Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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What happened to the Minsk agreements?
On the first of march 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been RUSSIA'S insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces. SO JUST ANOTHER LIE)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea
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Zelensky didn't come to power in a coup, educate yourself! Educate yourself about Minsk as well.
Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
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@DemiGod.. Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022!
This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO.
His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, Putin decided to reject the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@patrickkoh1056 The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
Leak from the Kremlin
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@jimmyc974 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@jimmyc974 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959.
This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased.
In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict.
Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015 .
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@user1qaz2wsx3edc Reminder: Then what about these people?: Saami, Ludic, Veps, Votic, Moksha, Erzya, Mari, Komi, Udmurt, Mansi, Khanty, Samoyeds, Nenets, Nganasan, Selkup and many other native people. Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, Ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Ingria, Karelia, Sakha, Kurilene, Khanty, Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Bukovina, Tuva, Northern Caucasus to name a few?
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@azmanhamid4569 Minsk??
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
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@antonywooster6783 The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Recessive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
And in 2022 they started the full scale invasion (after 200 rounds of peace talks). putin wants Ukraine, he doesn't want peace!
How could this be "russia did not start the war"??
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@aiesyahsyahirah4717 There was the Revolution of Dignity/Maidan in 2014. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Resessive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. (The russian friendly president ordered snipers to kill the protesters). On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@MarkNOTW In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the Corridors of Power.
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Yes, we all remember Bucha. How can we forget!?
- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@АлександрСибиряк-л1е "Killed by Ukraine"? You are lying, you have absolutely no shame in life!
The evidence is clear, it was done by the Russian orcs.
Russian forces first entered Bucha in late February 2022 as they launched an invasion of Ukraine and attempted to make their way to Kyiv, the country’s capital, 25km (16 miles) southeast of Bucha.
Ukrainian resistance repelled the initial advance, forcing Russian troops to withdraw from the area before re-grouping and returning on March 3. What followed was a brutal campaign of violence against the local population.
When Russian forces withdrew from the Kyiv region at the end of March, evidence of mass graves and civilian executions began to emerge. In response, an ad hoc collaborative network of international and domestic bodies started documenting the many cases like Oleysa’s that could support investigations into possible war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Matviychuk has been working on human rights cases for more than 20 years. But she is visibly distressed when she describes the alleged war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine since February. Matviychuk says such acts are a “cruel military tactic” deployed by Russia during conflicts “to achieve their geopolitical goals”, but she was still unprepared for the “sheer scale and brutality” of their recent actions.
They currently have more than 8,000 cases, including accusations of beating, looting, murder, torture, kidnapping, and rape, in the CCL database that they can share with the police and the security service. She says this is “only the tip of the iceberg”.
More than 1,000 bodies of civilians have been discovered in the Bucha region since Russian forces withdrew from the area. According to the Kyiv police, some 650 people were executed.
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Ты лжец!
Дезинформация: Украина восемь лет совершала геноцид на Донбассе.
Вердикт: ФЕЙК-НОВОСТИ
Для достижения своих экспансионистских целей на Украине Россия одновременно с военной агрессией развязала информационную войну против Украины. Более того, именно «предлог», основанный на дезинформации и лжи, Путин использовал для начала вторжения в Украину 24 февраля 2022 года.
24 февраля 2022 года Путин заявил, что целями полномасштабной войны, которую он называет «спецоперацией», являются «защита населения от геноцида, а также денацификация и демилитаризация Украины вместе с защитой тех людей, которые были подвергался насилию и геноциду со стороны киевского режима в течение восьми лет». Аналогичные заявления Путин сделал и на заседании Совета по правам человека в декабре 2021 года, заявив, что «то, что происходит сейчас на Донбассе, очень напоминает нам геноцид».
Утверждение о том, что Украина совершила геноцид на Донбассе, стало основным пропагандистским посланием не только для Кремля и кремлевских СМИ, но и для других пророссийских источников. Цель этой дезинформации — провозгласить действия России в Украине законными и полностью игнорировать любые обвинения со стороны Кремля. На самом деле не существует ни одного международного документа или заключения какой-либо соответствующей международной организации, подтверждающего обвинения Москвы. То, что Путин и Кремль не могут доказать, что геноцид действительно имел место на Донбассе, подтверждается тем фактом, что Россия никогда официально не обращалась в Управление ООН по предотвращению геноцида или какие-либо другие международные институты по вопросам геноцида и этнических чисток.
(По данным ООН и Хьюман Райтс Вотч, с 2014 года на Донбассе погибло 3400 мирных жителей. И 84 процента из них были убиты российской и сепаратистской артиллерией. Читайте отчеты! Подавляющее большинство смертей пришлось на первые два года войны (2014 и 2015))
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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internetresearchagency2238 Putin was never gonna respect the Minsk agreements, in fact he has never held any agreements. It was just a game to fool Ukraine and the rest of the world.
He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
By the way, what do you think will happen to a potential separatist group working inside Russia? How long do you think they will live? One day? Two days? Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putins wet dream of reestablish the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after that, they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
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The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis.
Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes.
According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol.
While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible.
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One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbour, Ukraine.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@fred4687 Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked Russian soldiers to Donbas. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Soon after, there was a massacre in Odessa (dozens of people were burned alive)"
Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa.
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed.
Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 " Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April? Hint: someone visited Zelensky in Kiev at that time"
There wasn't any real peace talks in Turkey.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv.
The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ukraine has been willing to negotiate the whole time. Putin has refused. What you read in Russian propaganda, is not true.
MINSK I: Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015. It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.) YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@MrLeadb1 Sure, in the eyes of a russian!
A number of reports and researchers (among them independent Russian experts) concluded that the conflict started much earlier than the Georgian military operation which began on 7 August at 23:35 and that Russia was responsible for the war. Some have argued that shelling carried out by South Ossetian separatists in early August was done to trigger a Georgian military response and therefore a Russian military intervention.
The beginning of the armed conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia was dated by the commission to 7 August 2008 at 23.35; however, the commission acknowledged that "a violent conflict had already been going on before in South Ossetia," and "President Saakashvili’s order on 7 August 2008 at 23.35 and the ensuing military attack on Tskhinvali has to be seen as but one element in an on-going chain of events for military violence had also been reported before the outbreak of the open hostilities on 7 August 2008." The open hostilities between Georgia and Russia are considered to have begun on 8 August 2008. The report acknowledged that "volunteers or mercenaries" entered Georgia from Russia before the Georgian military operation and there was the presence of "some" non-peacekeeping Russian troops in South Ossetia before the public decision for an intervention was made by the Russian leadership.
The commission said that the South Ossetian attacks on Georgian villages (Zemo Nikozi, Kvemo Nikozi, Avnevi, Nuli, Ergneti, Eredvi and Zemo Prisi) were equivalent to an "attack by the armed forces of a State on the territory of another State" resembling the situations described in Art. 3(a) of UN Resolution 3314. As the South Ossetian attacks were "primarily" directed against Georgian peacekeepers and against Georgian police, this was an attack by the South Ossetian armed forces on the land forces of Georgia. The commission also said "To the extent that South Ossetian militia initiated the shooting on Georgian villages, police and peacekeepers before the outbreak of the armed conflict," South Ossetia violated the prohibition of the use of force.
The commission stated that an attack by Georgian forces on Russian peacekeepers deployed in Georgia – "if not in self-defence against a Russian attack", would not be justified. However, the commission concluded that an attack on Russian peacekeepers was not a sufficient condition to be used for self-defence by Russia and "the fact of the Georgian attack on the Russian peacekeepers’ basis could not be definitely confirmed by the mission." The commission said that Russian peacekeepers, if they "had been directly attacked", had the right to immediate, necessary and proportionate response. However, "doubts remain whether the Russian peacekeepers were attacked in the first place," and the mission could not establish whether, at the time of the alleged attacks on Russian peacekeepers’ bases, the peacekeepers had lost their protection due to their participation in the hostilities. The commission concluded that the expulsion of the Georgian forces from South Ossetia, and the defence of South Ossetia as a whole was not a legitimate objective, and according to international law, the Russian actions as a whole, were not neither "necessary nor proportionate" to protect Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia. The commission concluded that Russia did not have the right to justify its actions as "a mere reinforcement and fulfilment" of its peacekeeping mission.
The commission concluded that the South Ossetian separatists could not validly invite Russia to support them militarily. It also concluded that "Russian military activities against the Georgian military forces were not justified as collective self-defence under international law." The commission also concluded that Russian military actions also could not be justified as a humanitarian intervention.
The report further stated that Russian citizenship, conferred to the vast part of Abkhaz and Ossetians can not be considered legally binding under international law.
The report found that Russian and South Ossetian allegations of genocide committed by the Georgian side were "neither founded in law nor substantiated by factual evidence." The report found that during the conflict "all sides to the conflict - Georgian forces, Russian forces and South Ossetian forces - committed violations of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights Law." The report also found facts of ethnic cleansing of Georgians, saying that "several elements suggest the conclusion that ethnic cleansing was indeed practised against ethnic Georgians in South Ossetia both during and after the August 2008 conflict." The commission said that in many cases Russian forces did not act to prevent or stop South Ossetian forces from committing acts of deliberate violence against civilians during the conflict and after the cease-fire.
After the disclosure of alleged US diplomatic cables by WikiLeaks, the dispatches sent during the initial stage of the war from Tbilisi were published. Former US Ambassador to Georgia John F. Tefft alleged that the Georgians did not intend to start the conflict, but rather were dragged into the war. The diplomat’s cables were initially published by Russian Reporter magazine, a Moscow-based weekly.
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@@alextim6961 Sure, in the eyes of a russian!
A number of reports and researchers (among them independent Russian experts) concluded that the conflict started much earlier than the Georgian military operation which began on 7 August at 23:35 and that Russia was responsible for the war. Some have argued that shelling carried out by South Ossetian separatists in early August was done to trigger a Georgian military response and therefore a Russian military intervention.
The beginning of the armed conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia was dated by the commission to 7 August 2008 at 23.35; however, the commission acknowledged that "a violent conflict had already been going on before in South Ossetia," and "President Saakashvili’s order on 7 August 2008 at 23.35 and the ensuing military attack on Tskhinvali has to be seen as but one element in an on-going chain of events for military violence had also been reported before the outbreak of the open hostilities on 7 August 2008." The open hostilities between Georgia and Russia are considered to have begun on 8 August 2008. The report acknowledged that "volunteers or mercenaries" entered Georgia from Russia before the Georgian military operation and there was the presence of "some" non-peacekeeping Russian troops in South Ossetia before the public decision for an intervention was made by the Russian leadership.
The commission said that the South Ossetian attacks on Georgian villages (Zemo Nikozi, Kvemo Nikozi, Avnevi, Nuli, Ergneti, Eredvi and Zemo Prisi) were equivalent to an "attack by the armed forces of a State on the territory of another State" resembling the situations described in Art. 3(a) of UN Resolution 3314. As the South Ossetian attacks were "primarily" directed against Georgian peacekeepers and against Georgian police, this was an attack by the South Ossetian armed forces on the land forces of Georgia. The commission also said "To the extent that South Ossetian militia initiated the shooting on Georgian villages, police and peacekeepers before the outbreak of the armed conflict," South Ossetia violated the prohibition of the use of force.
The commission stated that an attack by Georgian forces on Russian peacekeepers deployed in Georgia – "if not in self-defence against a Russian attack", would not be justified. However, the commission concluded that an attack on Russian peacekeepers was not a sufficient condition to be used for self-defence by Russia and "the fact of the Georgian attack on the Russian peacekeepers’ basis could not be definitely confirmed by the mission." The commission said that Russian peacekeepers, if they "had been directly attacked", had the right to immediate, necessary and proportionate response. However, "doubts remain whether the Russian peacekeepers were attacked in the first place," and the mission could not establish whether, at the time of the alleged attacks on Russian peacekeepers’ bases, the peacekeepers had lost their protection due to their participation in the hostilities. The commission concluded that the expulsion of the Georgian forces from South Ossetia, and the defence of South Ossetia as a whole was not a legitimate objective, and according to international law, the Russian actions as a whole, were not neither "necessary nor proportionate" to protect Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia. The commission concluded that Russia did not have the right to justify its actions as "a mere reinforcement and fulfilment" of its peacekeeping mission.
The commission concluded that the South Ossetian separatists could not validly invite Russia to support them militarily. It also concluded that "Russian military activities against the Georgian military forces were not justified as collective self-defence under international law." The commission also concluded that Russian military actions also could not be justified as a humanitarian intervention.
The report further stated that Russian citizenship, conferred to the vast part of Abkhaz and Ossetians can not be considered legally binding under international law.
The report found that Russian and South Ossetian allegations of genocide committed by the Georgian side were "neither founded in law nor substantiated by factual evidence." The report found that during the conflict "all sides to the conflict - Georgian forces, Russian forces and South Ossetian forces - committed violations of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights Law." The report also found facts of ethnic cleansing of Georgians, saying that "several elements suggest the conclusion that ethnic cleansing was indeed practised against ethnic Georgians in South Ossetia both during and after the August 2008 conflict." The commission said that in many cases Russian forces did not act to prevent or stop South Ossetian forces from committing acts of deliberate violence against civilians during the conflict and after the cease-fire.
After the disclosure of alleged US diplomatic cables by WikiLeaks, the dispatches sent during the initial stage of the war from Tbilisi were published. Former US Ambassador to Georgia John F. Tefft alleged that the Georgians did not intend to start the conflict, but rather were dragged into the war. The diplomat’s cables were initially published by Russian Reporter magazine, a Moscow-based weekly.
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@serjisokom2455 The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, the Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine.
Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@@alextim6961 You are telling the same lie over and over again, even if you know the truth very well. Typical russian behaviour!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@@alextim6961 "Preparation for the coup, Orange revolution dress rehearsal, Western intelligence direct role and physical presence of Nuland, provocations with snipers, betrayals and and direct financial aid from Germany, Britain, Poland, CIA agents in Yanukovich close circle. Only you dont know those and many other open secrets of staged Maidan coup. Since overthrow of legitimate president and formation of ethnicratic Banderites regime"
RUSSIAN LIES AND PROPAGANDA. (As usual)
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@philipcoffman4372 I relate to the free press, not Russian propaganda.
Aljazeera July 17, 2023: The Black Sea Grain Initiative – a deal brokered between Russia and Ukraine by the United Nations and Turkey – has allowed 32.9 million metric tonnes of food to be exported from war-torn Ukraine since August.
More than half of that grain went to developing countries, including those getting relief from the World Food Programme (WFP), according to the Joint Coordination Centre in Istanbul.
UNCTAD: Developing countries received the largest share of food exports.
Many developing and least developed countries rely on these grains to provide affordable food for their populations. Under the Initiative, exports of these vital grains from Ukraine were able to resume, reaching global markets. Exports of corn to developed and developing countries have been almost evenly split, at 51 per cent and 49 per cent, respectively. Exports of wheat have gone predominantly to developing countries and least developed countries, representing 65 per cent of total wheat cargo.
BBC: Almost 33 million tonnes of grain were shipped from Ukraine under the deal, and world food prices declined by roughly 20% as a result, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization.
According to the UN's Joint Coordination Centre, 57% of the foodstuffs exported from Ukraine over the past year went to developing countries and 43% to developed countries.
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@mariereddy4259 Putin initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union as Great Russia . That is his plan.
By the way, what do you think will happen to a potential separatist group working inside Russia? How long do you think they will live? One day? Two days? Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. Putins wet dream of Great Russia started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after that, they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Putin has robbed his country for 20 years now. And all you do is clap your hands and say "Genius".
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
(Vladimir Putin's Salary $187 Thousand Per Year)
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. His children study in western schools, lives in London, own big houses in France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs.
The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021. Putin, however, denied that the mansion belonged to him. “Nothing that is listed there as my property belongs to me or my close relatives, and never did,” he had said and termed the video “boring”.
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@rogeroeyen as usual, you got it all wrong. No surprise there!
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Amnesty: Ukraine 2022
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February was a violation of the UN Charter and an act of aggression, a crime under international law. Russian forces conducted indiscriminate attacks resulting in thousands of civilian casualties, amid mounting evidence of other crimes including torture, sexual violence and unlawful killings. Attacks on civilian infrastructure also led to violations of the rights to housing, health and education. The crackdown on dissent and human rights defenders in Russian-occupied Crimea continued.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered an extensive human rights, humanitarian and displacement crisis. Russian forces conducted indiscriminate attacks, using weapons with wide-area effects which resulted in thousands of civilian casualties.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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Russian forces attacked the city of Zaporizhzhia on the evening of 10 August, damaging a civilian building, killing at least one civilian and injuring 16.
On 9 August, Russian forces attacked a residential neighbourhood in Zaporizhzhia. As of the morning of 10 August, three civilians are known to have been killed and nine – including an infant – injured in the attack.
Since the beginning of the Russian invasion, their forces have been regularly hitting civilian targets in Ukraine.
Denise Brown, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Ukraine, has condemned the missile strike on Zaporizhzhia that Russian forces carried out on 10 August and that damaged the Reikartz hotel, which UN representatives had used in the past during trips to Ukraine.
"I have stayed in this hotel every single time I visited Zaporizhzhia. My team uses it as their base for their frequent travels to the city. It was the UN base for the operation to evacuate civilians from the Azovstal plant in Mariupol in May last year."
Brown said that the number of indiscriminate attacks, which have damaged civilian structures, killing and injuring civilians, "have reached unimaginable levels". She added that these attacks violate international humanitarian law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”. Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles.
Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote.
While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset.
All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 “HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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bjornsjostrom3800 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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bjornsjostrom3800 Keep clapping for your russian nazis!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this?
The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews.
"The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes.
Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties". Russia has NEVER tried to minimize civilian casualties!
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria.
The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion.
In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine.
The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries. - During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The REAL STORY is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what protesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Kyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity.
From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks. Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”.
This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
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Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia.
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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Feb -14 “coup”:
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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Diplomat Wolfgang Sporrer:
There were three main reasons for the failure of the Minsk agreements. First, the Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified.
THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries.
Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV. In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column. However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
The second reason for their failure was the low technical quality of the Minsk agreements. There were far too many provisions for their verification, and the sequencing of various measures also remained controversial to the end, as the agreement itself didn’t specify any.
The third reason for the failure — and this may sound banal now, but it is true — is that it has not been possible to meet in person since the end of 2019 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. As little as the Minsk agreements were actually implemented in practice, they did help to build trust.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@irenagreg7373 Russian misinformation about 48 people dead during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa:
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed.
Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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While food and fertilizers are not under sanctions, Russia says sanctions-related restrictions on its banking, transit and insurance make trade untenable. The U.N.'s Guterres pushed back against those claims in a press conference Monday, saying Russia's grain trade had "reached high export volumes" and its fertilizer markets were "stabilizing" under policies laid out in a memorandum of understanding between the U.N. and Russia last July.
The most prominent exporter in the Black Sea region is Russia, from which strong exports continue to flow in 2022/23 and is forecast to reach a record for annual wheat exports. Despite the Russian government claims of export challenges, Russia’s grain and oilseed exports have thrived during the current marketing year with ample supplies and competitive prices. Export volumes could be even larger, but the Russian government continues to apply export taxes and quotas, trade-restricting measures that are self-imposed.
Guterres has proposed to Putin that Russia allow the Black Sea grain deal to continue for several months, giving the EU time to connect a Rosselkhozbank subsidiary to SWIFT, two of those sources familiar with discussions.
UN, July 12 (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has proposed to Russian President Vladimir Putin that he extend a deal allowing the safe Black Sea export of grain from Ukraine in return for connecting a subsidiary of Russia's agricultural bank to the SWIFT international payment system.
Guterres sent a letter to Putin on Tuesday (beginning of July) proposing a way forward to further facilitate Russian food and fertilizer exports and ensure the continued Black Sea shipments of Ukrainian grain, a U.N. spokesman said on Wednesday. RUSSIA HASN’T RESPONDED..
"The objective is to remove hurdles affecting financial transactions through the Russian Agricultural Bank, a major concern expressed by the Russian Federation, and simultaneously allow for the continued flow of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters.
To convince Russia to agree to the Black Sea deal, a three-year memorandum of understanding was struck at the same time under which U.N. officials agreed to help Russia get its food and fertilizer exports to foreign markets.
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@TrandafiraPP Putin/russia has broken all the agreements up to now, including all the Minsk and the Budapest agreements.
Are you talking about this from 1991 (people with 90 % brain damage would still see that putin has violated that agreement):
"We, the Republic of Belarus, the Russian Federation and the Republic of Ukraine, as founder states of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which signed the 1922 Union Treaty, further described as the high contracting parties, conclude that the USSR has ceased to exist as a subject of international law and a geopolitical reality.
Taking as our basis the historic community of our peoples and the ties which have been established between them, taking into account the bilateral treaties concluded between the high contracting parties;
striving to build democratic law-governed states; intending to develop our relations on the basis of mutual recognition AND RESPECT FOR STATE SOVEREIGNTY, the inalienable RIGHT TO SELF- DETERMINATION, the principles of equality and NON-INTERFERENCE IN INTERNAL AFFAIRS, REPUDIATION OF THE USE OF FORCE and of economic or any other methods of coercion, settlement of contentious problems by means of mediation and other generally recognized principles and norms of international law;
considering that further development and strengthening of relations of friendship, good-neighborliness and mutually beneficial co-operation between our states correspond to the vital national interests of their peoples and serve the cause of peace and security;
confirming our adherence to the goals and principles of the United Nations Charter, the Helsinki Final Act and other documents of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe"
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@TheVinci19 So you are not concerned of all the killings, you just want to do it all in one go?? What do you think will be the answer if Russia use nukes?
And you cant be that ignorant that you don't believe that Russia has used clusters!?
The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–present) has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion. As of July 1, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported. Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited. Neither Russia nor Ukraine are signatories of the of the 2008 convention limiting the use of cluster munitions. The use of such weapons against civilians violates the principles of humanitarian law and therefore constitutes a war crime. Reports of Russian attacks have prompted the International Criminal Court to launch an investigation into the commission of war crimes in Ukrainian territory.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Putin lies as usual!
As of May 2023, over 30 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
Since being signed in July last year, the U.N. says the Black Sea Grain Initiative has allowed more than 32 million metric tons of food commodities to be exported to 45 countries worldwide.
It is for this reason that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had described the deal as playing an “indispensable role” in global food security.
Guterres said in early July that the agreement “must continue” at a time when conflict, the climate crisis, energy prices and other factors roil the production and affordability of food, while 258 million people face hunger in 58 countries worldwide.
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The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes. According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol. While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible.
Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February.
Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@jimmyc974 Hello jimmypedo, long time no see!
According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015)
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
Official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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"Russia, still fighting the Nazis." I corrected the sentence for you: The Nazis are still fighting for Russia!
- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine.
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@MasterMind75427 The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations. In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022), at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
As of July 1 (2022), hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited
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@JohnAkaSB If you don't mind some copy and paste:
Putin's wet dream of reestablishing the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
Nevertheless, the Minsk Agreements have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@JohnAkaSB The Maidan Revolution was about people had enough of widespread corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russian oligarchs and Russian authorities and human rights violations.
The Russians put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. Then the protests increased and Yanukovych had to resign.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@wg5768 "You need to read up on the 2014 coup of the Ukrainian government"
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@wg5768 "After eight years of shelling the Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine"
Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@wg5768 "Also,the two Minsk Agreements signed by Ukraine and Russia"
The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@wg5768 "Also,the two Minsk Agreements signed by Ukraine and Russia"
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@peaceb4 The UN published a report in March highlighting summary executions, torture, and other instances in which Russia and Ukraine violated international human rights laws in their treatment of prisoners of war.
The report comes after another UN report last week found that Russian forces in Ukraine committed an array of violations that amount to war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
Details: The most recent report by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is based on interviews with more than 400 POWs and focuses on how they were treated in the one-year period since Russia attacked Ukraine.
Those interviewed include Ukrainian POWs who have been released as well as Russians held captive in Ukraine.
UN monitors said they were not given "confidential access" to POWs held by Russia.
Instances under Russia's control include the "summary executions of 15 POWs, the use of POWs as human shields, the deaths of two wounded men POWs due to a lack of medical care, and torture or other ill-treatment to extract information," per the report.
The monitors interviewed 24 women POWs held by Russia as well, finding that 17 of them "were subjected to beatings, electrocution, forced nudity, cavity searches and threats of sexual violence."
Meanwhile, the monitors documented the summary executions of at least 25 Russian POWs at the hands of Ukrainian forces.
Of note: Ill-treatment of POWs took place on both sides, but was it was far more common against Ukrainians, AP reports.
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albinvega7008 Businessinsider:
As recounted in the interview, Bennett visited Russia a few months before the war, where he then relayed to Putin a request from Zelenskyy to meet. "They're Nazis, they're warmongers, I won't meet him," Putin responded, in Bennett's telling.
After the war began in February 2022, Bennett said he tried again to work as an intermediary between Putin and Zelensky, acknowledging that his primary interest was his own country's security.
In the weeks following the invasion, Bennett said he spoke with both Putin and Zelenskyy, and even made a secret trip to Moscow, in an effort to negotiate an end to the conflict. At the time, Zelenskyy himself noted that the Israeli prime minister was "trying to find a way of holding talks," a fact for which "we are grateful."
"It's unsure there was any deal to be made". "At the time I gave it roughly a 50% chance. Americans felt chances were way lower. Hard to tell who was right."
He continued: "It's not sure such a deal was desirable. At the time I thought so, but only time will tell."
In the interview, Bennett himself notes that IT WAS NOT the US, France, or Germany that put an end to any peace talks. Rather, it was RUSSIA SLAUGHTERING hundreds of civilians in a town outside the Ukrainian capital, a war crime discovered just about a month after the full-scale invasion began.
"The Bucha massacre, once that happened, I said: 'It's over,'" Bennett recalled.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances.
There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication: “HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA.
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.) ...........
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@PerceivedREALITY999 ....... In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, "westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a "Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@MarkNOTW "Ukraine is the one that broke the Minsk agreement and then reneged on another deal in Feb 2022."
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@MarkNOTW "Ukraine is the one that broke the Minsk agreement and then reneged on another deal in Feb 2022."
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@MarkNOTW There wasn't any agreement in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@MarkNOTW Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@MarkNOTW "EU leaders have admitted the Minsk agreement was a ruse to allow time to militarize UKR. We have the interviews and eye witness testimony. It is indisputable."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed.
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@katiaengel1 In 2022, Facebook users published a post claiming that the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, owns a “palace” worth 35 million USD in Miami, as well as “billions of assets” outside the borders of Ukraine. The authors of the post point to Kremlin propagandist Scott Ritter as the source of information.
The claim that Zelenskyy owns real estate worth several tens of millions is without evidence. The overall net worth of the President of Ukraine is estimated at 20-30 million USD, while a 35 million USD villa in Miami is included neither in his property declarations nor in Pandora Papers. In addition, according to PolitiFact, a US fact-checking agency, Florida’s public real estate registry does not include any real estate linked to Zelenskyy or the companies named in the Pandora Papers.
The information that Zelenskyy owns a villa worth 35 million USD in Miami was reported in the Russian media as early as February 23rd. Russian propaganda media, including Риа Новости, Газета.ру, Россиская Газета relied on Ukrainian, pro-Russian oppositionist Illia Kyva, who published the mentioned information on Telegram. Notably, Газета.ру connected Kyva’s statement regarding Zelenskyy’s property with Pandora Papers, the materials of the offshore accounts of politicians and their entourage by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). In addition, one of the publications did not name Illia Kyva as the source of information, but the pro-Kremlin Telegram channel Nezygarь.
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@hanna8418 Zelensky is not a multi billionaire, not even a billionaire! But Putin is, what do you call him then?? Where do you think his wealth come from, his salary is USD 180 000 a year?
Putin has robbed his country for over 20 years now. And all you do is clap your hands?
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@Faiez-rh1gm "Putin said" 🤣
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Aljazeera: In leaked phone calls, Russian soldiers appear angry at losses in Ukraine
Excerpts released by Kyiv of phone calls placed in early July appear to show Russian troops complaining.
Ukraine’s counteroffensive was in its second month when Andrey, a Russian soldier, called his wife to say his unit was taking heavy casualties. They were so badly equipped, he said, it felt like the Soviet forces in World War II.
“They are f*****g us up,” Andrey said by telephone on July 12, comparing the onslaught to the worst moments of Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. “No f*****g ammunition, nothing … Shall we use our fingers as bayonets?”
While Russia has so far largely stemmed Ukraine’s military campaign and made some modest territorial gains of its own in places, the soldiers in the intercepts complain that their units have suffered from heavy losses, a lack of munitions, proper training and equipment, as well as poor morale.
N. Melvin, director of International Security Studies at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a defence and security think tank headquartered in London, said the calls appeared to confirm some Russian forces were thrown into defensive operations with little preparation and were sustaining high casualties, sowing tensions between soldiers and commanders.
In December, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the military had to learn from and fix the problems it had experienced in Ukraine, promising to provide the army with whatever it needed. Reuters reported this month that Russia has doubled its defence spending target this year to more than $100bn – a third of all public expenditure.
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@Widmanstatten The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023:
“After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued.
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine .
“Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria.
The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@sturmassier During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported.
The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries. -
During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances.
There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports.
Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers tell you all about what Putin wants to achieve: Destroy and eradicate all Ukrainian. And still it is not a war, but a Special Military Operation!!?
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@robo__cop8154 "dn't put military infra. in civilian buildings if you dn't want them destroyed"
Two attacks on average EACH day on hospitals or ambulances. Over 300 bridges, several power plants, drinking water etc. 150.000 residential buildings, 3000 schools, 3000 shops, 85.000 agricultural machinery, 330 hospitals etc, etc.
All this is military infrastructure??? Why do I have the feeling that you would excuse absolute everything that the Russian orcs would do??
To repeat, Aljazeera: "Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again."
Euronews: Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London
Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars." They've never had much care for individual human life."
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@Frank-qs3pe Biden inherited an economic catastrophe caused partly by Trump and partly by Covid.
So far, under Biden, an impressive 15.7 million jobs have been added to the economy. Yes, the president benefited from a pandemic bounce-back. Businesses were going to bring back some workers no matter who was in the White House. But the rehiring was very rapid (helped along by the Biden stimulus), and, now, the economy has 6 million more jobs than it had pre-pandemic. Under Trump, job growth was also strong; 6.7 million jobs were added before the pandemic. But when you factor in the pandemic, Trump’s economy shed millions of jobs.
FactcheckORG: Government statistics show that in the initial processing of millions of encounters, 2.5 million people have been released into the U.S. and 2.8 million have been removed or expelled.
Some Republicans, however, have misleadingly suggested the number released into the country since Biden took office is much higher.
Release and removal rates for the last two years of former President Donald Trump’s term and the first 26 months of Biden’s, using DHS data, including the lifecycle report, ICE detention statistics and other figures published by the Republican majority on the House Judiciary Committee. It showed the Biden administration “has removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden.”
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@d4rd1v79 During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at.
Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@d4rd1v79 Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@patrickcerta4998 "I'm a Nazi. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
“You have to understand that when you kill a person, you feel the excitement of the hunt. If you’ve never been hunting, you should try it. It’s interesting,” he said.
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies. The group, and Milchakov himself, have been credibly linked to atrocities in Ukraine and in Syria.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group Rusich, is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
According to a confidential report by Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service, which was obtained by Der Spiegel and excerpted on May 22, numerous Russian right-wing extremists and neo-Nazis are fighting in Ukraine.
German analysts wrote that the fact that Russian military and political leaders have welcomed neo-Nazi groups undermines the claim by Putin and his government that one of the principal motives behind the invasion is the desire to “de-Nazify” Ukraine, Spiegel said.
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@kahutochishisumi9056 Metro: Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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@kurkkobain Russia wants to destroy everything "Ukrainian". It's both a culture war and a genocide. Does this look like random error to you:
The total amount of damage caused to Ukraine’s infrastructure due to the war has increased to almost $138 billion.
Russia continues to conduct a “massive” barrage of strikes on critical infrastructure. According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports.
Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
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@LostSouLVL The Donbas lie again? Really??
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@josephsmith688 Forbes: President Zelensky Is Not A Billionaire.
Despite social media reports claiming he’s a billionaire, Zelensky doesn’t come close to making Forbes’ global wealth rankings.His main asset: an estimated 25% stake in Kvartal 95, a group of companies that produce humorous shows, which he transferred to his partners after being elected president, though he’ll likely regain his shares after leaving office.
While he does own a flat in one of Ukraine’s most expensive apartment buildings in the center of Kyiv, it’s relatively modest by Western standards. Forbes estimates Zelensky’s entire real estate portfolio is worth $4 million, including two more wholly owned apartments, two that he co-owns, a single commercial property and five parking spaces.
We estimate he and his wife Olena Zelenska share a bank account that holds roughly $2 million in cash and government bonds. Their other assets, consisting of two cars and some jewelry, are worth no more than $1 million.
Putin's net worth is estimated to USD 20 Billion+ (20.000.000.000) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. (his salary as president is USD 180.000)
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@pedropalotes7638 The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has again condemned Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, calling for Moscow’s immediate withdrawal and an end to the fighting.
141 countries backed the resolution calling for a “comprehensive, just and lasting peace” in Ukraine. Thirty-two countries abstained from voting, while seven countries, including Russia, voted against (Belarus, Russia, Congo, Eritrea, Mali, Nicaragua and Syria).
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@dannyjanssens8985 Leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@markobucevic8991 You're a liar!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@mariofabrini3304 Djeezes what a m0r0n!
During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@mariofabrini3304 Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
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@mariofabrini3304 Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv.
There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity. When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education.
"Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools. To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total." "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson. There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots.’
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
(These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion. )
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savetheoligarchs OK, is this is NOTHING?🤣 Read it and weep, jerk!
NATO Summit: G7 countries agrees on long-term security commitment for Ukraine
"We confirm that the security of Ukraine is an integral part of the security of the Euro-Atlantic region."
NATO allies pledge new military package for Ukraine
As the specific areas of security and military cooperation, the press release listed providing modern military equipment on land, in the air, and at sea, training, intelligence sharing, developing resistance to cyber and hybrid threats, supporting Ukraine's defense industry, and interoperability with NATO forces.
The U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and Japan governments agreed to provide Ukraine with "modern military equipment across land, air, and sea domains."
The aid will prioritize air defense, artillery, long-range weapon systems, armored vehicles, and air combat capabilities, AFP reported.
G7 also reportedly pledged to provide Ukraine further military and financial assistance in case of a future Russian armed attack.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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The primary actors in this disinformation campaign include the ru SSian Ministry of Defence and media outlets either owned by or affiliated with the ru SSian government.
The Russia-led disinformation campaign targeting Africa is built around three primary narratives that seek to distort the region’s perception of Western involvement in the continent’s public health and geopolitical affairs.
The first narrative alleges the existence of US-controlled bioIabs in African countries, including Nigeria, Sierra Leone, and Uganda, claiming that these facilities are not dedicated to public health but to the development of bioIogical we apons. In tandem, the US is allegedly shifting its bi oweap ons projects from Ukraine to Africa, and it is suggested that recent outbreaks of diseases like monkeypox are a direct result of these supposed labs.
The second central theme of the campaign fosters anti-Western sentiments. It positions the West as exploiting Africa for dangerous experiments and advancing its own interests at the expense of the well-being of African people. In contrast, ru SSia is framed as a counterforce to Western hegemony, promoting an image of solidarity with African nations against the perceived exploitation by the West.
The third narrative ties these alleged bioIab activities to historical instances of unethical medical practices by Western institutions, particularly those involving African populations. By invoking deep-seated historical grievances, the campaign amplifies distrust towards the West, making the present-day claims of bi owea pons Iabs resonate more strongly with audiences who may already harbor skepticism toward foreign interventions.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections.
The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa.
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION. The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred.
This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture:
Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". - Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@pong9000 Is this the plan you you are reacting to? What's wrong here?
Zelensky's 10-point peace plan:
1. Radiation and nuclear safety, focusing on restoring security around Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Zaporizhzhia in Ukraine, which is now Russian-occupied.
2. Food security, including protecting and ensuring Ukraine’s grain exports to the world’s poorest nations.
3. Energy security, with a focus on price restrictions on Russian energy resources, as well as aiding Ukraine with restoring its power infrastructure, half of which has been damaged by Russian attacks.
4. Release of all prisoners and deportees, including war prisoners and children deported to Russia.
5. Restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity and Russia reaffirming it according to the UN Charter.
6. Withdrawal of Russian troops and the cessation of hostilities, the restoration of Ukraine’s state borders with Russia.
7. Justice, including the establishment of a special tribunal to prosecute Russian war crimes.
8. The prevention of ecocide, and the protection of the environment, with a focus on demining and restoring water treatment facilities.
9. Prevention of an escalation of conflict and building security architecture in the Euro-Atlantic space, including guarantees for Ukraine.
10. Confirmation of the war’s end, including a document signed by the involved parties.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, 2westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a 2Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Amnesty International:
One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023:
“After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory.
El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@superstar8162 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@superstar8162 The Minsk Agreements were a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@mahershalmatinek7376 The US "secret" documents said this:
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded
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@КонстантинСаченко-о3й Stalin began to take measures to protect the USSR, in fact from the entire Europe?? Are you serious?? Is that what you learn in Russian schools?
You can search the internet for the numbers, it is well known (unless you are in censored Russia).
Side switching: Hitler broke the pact between them in 1941, then Soviet of course switched side and became one of the Allied. (Most of Europe had fought the Nazis for 2 years already)
I think you forgot to mention the secret pact in the Molotov/Ribbentrop: To divide Europe between them. Germany the West and Soviet the East.
One week after the pact was signed, Hitler attacked Poland from the West and one week later Soviet invaded from the East. Then they took Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.
German planners in April and May 1939 feared massive oil, food, rubber and metal ore shortages without Soviet help in the event of a war. They discussed prior hostilities between the countries in the 1930s and addressed their common ground of anti-capitalism, stating "there is one common element in the ideology of Germany, Italy and the Soviet Union: opposition to the capitalist democracies," "neither we nor Italy have anything in common with the capitalist west" and "it seems to us rather unnatural that a socialist state would stand on the side of the western democracies." The Germans explained that their prior hostility toward Soviet Bolshevism had subsided with the changes in the Comintern and the Soviet renunciation of a world revolution. The Soviet official at the meeting characterized the conversation as "extremely important."
Germany and the Soviet Union signed the agreement in August 1941, providing for the trade of certain German military and civilian equipment in exchange for Soviet raw materials. The agreement provided for roughly 200 million in Soviet imports of raw materials (for which they would receive a seven-year line of credit), German exports of weapons, military technology and civilian machinery.
Like I said, one week after the pact was signed, Hitler attacked Poland from the West and one week later Soviet invaded from the East.
You should read more history instead of Russian propaganda!
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@FunnyBunny-pd5xx F..king bullshit!
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@FunnyBunny-pd5xx Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@zahkam7322 You do know that russia sent unmarked soldiers into Donbas before the war, right? To stir up the pot and arm the separatists.
These russian special forces together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@RonnyMcAndrews I doubt you'll learn anything by reading Kremlin propaganda.
The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes.
“What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others,” Bachelet said.
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@johannuys7914 The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@tirsobautista6875 "The current conflict can be resolved only if pro-peace politicians are allowed to make their case" Yes, IN RUSSIA!
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. Germany was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted).
As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe. They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion.
Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely. Back to its historical boundaries, e.g. from 1460 (small area around Moscow). The world must prepare for an armed peace, with EU and NATO membership for Ukraine as the only credible guarantee against new adventures from the Gremlins.
What happens inside the remnants of Muscovia (and North Korea for that matter) is their own problem. After a certain point there is no point in trying to help a mafia regime. Too bad for the population, but then they'd rather get rid of the regime themselves.
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- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
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@jimmyc974 NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press:
Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
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@NAS_Imports What bombardment of Crimea are you talking about?
Russia was concerned that the new government avowedly committed to closer relations with the West put its strategic positions in Crimea at risk. On 22–23 February, Putin convened an all-night meeting with security services chiefs to discuss extrication of the deposed Ukrainian president, Yanukovych, and at the end of that meeting Putin had remarked that "we must start working on returning Crimea to Russia". After that GRU and FSB began negotiating deals with local sympathizers to ensure that when the operation began there would be well‑armed "local self‑defense groups" on the streets for support. On 23 February pro-Russian demonstrations were held in the Crimean city of Sevastopol.
One of the initial Russian disinformation stories was the false allegation of a Corsun Pogrom, which claimed that pro-Maidan Ukrainians stopped several buses with Anti-Maidan protesters on 20 February. Russian media sources described beating and humiliation among the protesters, while a fake news documentary claimed multiple tortured and killed people. No such event actually occurred and when human rights organizations tried to contact the producers of the documentary they found that no such organization existed. Human rights group attributed the fake story to "pro-Kremlin trolls.
In a poll published on 24 February 2014 by the state-owned Russian Public Opinion Research Center, only 15% of those Russians polled said 'yes' to the question: "Should Russia react to the overthrow of the legally elected authorities in Ukraine?"
Regarding the myth of Nazi-ruled Ukraine, this is a clear propaganda narrative that became a cornerstone in pro-Kremlin disinformation, which can clearly be challenged with the issue of a 2015 ban on Nazi and Communist ideologies, and with the far-right groups having limited presence during the Euromaidan protests itself and have suffered defeats in every national election after that, with a united front of all radical right-wing parties in the 2019 parliamentary elections winning only 2.15% of the vote falling far short of the 5% minimum guaranteeing entry into parliament.
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@naas699 There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
Ukraine's top negotiator, Arakhamiia denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Johnson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to Arakhamiia, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin. Arakhamiia added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“
more of what he said. „When asked why Ukraine did not agree to this point, Arakhamia replied that there was no confidence in the Russians, because they were ready to promise anything. ... Secondly, there was no confidence in the Russians that they would do it. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“ You’re picking and choosing to support a false conclusion.
Then there was the Bucha massacre and it was over.
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@tyecollaborator5017 "Azov is responsible for Bucha". What the .uck are you smoking!? Do you even know where Bucha is and who fought there?
- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@Faiez-rh1gm The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
Leak from the Kremlin
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@Jackb0203 I believe the war in Iraq was wrong (at least badly implemented). But it's not comparable to this war.
There was UN Security Counsel resolution (1441) to give Iraq a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament obligations.
The most important text of Resolution 1441 was to require that Iraq "shall provide UNMOVIC and the IAEA immediate, unimpeded, unconditional, and unrestricted access to any and all, including underground, areas, facilities, buildings, equipment, records, and means of transport which they wish to inspect". However, on January 27, 2003, Hans Blix, the lead member of the UNMOVIC, said that, "Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptance, not even today, of the disarmament that was demanded of it".
Blix noted that Iraq had failed to cooperate in a number of areas, including the failure to provide safety to U-2 spy planes that inspectors hoped to use for aerial surveillance, refusal to let UN inspectors into several chemical, biological, and missile sites on the belief that they were engaging in espionage rather than disarmament, submitting 12,000-page arms declaration that it handed over in December 2002, which contained little more than old material previously submitted to inspectors, and failure to produce convincing evidence to the UN inspectors that it had unilaterally destroyed its anthrax stockpiles as required by resolution 687 a decade before 1441 was passed in 2002. On March 7, 2003, Blix said that Iraq had made significant progress toward resolving open issues of disarmament but the cooperation was still not "immediate" and "unconditional" as called for by UN Security Council Resolution 1441. He concluded that it would take "but months" to resolve the key remaining disarmament tasks. The US government observed this as a breach of resolution 1441 because Iraq did not meet the requirement of "immediate" and "unconditional" compliance.
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Errr, Putin broke the agreement right after it was signed!
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@chlim6826 CEPA: Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@mommamomma3607 The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@alphabogeyman7462
UN report Sept 25, 2023: Ukrainian prisoners of war tortured to death. The torture is said to have taken place in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, and mainly in Kherson and Zaporizhzhya.
Russian soldiers are also said to have raped Ukrainian women aged 19 to 83 while their families were forced to listen from the next room. Another member of the commission, Pablo de Greiff, said it was impossible to know how many cases of lethal torture there have been in Ukraine.
- We have limited access, but it is quite a large number and it comes from very different regions across the country, and both near and far from the front lines, de Greiff said. The International Humanitarian Law prohibits all forms of ill-treatment in war. This international law of warfare has been ignored by Russia ever since the annexation of the Crimean peninsula, according to Lindemann. She believes that the Russian authorities are very aware of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine. - It swems like an order from above, in that the same type of treatment has been carried out systematically, across land areas and military groups.
- Why are the Russians doing this? - Russian soldiers are fed a rhetoric of hate, which in turn goes beyond the population that is subjected to torture by the Russian forces. At the same time, they receive no training, so they have no knowledge of which rules apply to war.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. Germany was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted).
As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe. They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion. Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely. Back to its historical boundaries, e.g. from 1460 (small area around Moscow).
The world must prepare for an armed peace, with EU and NATO membership for Ukraine as the only credible guarantee against new adventures from the Kremlins. What happens inside the remnants of Muscovia and North Korea is their own problem. After a certain point there is no point in trying to help a mafia regime. Too bad for the population, but then they'd rather get rid of the regime themselves.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians.
Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 “The Srebrenica massacre was a horrific war crime. I'm Serbian and I'm extremely disappointed by what happened. War is hell, I hope it will never happen again.”
Still you are cheering for all the Russian warcrimes in Ukraine, what a hypocrite!!
And you want to talk about the Minsk Agreements again? OK, I’ll tell you again, RUSSIA BROKE THEM! They didn’t withdraw their troops from Donbass (they didn’t even admit they were there until later)
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution. Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA HAD PUT MUCH PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government CORRUPTION AND ABUSE POWER, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, SPARKING THE DONBASS WAR.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the South-Eastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. They are looting and plunder all over. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia. The Russians in the now occupied Donbass has started indoctrination of children. All history books that mention Ukraine as a nation are forbidden and burned. The children have to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian (both languages was teach before). Also many children are kidnapped/deportet to Russia. Mostly those who the authoroties suspects are pro-Ukrainian. Some of them far East in Russia, where they have small chances for returning home.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Globalbar: All forms of resistance have been banned in Putin’s Russia. Since the start of the war against Ukraine, it is forbidden to hold up a blank white sheet of paper, call the war against Ukraine a war, or dance for peace. At the same time, organisations are banned from operating in Russia. We have examined which laws have been passed and what they effectively restrict.
In February 2022, the Russian organisation Memorial was shut down after being labelled an extremist organisation. Memorial was one of the three recipients of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize and its closure followed a legal process.
Despite the fact that Russia is a de facto totalitarian state, the government wants to make it appear as if the regime’s repression has a legal basis. This is why the legal system is often referred to when activists are imprisoned or organisations are shut down. This goes back to the time of the Soviet Union when it was common for activists to be sentenced to psychiatric care, something that still happens today and has affected protesting artists, among others. At the same time, the Russian/Soviet system gives the accused the right to make a closing argument and these speeches, such as the one Navalny held, have the precondition of becoming historic.
The regime uses various laws to prevent any opposition from organising. Last year, the Russian parliament, the Duma, tightened virtually all laws regulating news media and civil society in Russia. It is now virtually impossible to engage in any kind of organised activity that critizises Putin or the Russian regime.
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@shareurtube The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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As always, you are lying! Ukraine hasn't targeted any of the countries you mentioned.
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion.
In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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internetresearchagency2238 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@glfan896 Dozens of Bucha civilians were killed by metal darts from Russian artillery.
Pathologists and coroners who are carrying out postmortems on bodies found in mass graves in the region north of Kyiv, where occupying Russian forces have been accused of atrocities, said they had found small metal darts, called fléchettes, embedded in people’s heads and chests.
According to a number of witnesses in Bucha, fléchette rounds were fired by Russian artillery a few days before forces withdrew from the area at the end of March.
According to Neil Gibson, a weapons expert at the UK-based Fenix Insight group, who has reviewed the photos of the projectiles seen, they include the 122mm 3Sh1 artillery round, in use by Russian artillery and which are filled with fléchettes.
“Fléchettes are an anti-personnel weapon designed to penetrate dense vegetation and to strike a large number of enemy soldiers,” according to Amnesty International. “They should never be used in built-up civilian areas.”
“You don’t have to be an arms expert to understand that Russia ignored the rules of war in Bucha,” Bucha’s mayor, Anatoliy Fedoruk, said. “Bucha was turned into a Chechen safari, where they used landmines against civilians.”
A team of 18 experts from the forensic department of France’s national gendarmerie, alongside a team of forensic investigators from Kyiv, have started documenting the terror inflicted on civilians during the month-long occupation.
“We are seeing a lot mutilated (disfigured) bodies,” said Pirovsky. “A lot of them had their hands tied behind their backs and shots in the back of their heads. There were also cases with automatic gunfire, like six to eight holes on the back of victims. And we have several cases of cluster bombs’ elements embedded in the bodies of the victims.”
Evidence collected by the Guardian during a visit to Bucha, Hostomel and Borodianka, and reviewed by independent weapons experts, showed that Russian troops used cluster munitions – which are banned in much of the world – and powerful unguided bombs in populated areas, which have destroyed at least eight civilian buildings.
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@glfan896 2022: According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes, possibly related to the occupation. (since then, over 1200 people are found in mass graves, but many are still missing)
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range. An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
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@miroslavdianezevic Sure, and the russian forces only have flowers in their guns.
OSCE Permanent Council 1417, Vienna, 30 March 2023:
1. Mr. Chair, tomorrow the Bucha Summit will take place – a high-level event organised by Ukraine to commemorate the victims of the heinous acts committed by Russia during its brutal and illegal war of aggression against Ukraine. Exactly a year ago, after Ukrainian forces liberated Bucha, Irpin, Borodyanka, and other settlements around Kyiv, the world saw the barbaric face of the Russian invaders. Arbitrary detentions and intimidation of local residents; torture; wilful killings of civilians, many of whom were summarily executed just before the Russian retreat; the deliberate targeting of women, children and the elderly who tried to evacuate; rape and other acts of sexual or gender-based violence, including against children - these are just some examples of the documented crimes committed by Russian troops against civilians in this region. The sheer magnitude of Russia's atrocities committed in Ukraine since 24 February 2022, is beyond words. The Ukrainian Prosecutor General announced last week that they have already documented over 76,000 criminal cases, and this number continues to climb every day. Criminal acts carried out by the Russian occupiers will continue to be documented as Ukraine liberates all of its territories currently under Russian control.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized.
They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@tirsobautista6875 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@tirsobautista6875 Putin was never gonna respect the Minsk agreements, in fact he has never held any agreements. It was just a game to fool Ukraine and the rest of the world.
He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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internetresearchagency2238 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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"Who's the aggressor here"? IT'S RUSSIA!
President Gorbachev himself said there were no such promise. These countries seek to NATO for protection to a more and more aggressive Russia.
Putin himself both had speeches and written that he wants to restore the Soviet Union as Great Russia. He also said Ukraine and Ukrainians doesn't exist.
LOL, US placed nuclear missiles in IRAN??! This shows that you're not sane! And they don't have over 850 bases, say more 10% of that. Wiki: The United States has military bases in 85 countries and territories.
"Where are the Russian and Chinese bases"
Wiki: Djibouti, Tajikistan, Pakistan, Cuba, Cambodia, Armenia, Azerbaijan (Artsakh), Belarus, Georgia (Abkhazia and South Ossetia), Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzystan, Moldova (Transnistria), Syria, Tajikistan, Libya, Mali, Ukraine.
Coming: Central African Republic, Egypt, Eritrea, Madagascar, Mozambique, Sudan.
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HalleysComet81 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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HalleysComet81 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
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HalleysComet81 In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
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HalleysComet81 By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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StopFollowingTheClowns-sx5zn Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@MarkNOTW Dailymail Nov. 2022: Russia has said it no longer wants to change the government in Ukraine, despite regime change being a key early objective of Vladimir Putin's invasion.
At the beginning of the war, Putin sent troops into Ukraine with the objective of overthrowing the Ukrainian government and installing a Russia-friendly regime.
But now, nine months into Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russia 'does not intend the "special operation" to change the government in Ukraine', Sky News reports.
Moscow had aimed to overthrow the Ukrainian government, but Russia's setbacks on the battlefield and stretched resources in Ukraine means that Putin has had to peddle back on his initial objectives.
Lavrov: "We will certainly help the Ukrainian people to get rid of the regime, which is absolutely anti-people and anti-historical.' "
- Russian President Vladimir Putin is seeking “regime change” and will likely go all the way and invade the rest of Ukraine, according to a former director for Russia at the National Security Council.
″I think given the size of the force, the rhetoric we’ve heard about Ukraine overall and its statehood, I think you’re going to see him [Putin] go all the way,” Jeffrey Edmonds told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Wednesday.
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So, you are worried about civilian infrastructure? Did that worry come recently?
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion.
According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances.
There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications.
Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa.
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops.
In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV You don't know what the ..uck you're talking about!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV "did you know Nzis is actually 🚫 in Russia"
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- - A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV "did you know Nzis is actually 🚫 in Russia"
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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The Russians are the real Nazis.
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
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@kahutochishisumi9056 The "trust me bro" sources are the ones that states 3000 Ukrainian deaths per day, and max 5 Russians.
The info I gave is from the US intelligence and are of course approx numbers.
If you prefer Russian info: Leak from the Kremlin.
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@@alextim6961 What about the Soviet/russian colonialist/imperialist wars in Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Northern Caucasus, Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Tsjetsjenia, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, Buratia, Ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Ingria, Karelia, Sakha, Kaliningrad, Khanty, Kuril Islands? And Georgia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Hungary, transnistria, Romania, Bulgaria, Korea and Aghanistan? Central African Republic, Mali, Sudan, Mozambique, Libya and Madagascar?
(From lifeisharditsharderifyoure6822): This is a list of wars and atrocities that were committed by Russia since early 20th century until today, and let's remember these are not just wars, many are full on occupations with countless war crimes and total suppression of the indigenous people their language, culture and anything that wasn't russian.... Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
Peaceful country my as..!!
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime.
It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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No, but putin is using them as targets!
Alj@zeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@darkcloud5830 LOL, the same lies over and over again! Russia attacked Ukraine unprovoked in 2014. Periode!
"Why not look at 2014 when Ukraine was killing Russians?" Ukraine was killing RUSSIAN SOLDIERS who had entered the country illegally. They also armed the separatists in Donbas and started a war against Ukrainian authorities. Didn't you think Ukraine had the right to fight back??
You probably have westernophobia, so it doesn't matter what I say. I know you are a brainwashed ruzzian that never will accept the truth!
Putin violated the Minsk agreements just hours after it was signed. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@mariaadelecagna3540 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@paulodekina7144 Not the same. Putler has ruled Russia like a maf ia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Brow der investigated him and said Putler is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putler was the “richest man in the W0rld” as a result of “terr ible cri mes” . Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@OshinNatasha-c5u You tell me who's confused (and brainwashed)? The russian regime ticks every box in fascism.
World101: What does fascism mean? (my "check" paranthesis) Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check).
This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check).
However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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@@alextim6961 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. Study history!
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014
Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@josephsmith688 Depends when in history, but how about 1954:
The decision on Crimea adopted by the Supreme Soviet on 19 February 1954. The Supreme Soviet was, as is well known, the legislative national assembly of the Soviet Union.
In this context, it is worth noting that the decision came about after a process that had stretched over some time, and was shortly afterwards approved by the Russian and Ukrainian Soviet Republics respectively. As an official justification for the transfer, reference was made to economics, geography and cultural ties between the Crimean Peninsula and the mainland. After all, Crimea is not self-sufficient and does not have a land connection with Russia - the peninsula has therefore always been dependent on getting necessary supplies from the Ukrainian mainland, including electricity, water for agriculture via artificial canals, etc.
It is also worth noting that Russia NEVER made any claim on the Crimean Peninsula in terms of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
But neither have the Russian authorities subsequently made any such demand, be it in relation to the negotiations on the Budapest memorandum in 1994, the Ukrainian-Russian friendship agreement in 1997 or in The Kharkiv Agreement in 2010.
On the contrary, as late as 2008, in an interview with German ARD, in connection with the then military conflict Russia had with Georgia over Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Putin specified that RUSSIA DOES NOT lay claim to Crimea - and became slightly indignant when the interviewer referred to the French foreign minister, who had expressed concern that Crimea could be Russia's next target. To this Putin replied:
"I think talking about something like 'the next goal' is inappropriate. […] Crimea is not a disputed area.
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@delanoscorpio9652 Leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings.
By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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LOL, "against an elderly woman". It is Kadyrov who has placed his mother as the head in name only, to avoid sanctions. The real head is Kadyrov himself.
RadioFE: All Chechens are required to contribute a percentage of their salary to the Akhmad Kadyrov Regional Public Fund.
Chechen officials have rejected that claim as untrue. But the news portal Caucasian Knot has spoken to Chechen teachers, medical personnel, and police officers who confirm that a percentage of their monthly salary is routinely deducted.
The Russian Kommersant daily has also researched links between the Akhmad Kadyrov fund and various commercial entities owned by Ramzan Kadyrov's mother, Aymani, or his trusted associates.
According to The Family, budget-sector employees in Chechnya are required to forfeit at least 10 percent of their monthly salary, employees of private companies up to one-third, and business owners up to 50 percent of their profits to the fund.
The total sum contributed in this way, which is not taxed or audited, is estimated at between 3 billion and 4 billion rubles ($55 million-$73 million) per month. By contrast, Chechnya's official budget revenues for 2015 are declared to be more than 57 billion rubles, including over 20 billion rubles in subsidies from the federal government.
The eponymous fund was established in June 2004, some seven weeks after Akhmad Kadyrov's death.
Kommersant describes it as "one of the least transparent NGOs" in the Russian Federation. The fund has never been audited and does not comply with the legal requirement that all NGOs receiving over 3 million rubles per year must submit accounts to the federal Justice Ministry. (A Justice Ministry official told Kommersant that the Akhmad Kadyrov fund is exempt from doing so because its accounts are published in the Chechen media -- but they are not.)
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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In February 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putin's wet dream of reestablishing the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In March they invaded Crimea. Right after they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group.
Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat. In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation.
He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood. This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself.
Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.” Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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“1. US deployed missiles across Europe like Turkey, Italy and other countries (Due to secret mission not known many countries) against Soviet”
(Well, these are NATO countries and they place their weapons to defend eehm NATO countries. It’s not hard to understand!)
“2. To counter US action, Soviet planned to deploy their missiles in Cuba, but US opposed and threatened to invade Cuba.”
(Cuba wasn’t a Warzawa Pact country. Schlesinger, a historian and adviser to Kennedy, told National Public Radio in an interview on October 16, 2002, that Castro did not want the missiles, but Khrushchev pressured Castro to accept them. Castro was not completely happy with the idea, but the Cuban National Directorate of the Revolution accepted them, both to protect Cuba against US attack and to aid the Soviet Union )
“5. But US violated agreed treaty by partially removing missiles from Turkey but not from Italy and other places from Europe (Not much info about original treaty what both US and Soviet concluded because of secrecy)”
(WRONG: US didn’t violate the treaty, Italy wasn’t a part of the deal (nor the rest of Europe), only the missiles in Turkey on the borders to Soviet.)
“6. NATO committee recruited Hitler's General from 1961 - 64 and the following years of wars used chemical bombs in Vietnam, Iraq, Serbia, in Ukraine against Russia”
(WRONG: They never used chemical weapons in Iraq, Serbia and Ukraine. But they used herbicider in Vietnam to make the leaves to fall off in the jungle, so the Vietcong couldn’t hide.
In addition, US accused the Soviet Union of supplying T-2 mycotoxin to the communist states in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia for use in counterinsurgency warfare. Over ten thousand people were alledegly killed in attacks using chemical weapons in Laos, Cambodia and Afghanistan. The descriptions of the attacks were diverse and included air-dropped canisters and sprays, booby traps, artillery shells, rockets and grenades that produced droplets of liquid, dust, powders, smoke or "insect-like" materials of a yellow, red, green, white or brown color.
The Soviet biological weapons program violated the Biological Weapons Convention and was the world's largest, longest, and most sophisticated program of its kind. At its peak, the program employed up to 65,000 people.
Despite being a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention, Russia has continued to hold and occasionally use chemical weapons. In 1997, Russia declared an arsenal of 39,967 tons of chemical weapons, which it worked in part to decrease. Its stock of weapons was declared destroyed in 2017. The poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in 2018 and the poisoning of Alexei Navalny in 2020, both carried out by Russia, revealed that the country maintained an illicit chemical weapons program)
“7. The civilians death toll more than 11 millions since WW2 because of USA wars in Vietnam, Afghan, Iraq, Serbia, Syria, Libya, Korea, others”
(Soviet/Russia was part in all the wars you’re mentioning here. And there were others too.)
“8. Looting oil from Syria without paying by Super power USA like Super thief USA”
(Asia Fact Check Lab (AFCL) found that the accusations echo those made by official Syrian media reports. The Syrian government has no control over the northeast area of the country, which is occupied by the anti-government coalition known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). U.S. and international media have reported that a U.S. company had secured an oil deal in the area, but it did so with the approval of the SDF, which helped to oust ISIS terrorist forces that previously controlled the oil production there. The U.S. currently authorizes non-governmental organizations to purchase petroleum in Syria, but the products have to stay in Syria for non-profit use.)
(Ukraine and Georgia are seeking to NATO because they seek protection from an increasingly aggressive neighbour.
Russia is always blaming NATO for everything. They themselves stir up the pot, then say they have no other option then war. This is the primitive Russian modus operandi.)
“2014 - 15 - 22: 1. Ukraine violated Minsk agreement supported by west”
(Just another lie: RUSSIA VIOLATED the Minsk agreements)
"US developing bio weapons against Russia in Ukraine soil like Hitler did in Germany "
( Kremlin propaganda, all lies. In March 2022, during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian officials falsely claimed that public health facilities in Ukraine were "secret U.S.-funded biolabs" purportedly developing biological weapons, which was debunked as disinformation by multiple media outlets, scientific groups, and international bodies.
Russian scientists, inside and outside Russia, have publicly accused the Russian government of lying about evidence for covert "bioweapons labs" in Ukraine, saying that documents presented by Russia's Defense Ministry describe pathogens collected for public health research. The "bioweapons labs" claim has also been denied by the US, Ukraine, the United Nations, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Russia's disinformation campaigns to justify invading Ukraine have failed up to now, but Russia keeps trying. Russia has a long history, dating back to Soviet times, of claiming that the U.S. has been developing biological or chemical weapons and even, in the 1980s, claimed that the virus that causes AIDS was a result of that.)
“As Soviets destroyed colonialism Russia will destroy neo colonialists and neo nazis”
(Soviet destroyed colonialism, ridiculous. But if you want to destroy neo-nazis, begin with yourselves.)
"Note: Russia never provoked West or US purposefully like US Russia never interfere other state affairs like US"
(Russia is literally everywhere, sticking it’s nose where it don’t belong. Take Africa for instance.
Africa Center For Strategic Studies: Russia has arguably expanded its influence in Africa in recent years more than any other external actor. These engagements extend from deepening ties in North Africa, expanding its reach in the central Africa, and rekindling Cold War ties in southern Africa. Russia’s approach is distinctive among external actors in that Moscow typically relies on irregular (and frequently extralegal) means to expand its influence—deployment of mercenaries, disinformation, election interference, support for coups, and arms for resources deals, among others.
This low-cost, high influence strategy seeks to advance a very different world order than the rules-based, democratic political systems to which most Africans aspire. The disinformation campaign is spread across the whole continent. The outcomes from Russia’s interventions in Africa, therefore, will have far reaching implications for governance norms and security on the continent.
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@darkcloud5830 ".... but he continue to ignore it when Putin demands he honor it. Merkel reveals that they have no intention to honor it."
Why does putin demand that, when he himself does not honor it?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the hostilities the Russian Federation has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the untruthfulness of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased.
In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich I know, this story is not so popular in Russia ; )
The European countries had fought the nazi's for 2 years already when Soviet/Russia entered the scene.
Return of stolen land? Goodie! NOW they are back! But does that mean that after the Ukraine war, you will get Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia "back"? What about Poland and East Germany? Hungary, Czech republic, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Moldova?
It was indeed CHURCHILL that Stalin had to beg.
No help, what do you call this?: (in short)
In 1941 Stalin contacted Churchill for help. USA, UK and other European countries sent ships with weapons and equipment to Russia to help defeat the nazis. There were 78 (with about 1400 ships) convoys between 1941 and 1945, sailing to Murmansk with 4 million tons of weapons and other equipment. This was one of the reasons that the (once?) heroic russian people stood against the nazis.
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@knudskoubo1090 Russia is by far the largest country on the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
Euro Area: 14.041,00
3. Japan: 4,231.10
4. Germany: 4,072.00 (GDP is projected to be 4121.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 4199.00 USD Billion in 2025)
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40 (GDP is projected to be 2290.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 2308.00 USD Billion in 2025)
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia doesn't indiscriminately shell civilians. Russia targets the Ukrainian military."
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming.
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia doesn't indiscriminately shell civilians. Russia targets the Ukrainian military."
Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February.
Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn.
"The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage."
"They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians".
In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable.
Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 It doesn't matter how many lies the Kremlin regime are spreading. The evidence of the Bucha massacre speaks for itself.
On September 23, a United Nations-appointed panel of independent experts released a statement:
concluding that Russian Federation forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine, an announcement that follows an earlier U.S. Government assessment, released in March. In the 27 towns and settlements they visited, the UN-appointed panel saw the remnants of torture and executions and documented evidence of sexual and gender-based violence, including rape, based on testimonies from brave survivors, government officials, and other witnesses. While inspecting mass graves, they also found that the Russian Federation perpetrated many of these atrocities against children and the elderly.
Since Putin launched his unjustified full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin has spuriously claimed Russian forces were liberating the Ukrainian people, while in reality committing war crimes against the country’s civilians. In Bucha and Irpin, retreating Russian forces left behind hundreds of bodies of innocent civilians in the streets, and Ukrainian women bravely came forward to tell of the abuse and sexual violence they experienced. And in just the last week, 440 bodies of men, women, and children were exhumed from mass graves in Izyum. In such a short time, Putin and his army have committed atrocities against the Ukrainian people that will leave voids and scars for generations. And sadly, we continue to hear even more harrowing stories from innumerable Ukrainians across the country who themselves have been victims of, or witness to, interrogations, detainments, torture, and forcible deportations to remote areas of Russia.
As President Biden said just a few days ago to the UN General Assembly, “this war is about extinguishing Ukraine’s right to exist as a state, plain and simple, and Ukraine’s right to exist as a people.” The world must unite against the Kremlin’s shameless inhumanity and hold those responsible for these atrocities accountable.
At USAID, we will continue working with the Ukrainian government and Ukrainian civil society to document Russia’s human rights abuses. With our support, these organizations have already documented more than 15,000 incidents, and handed over their evidence to authorities for further investigation. As Putin prolongs his invasion, we will continue this vital work so that the Ukrainian people can one day seek the justice they deserve.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 UN report details summary executions and attacks on individual civilians by Russian troops in northern Ukraine from February to April:
(7 December 2022) – In the initial weeks of the invasion of Ukraine, Russian armed forces summarily executed or carried out attacks on individuals leading to the deaths of hundreds of civilians, the Head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, Matilda Bogner said today. A UN Human Rights report based on the work of the Mission details how Russian troops killed civilians in Ukrainian towns and villages across the Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions of Ukraine from 24 February until 6 April 2022.
Bogner said the summary executions examined in the report may constitute a war crime. “There are strong indications that the summary executions documented in this report may constitute the war crime of willful killing,” she said.
The report explains how killings of civilians were not confined to specific locations, although some areas were more affected than others. In the town of Bucha near Kyiv, which was under the control of Russian troops from 5 to 30 March, the Mission documented the killing of 73 civilians (54 men, 16 women, 2 boys and 1 girl) and is in the process of corroborating an additional 105 alleged killings.
Summary executions often followed security checks by Russian armed forces. “A mere text message, a piece of camouflage clothing, or a record of previous military service could have fatal consequences,” Bogner said.
The report states that the UN has, so far, documented the violent deaths of 441 civilians (341 men, 72 women, 20 boys and 8 girls) in the three regions in the initial 6 weeks of the Russian invasion alone. The report cautions that the actual figures are likely to be considerably higher as work is still ongoing to corroborate an additional 198 killings that occurred in the Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions of Ukraine occupied by Russia in the initial stages of the ongoing armed attack against Ukraine.
Apart from the summary execution of civilians, the report covers cases when Russian troops launched attacks that did not respect the principle of distinction between military objectives and civilians, and failed to take all feasible precautions to spare civilians. “Civilians were targeted on roads while moving within or between settlements, including while attempting to flee the hostilities,” Bogner said.
The report examines 100 killings in more detail. Of the number, according to the report’s assessment, 57 amounted to summary executions (48 men, 7 women and 2 boys). Thirty of those took place in places of detention while the remaining 27 victims were killed on the spot, shortly after coming under the control of Russian forces.
“Russian soldiers brought civilians to makeshift places of detention and then executed them in captivity. Many of the victims’ bodies were found with their hands tied behind their backs and gunshot wounds to their heads,” said Bogner.
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@Alien_isolationist Putin is not interested in real peace talks, he wants it all. He broke the Minsk right after it was signed. And there was never an agreement in Turkey either.
Former PM Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
A video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@Peter-xg5fq The NKVD prisoner massacres were a series of mass executions of political prisoners carried out by the NKVD, the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs of the Soviet Union, across Eastern Europe, primarily Poland, Ukraine, the Baltic states, and Bessarabia.
After the start of the German invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, the NKVD troops were supposed to evacuate political prisoners into the interior of the Soviet Union, but the hasty retreat of the Red Army, the lack of transportation and other supplies and the general disregard for legal procedures often meant that the prisoners were executed. Approximately two thirds of the 150,000 prisoners were murdered; most of the rest were transported into the interior of the Soviet Union, but some were abandoned in the prisons if there was no time to execute them, and others managed to escape.
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@stanspb763 Written by Marksullivan:
When you mention WW2, never forget Russia’s enthusiastic alliance with Hitler’s Nazi regime from 1939 - 1941. It is all documented in the (now public) “Secret Protocols” in the Molotov - Ribbentrop Pact.
Poland was invaded not only by Germany. The Russians invaded from the East and partitioned Poland between them. And Russia’s occupation of Poland was brutal. Russia executed nearly 22,000 Polish officers and academics in the Katyn massacre. Russian documents declassified in the 1990s describe Russia’s atrocities in detail. The Russian army also herded thousands of Jews over the border to Nazi death camps.
The number of Poles who died due to Russian repressions in the period 1939-1941 is estimated as at least 150,000. Russia also invaded Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia and Finland on Hitler’s orders. Finland fought Russia to a standstill - but the other Baltic states were occupied and crushed by Russia for the next 50 years.
Russia also cheerfully profited by supplying Hitler with ammunition, fuel and raw materials so the Nazi war machine could defeat the French, bomb the British and sink American ships. If Russia had not helped Hitler so generously, but instead helped Poland - the Poles would have won their battle against the Nazis and Russia would never have been invaded. Then there is Russia’s pretend “outrage” that Europe and the USA are supplying Ukraine in its fight against Russian Fascism. Democratic nations will always see Fascists as the enemy.
After Hitler eventually double crossed his Russia ally, Stalin begged for the British and Americans to help Russia fight its former Nazis friends. Even before the United States entered World War II in December 1941, America sent arms and equipment to the Soviet Union to help it defeat the Nazi invasion. Totaling $11.3 billion, ($280 billion in today’s currency), the Lend-Lease Act of the United States supplied needed goods to the Soviet Union when it switched sides from the Nazis to the Allies in 1941 until the end of the war in 1945.
The substantial aid the USA sent included: 400,000 jeeps & trucks 14,000 airplanes 8,000 tractors 13,000 tanks 1.5 million blankets 15 million pairs of army boots 107,000 tons of cotton 2.7 million tons of petrol products 4.5 million tons of food On top of that, the British made their fleet available to deliver the aid. 30,000 British seafarers died to get the supplies through freezing U-boat infested waters to Russia, while British Airmen were stationed in Russia to conduct bombing missions to slow Hitler’s advance into Russia. Stalin begged the USA and Britain for help after his 2 years allied to the Nazis - and we delivered! (An interesting aside is that Russia refused to assist the USA fighting the Japanese until the last few days of that war. So, despite all the aid the USA and Britain gave Russia, if allied airmen in the Pacific war were forced to land in Russian territory, they were placed in prisoner of war camps by Russia.)
Without Allied help, Russia would have lost WW2. The Russian dictator admitted this publicly. Josef Stalin raised a toast to the Lend-Lease program at the November 1943 Tehran conference with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt. "I want to tell you what, from the Russian point of view, the president and the United States have done for victory in this war," Stalin said. "The most important things in this war are the machines.... The United States is a country of machines. Without the machines we received through Lend-Lease, we would have lost the war." Of course Western Democracies will proudly continue to fight Fascism right into the modern day.
So when Putin decided to embrace the Fascist dogma of racial superiority - Russia should have expected this humiliation. Unfortunately, Russia has a history of fighting on the Fascist side both in WW2 and in the current war. Russia’s dark history of their Nazi alliance is not taught in their schools. Most Russians simply do not know their shameful past. But we must remind Russia of its shameful past - and we must never let them forget again.
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Crimea was governed by the Constitution of Crimea as an autonomous republic of Ukraine. They had their freedom as an autonomous Republic until Russia annexed them. Russia has no more historic right to Crimea than Ukraine. Besides, Soviet/Russia has replaced a large part of the population.
Their background is this, briefly: The Cimmerians, Bulgars, Greeks, Scythians, Goths, Huns, Khazars, Kievan Rus', Byzantine Greeks, Kipchaks, Ottoman Turks, Golden Horde Tatars, the Mongols , the Venetians, the Genoese, Crimean Khanate, Ottoman Empire, the Russian Empire, Germany, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, and later the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.
Each controlled Crimea until Crimea became part of independent Ukraine with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. When the Soviet Union broke up, Ukraine held a significant number of nuclear weapons. In fact, the country had more nuclear warheads than China, the UK and France combined, making it the third-largest nuclear power in the world. Three years later, Ukraine reached an agreement with Russia and the US to hand over its nuclear weapons to be destroyed. In return, Russia promised to forever recognize the independence of the whole of Ukraine, including Crimea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Expanding its program to create “Putin’s faithful soldiers” to occupied Ukrainian territories, Russia has added summer “military” camps, “patriotic” clubs, and “bravery” lessons in the school curriculum aimed to brainwash Ukrainian children and eventually recruit them for a battle against their homeland, according to the Institute of Mass Information.
Following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has changed the national education program and included mandatory “basic military training” and “patriotism” lessons in the school curriculum in the occupied territories, the Institute of Mass Information said April 5. Today, in Russian classes, boys and girls learn to use assault rifles and provide battlefield first aid, while they also absorb the Kremlin’s standpoint on the war in Ukraine, which portrays the 2014 annexation of Crimea as a “reunification” and the invasion as a “liberation.”
In the occupied territories of Ukraine, Russian authorities are trying to weaponize the education process with even greater ferocity and cynicism, compelling schools and universities to promote military service, indoctrinating young minds with propaganda narratives, and threatening those who resist Russia’s armed aggression with deportation or torture.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 On 6 February, the National Resistance Center reported that occupiers set up “pre-conscription” training classes for Kherson Oblast school students in grades 10-11 to promote service in the Russian army. According to the Center, the Russian occupation administrations in Skadovsk, Kalanchak, Novotroitsk, and Genichesk districts established “cadet” classes in local schools, where boys aged 15 receive “deep” military education. Moreover, to motivate Ukrainian teenagers, Russian invaders promise high-ranking positions in the Russian military if they complete military training classes.
In the occupied Donetsk Oblast, Russian soldiers armed with assault rifles regularly conduct so-called “bravery” lessons in schools, as reported by Petro Andriushchenko, the adviser to the mayor of Mariupol. As the propaganda seeks to create a favorable image of invaders, teachers – collaborators in classes portray invaders as heroic liberators and “cool guys” needing help. Andriushchenko added that earlier, students at Azov University in Mariupol were compelled to donate blood for the Russian military.
Furthermore, in 2022, the Mariupol City Council shared images from a “summer camp” in Melekino, where the youngest Ukrainians were taught to shoot and hate their homeland while dressed in red Soviet-style uniforms.
In March 2023, Russian occupiers in Zaporizhzhia Oblast announced the formation of the “Voluntary Youth Brigade,” which would collaborate with law enforcement services, police, and the army. The National Resistance Center asserts that Russian invaders established the organization in a revival of Soviet-era practices, not only to coerce Ukrainian children into joining Russian propaganda centers, but also “to share responsibility for service” with them. In addition, Ukrainian children are routinely made to write warm words on cards to invaders, sing the Russian anthem, and put together care parcels for the front, according to the Mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov.
From a legal perspective, Russia’s mandatory drafting of civilians in the occupied territories is a clear violation of Article 51 of the Fourth Geneva Convention on the Protection of Civilians during War, which says, “The Occupying Power may not compel protected persons to serve in its armed or auxiliary forces. No pressure or propaganda which aims at securing voluntary enlistment is permitted.”
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@RichD1 I'm sorry, but you are misinformed. THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. (Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.)
Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukrainian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@timminh468 Russia both armed them and sent in their own soldiers to another SOVEREIGN COUNTRY. What do you think would have happened if Ukraine (or another country) conspired, armed and sent in unmarked soldiers into a Russian republic??
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@prpk2276 I apologize to those who have read this a thousand times, but it seems necessary to repeat it:
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@ThisUnderWorldOfDarkness - Special Military Operation, you're funny 🤣. How come it's not war, when already 220.000 Russians are killed and a million wounded? What's war like in Russia?
- "Surgical strikes"? By bombing apartment buildings, civil infrastructure, women and children in city's far from the front. They are not trying to reduce anything. Everything happens on purpose. They are trying to break down the morale among Ukrainians, but they don't succeed. Even as hard they try with their war criminal behavior!
- I'm sorry to inform you, There are no NATO troops fighting. I know it must hurt, but ....
- Yes, the war will be over when the West stop supporting Ukraine, so it will never happen!
- Best spent money ever, morally speaking!
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@Barin-hn1bf "From Nazis and Nato, standing at Russia's gate". The nazi's are inside, not outside the russian border!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@АртемАртем-л4э 🤣: Metro,uk: Заблуждающийся Путин «думал, что захватит Киев за три дня»
Согласно просочившимся данным ФСБ, Владимир Путин изначально думал, что Россия сможет победить Украину и свергнуть ее правительство всего за три дня.
Прошел почти ровно год с тех пор, как Путин начал свое катастрофическое вторжение в Украину, и эти утечки, похоже, подтверждают то, что уже давно подозревалось: шпионы ФСБ передавали ему ложные сведения в ходе подготовки к войне, которые говорили российскому деспоту именно то, что он хотел. слышать.
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@Sever_Rusy Вы изучали мировую историю, где? Дайте угадаю, Москва? А как насчет истории Туркестана, Якутии, Бухары, Хивы, Северной Ингрии, Бурятии, Буковины, Тувы, Приднестровья, Северного Кавказа, например? Какие люди жили здесь веками?
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”:
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 After September 1990 when the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution had been unilaterally repealed by the Socialist Republic of Serbia, Kosovo's autonomy suffered and so the region was faced with state-organized oppression: from the early 1990s, Albanian language radio and television were restricted and newspapers shut down.
Kosovar Albanians were fired in large numbers from public enterprises and institutions, including banks, hospitals, the post office and schools. In June 1991, the University of Priština assembly and several faculty councils were dissolved and replaced by Serbs. Kosovar Albanian teachers were prevented from entering school premises for the new school year beginning in September 1991, forcing students to study at home.
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia.
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals.
In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
Reports on the use of cluster munitions raised concerns about the high numbers of civilian casualties and the long-lasting danger of unexploded ordnance. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, weapons equipped with cluster munitions have been used both by Russian armed forces and pro-Russian separatists, as well as to a lesser degree by Ukrainian armed forces.
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Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity.
When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education. "Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools.
To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total." "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots.’
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Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
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Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
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On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
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Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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- For the people of good will, it is obvious that one mustn’t offend the little ones. This is something mothers usually teach their children, so they know not to mistreat others. But as it turned out, generally accepted moral standards are not followed by the soldiers of the Russian army. This is evidenced by their military strategy regarding the civilian population of Ukraine: murder, torture, rape and pillage.
Russia violated Ukrainian territorial borders, but above that – it crossed the moral lines, which are determined by international scope of humanitarian law. The number of crimes against humanity commited by them is growing every day. The most egregious of them – are crimes against children. Children have become a literal target for airstrikes and machine gun fire. Despite the word “CHILDREN” (“ДЕТИ” in Russian) was written in capital letters on the asphalt near drama theater in Mariupol – Russian soldiers still targeted it, killing more than 300 hiding civilians. Also, the word “Children” is often written on the cars of those trying to evacuate – yet they are still shot at by Russian soldiers.
- Donbass: As of September 8, 2022, 383 children died as a result of full-scale invasion and more than 742 have been injured, 239 were missing and 7420 were deported.
- “Mother buried 13-year-old Elisey not far from Kyiv. The boy lived in an ancient village known since the 17th century, a village with a good name – Victory (Peremoga). For one and a half months, Russia tried to capture Kyiv, so a large number of cities and villages in the Kyiv region were occupied. This old village was not spared a similar fate. The occupation lasted from February 28 to March 30, 2022. On March 11, during the demand for evacuation from the village of Peremoga along the agreed "green" corridor, the occupiers shot a column of civilians, which consisted exclusively of women and children. As a result, 7 people died. Among them was Elisey. “
At first, he walked with his mother and three-year-old brother, the boy pulled on a white T-shirt over his jacket, as a signal to the military that those were peaceful people in front of them. Then the family drove in a convoy of five cars. The Russians definitely saw that only women and children were in the cars. They even were waved at. And then the column... was shot at.
- Mined houses, toys and household items are a characteristic feature of the Russian strategy for the destruction of the civilian population. For example, in Bucha, the Russians planted explosives in the piano. The attentiveness of the mother, who noticed that her daughter’s awards were not placed on the piano in the same way as before, saved the child from death.
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Inheriting Stalin: Filtration Camps and Forced Deportations of Children
The idea of “denazification and demilitarization” of Ukrainians is not new and was not born in the head of the current ruler of Russia. 75 years ago, from the west of Ukraine to Siberia and Kazakhstan, Stalin evicted 79 thousand Ukrainians, 35 thousand of them were women, 24 thousand were children. The deportation was part of a consistent strategy for the destruction of Ukrainians as a national community, which was carried out by the Soviet authorities through the Holodomors, the Executed Renaissance and the total Russification of the people and their elites.
On May 31, 2022, Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova reported during her visit to The Hague that Ukrainian law enforcement officers open 200-300 criminal cases on war crimes every day. Approximately 600 suspects have already been identified, 80 of them are already being prosecuted.
The suspects are the top military and political leadership, Russian propaganda agents, and others involved.
Some of the criminal cases have been filed against the events in the east of the country, where fierce fighting between the Ukrainian and Russian military is currently ongoing. Prosecutors are investigatingforced deportation of people, including children, to different parts of Russia. Due to ongoing hostilities, investigating crimes is sometimes difficult, however investigators managed to interview evacuated Ukrainians and released prisoners of war.
Daria Gerasimchuk, the President’s Commissioner for Children’s Rights and Children’s Rehabilitation, said that according to data from open sources, as of June 1, 2022, more than 234,000 children crossed the border towards Russia and the ORDLO (the uncontrolled by Ukrainian authorities territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions). Among them are about 2 thousand orphans and children deprived of parental care. These are forcibly deported, forcibly relocated children either to temporarily occupied territories, or to the Russian Federation, or to the Republic of Belarus. Gerasimchuk emphasized that such actions are illegal, prohibited by the Geneva Convention, international law, and Ukraine will fight for every child.
According to the commissioner for children’s rights, currently more than 7.5 million Ukrainian children are suffering from war, and it is not only about physical injuries. It is about a violation of the psychological, psycho-emotional state, and an absolute violation of all the rights of the child. “The actions taken by the Russian Federation in relation to Ukrainian children have all the signs of genocide of the Ukrainian people,” Gerasimchuk emphasized.
And what awaits the deported Ukrainians on the territory of Russia? The union of “fraternal nations” and a well-fed, well-arranged life in any Russian city? By no means. Do not forget that deportation is not a charity, but a punitive action.
This is confirmed by the telephone conversation intercepted by the Security Service of Ukraine of a Russian military man in Ukraine – with his wife. Yulia Kopytova complains to her husband Yury about the Ukrainian children brought to Russia who do not want to celebrate May 9, a sacred day of victory for Russians. The children explain this as a difference in values and insist that “this is not their holiday”. The woman describes in detail to her husband-occupier how she would punish them for this if she could. In particular, “I would inject them with drugs” and “carve stars on their backs”.
Another tactic Russia uses against Ukrainian children – is to separate them from their culture. Occupiers aim to destroy historical memory and the national identity of the child, as well as to adapt them to the Russian school curriculum in the occupied territories, including Mariupol in the new school year. The plan is to teach these three subjects: “Russian language and literature”, “History of the Fatherland” (Russian) and “Mathematics”.
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@annmowatt7547 "Exactly, had this been the US they would have bombed Kiev to smithereens by now."
The 1999–2000 battle of Grozny was the siege and assault of the Chechen capital Grozny by Russian forces, lasting from late 1999 to early 2000. This siege and assault of the Chechen capital resulted in the widespread devastation of Grozny. In 2003, the United Nations designated Grozny as the most destroyed city on Earth due to the extensive damage it suffered. The battle had a devastating impact on the civilian population. It is estimated that between 5,000 and 8,000 civilians were killed during the siege, making it the bloodiest episode of the Second Chechen War.
The Russian forces relied heavily on rocket artillery such as BM-21 Grad, BM-27 Uragan, BM-30 Smerch, ballistic missiles (SCUD, OTR-21 Tochka), cluster bombs and fuel air explosives. (The TOS-1, a multiple rocket launcher with thermobaric weapon warheads, played a particularly prominent role in the assault). These weapons wore down the Chechens, both physically and psychologically, and air strikes were also used to attack fighters hiding in basements; such attacks were designed for maximum psychological pressure.
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@bubullibooooo9928 Not everything, but a lot. But does it justifies the rapes, mutilation and killing of woman and children? I wouldn't call these Hamas terrorists animals, because that would be an insult to the animals.
"The Scope of Hamas' Campaign of Rape Against Israeli Women Is Revealed, Testimony After Testimony: "The aggregation of evidence collected by Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy and her Civil Commission presents a horrifying picture that leaves no room for doubt: On October 7, Hamas terrorists systematically carried out acts of rape and sexual abuse. She has discovered, however, that there is no rush to acknowledge this abroad." "The body of one woman had “nails and different objects in her female organs.” In another house, a person’s genitals were so mutilated that “we couldn’t identify if it was a man or a woman.”
Simcha Greinman, a volunteer who helped collect the remains of victims of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 assault on Israel, took long pauses as he spoke those words on Monday at an event at the United Nations."
"At the Nova music festival, where more than 350 young people were slaughtered and dozens kidnapped, witnesses hiding in the bushes saw terrorists gang-rape, then murder and mutilate women. A Hamas video from a kibbutz shows terrorists torturing a pregnant woman and removing her fetus. Our forensic scientists have found bodies of women and girls raped with such violence that their pelvic bones were broken. Those of us unlucky enough to have seen video evidence broadcast by the terrorists themselves witnessed the body of a naked woman paraded through Gaza, and another, still alive, in bloodied pants held captive at gunpoint being pulled into a jeep by her hair. This evidence, along with the explicit recorded confessions of captured terrorists, makes abundantly clear that mass rape was a premeditated part of Hamas's plan."
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@kassemsaid8686 The Russian general, Ivan Popov, said he had been dismissed as a commander after telling the military leadership about the dire situation at the front in Ukraine, where he said Russian soldiers had been stabbed in the back by the failings of the top military brass.
“The lack of counter-battery combat, the absence of artillery reconnaissance stations and the mass deaths and injuries of our brothers from enemy artillery.
I had no right to lie, therefore I outlined all the problematic issues that exist today in the army in terms of combat work and support. I called all things by their proper names, drew attention to the most important tragedy of modern warfare. This is the lack of counterbattery combat, the abssence of artillery reconnaissance stations and the mass deaths and injuries of our brothers from enemy artillery.
As many commanders of divisional regiments said today, the servicemen of the armed forces of Ukraine could not break through our army from the front, (but) our senior commander hit us from the rear, treacherously and vilely decapitating the army at the most difficult and tense moment.
I also raised a number of other problems and expressed it all at the highest level frankly and extremely harshly. In return, they fired me.”
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@robertwaim6376 - On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@hppower_and_squirrels There is the russian "truth" and the real truth! You and wolfswinkel know about the first.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
Putin was never gonna respect the Minsk agreements, in fact he has never held any agreements. It was just a game to fool Ukraine and the rest of the world.
He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
By the way, what do you think will happen to a potential separatist group working inside Russia? How long do you think they will live? One day? Two days? Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putins wet dream of reestablish the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after that, they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
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Ambassador Hillman: “Between Canada and the United States under the USMCA, the deal that we negotiated under President Trump in his first term, Canada and the United States are 99% tariff-free,” said on
Hillman said that the remaining tariffed products are primarily in the agricultural sector and are specifically designed to protect small family farms.
“Canada is your No. 1 customer, and you have a trade surplus with Canada in all manufactured goods,” Hillman said. “We provide affordable, reliable energy that helps fuel the U.S. economy.”
She explained that both nations maintain similar protective measures — the U.S. for sugar, dairy, fruits and vegetables, while Canada primarily restricts dairy imports. These tariffs only activate after agreed-upon import quotas are reached, as negotiated under the USMCA. And as the US dairy industry acknowledges, the US is NOT hitting its allowed zero-tariff maximum in any category of dairy product.
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@boota1979 You have no facts about Russia and the war between them and Ukraine. Still here you are commenting on the war, but only comment on a party that does not fight.
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
After September 1990 when the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution had been unilaterally repealed by the Socialist Republic of Serbia, Kosovo's autonomy suffered and so the region was faced with state-organized oppression: from the early 1990s, Albanian language radio and television were restricted and newspapers shut down. Kosovar Albanians were fired in large numbers from public enterprises and institutions, including banks, hospitals, the post office and schools. In June 1991, the University of Priština assembly and several faculty councils were dissolved and replaced by Serbs. Kosovar Albanian teachers were prevented from entering school premises for the new school year beginning in September 1991, forcing students to study at home.
Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia. The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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@gilbertknight6617 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Broskisnowski Ever heard of the content? Obviously not!
Pandora Papers: Several Russian outlets covered the leaks but the Kremlin was quick to dismiss the reports as “groundless.” Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the allegations were “hard to understand” and did not merit investigation.
The cache exposed assets stashed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and his inner circle, including the purchase of a waterfront apartment in Monaco by a Russian woman who reportedly had a child with the longtime leader.
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, which obtained the records, identified hundreds of offshore companies with 4,400 beneficial owners who were Russian — more than any other nationality. They include 46 Russian oligarchs.
In the Pandora papers there are 19 Russian politicians, 38 Ukrainian, 6 Indian, 10 Nigerian, 8 Venezuelan to name a few.
An adviser to Zelenskyy’s chief of staff said on Monday that the president had created the offshore companies in 2012 (he became President in 2019) to “protect” the group’s incomes against the “aggressive actions” of the “corrupt” government of then pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych.
“Journalists have de facto confirmed the president’s absolute respect for the standards of anti-corruption legislation,” Mykhailo Podoliak told the AFP news agency.
The Pandora Papers are the latest in a series of mass ICIJ leaks of financial documents, from LuxLeaks in 2014, to the 2016 Panama Papers (800 Russians on this list), which triggered the resignation of the prime minister of Iceland and paved the way for the forced resignation of the leader of Pakistan.
Corruption index 2022: 1. Denmark 2. Finland 9. Germany 18. UK 24. USA 85. India 116. Ukraine 137. RUSSIA 140. Pakistan 171. North Korea 180. Somalia.
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@magnus08f250 Just russian lies and propaganda. And the putin fans buys it all without blinking!
Usatoday: "The claim: Zelenskyy has a Florida home, $1.2 billion in overseas account, 15 homes, 3 planes and $11 million in monthly income
A Feb. 25 Instagram post (direct link, archived link) claims Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accumulated vast wealth overseas
"Zelensky owns 15 homes, 3 private planes, and has a monthly income of 11 million dollars. Why is no one questioning where our AID is going?" tweeted the account Trump's Nephew.
Forbes was found no evidence of these assets, while none of Florida's public records show that he owned a home in the Sunshine State.
Our rating: False
An investigative expert said that there's no evidence of the assets listed in the post, and Forbes, which tracks Zelenskyy's assets, also found no evidence of these assets. None of Florida's public records show that Zelenskyy owns a home in the state.
No evidence of the assets in post
There's no evidence Zelenskyy has any of the assets listed in the post, according to Drew Sullivan, co-founder and publisher of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.
“He does not have a house in Florida, nor did we find evidence of (a $1.2 billion) overseas account, but bank accounts are generally private and come out in leaks,” Sullivan said in an email. “There is no evidence of 15 homes, private planes, etc."
Sullivan also said "these fake numbers are being pushed by non-credible sources – social media accounts that regularly parrot Russian propaganda."
Forbes estimated in 2022 that Zelensky's real estate portfolio was worth $4 million, which included two apartments he owns, two apartments he co-owns, five parking spaces and commercial property.
USA TODAY previously debunked a claim that Zelenskyy bought his parents an $8 million mansion.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press:
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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RUSSIAS LIE MACHINE: It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed.
Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@simonrajan3945 Is that a Russian institute?
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
Leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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Thanks for the opportunity to remind you all of the atrocities done by the russian orcs!
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence.
Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable.
Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@Enteraname-tg3rg Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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yanksbiglywvil How is general Kisel, Dvornikov, Zhuravlev, Muradov, Mizintzev, Popov, Selivyorstov and Surovikin? (Fired)
How is the Nazi leaders Prigozhin and Utkin? How is the generals Sukhovetsky, Frolov, Simonov, Botashev, Kutuzov, Goryachev, Tsokov, Tushayev, Vitaly Gerasimov, Kolesnikov, Mityyaev, Mordvichec and Rezantzev? (KIA)
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Yes, there were a Russian staged coup i late 2013, when Putin forced Yanucovich to reverse the already negotiated political association and free trade agreement with EU. Luckily the Ukraninas protested and Yanokovich had to resign in february 2014.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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@monichat The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said.
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@Risingpheonix-lj6dc Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
There has been about 200 rounds of peace talks with russia. Putler doesn't want peace, he wants Ukraine.
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@peace20241 "I'm a Nazi. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of a video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
“You have to understand that when you kill a person, you feel the excitement of the hunt. If you’ve never been hunting, you should try it. It’s interesting,” he said.
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies. The group, and Milchakov himself, have been credibly linked to atrocities in Ukraine and in Syria.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group Rusich, is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
According to a confidential report by Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service, which was obtained by Der Spiegel and excerpted on May 22, numerous Russian right-wing extremists and neo-Nazis are fighting in Ukraine.
German analysts wrote that the fact that Russian military and political leaders have welcomed neo-Nazi groups undermines the claim by Putin and his government that one of the principal motives behind the invasion is the desire to “de-Nazify” Ukraine, Spiegel said.
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@malcolmb3744 Metro,uk: Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
Since then Russia has gone on to suffer as many as 500,000 casualties as well as a number of humiliating defeats, including losing Black Sea flagship the Moskva and the partial destruction of the Kerch Bridge, which links Russia to occupied-Crimea.
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@Vladimir0809 5 июля 2022 года Верховный комиссар ООН по правам человека сообщил, что большинство жертв среди мирного населения, задокументированных офисом, были вызваны неоднократным применением российской армией взрывного оружия в населенных районах. Они заявили, что тяжелые потери среди гражданского населения от использования такого неизбирательного оружия и тактики стали «бесспорными». По оценкам УВКПЧ, с 24 февраля 2022 года по 30 июня 2023 года 90,5% всех жертв среди гражданского населения были убиты взрывным оружием с широким радиусом действия, и что 84,2% из них были зафиксированы на территории, контролируемой Украиной. El País подсчитала, что к марту 2023 года российские войска стреляли со скоростью от 600 000 до 1,8 миллиона снарядов в месяц.
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Where does Obama come into this?
The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason. 😂
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries. The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine. Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 655 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded by grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive.
Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@JCP_323 No, the numbers are more like U.S 35-40 % (but so far only 30%) and Europe 60-65% financial support for Ukraine.
But why did Trump have to I ie about how much the US have given? The US has NOT given 500 bn, not even 350 bn, so why I ie about it?
They numbers are between 119 and 175 bn USD, depending on how you do the math (but only $83.4 billion has been sent). And of that total, 75 bn is given to US companies.
Only 35 bn is budget support for Ukraine. 69 bn is military support.
That means Ukraine has received 76 bn (35 bn budget support and 41 bn as weapons)
The U.S has given 0,3 % of their GDP (0,5 when all that is promised is received)
Estonia has given 2,5 %
Denmark 2,5 %
Lithuania 1,8%
Norway 1,7 %
On top of that, the actual value of the weapons and equipment sent to Ukraine by the USA is about 60% lower than they were priced because the price was for new stock. Much of the military equipment and ammunition sent to Ukraine is old and of limited combat effectiveness because it came from aging US stockpiles, some of the ammunition is expired, and a majority of the equipment isn't even used by the US military anymore (and therefore has an effective value of $0 to the USA). Normally, this stock would have to be disposed of, but giving it to Ukraine means there are effectively no disposal expenses. Furthermore, much of the funding for Ukraine is being spent in the USA, such as employing US workers to manufacture the replacement equipment and supplies for refilling US stockpiles.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution. Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA HAD PUT MUCH PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government CORRUPTION AND ABUSE POWER, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, SPARKING THE DONBASS WAR.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK II:
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@biancaenera2500 In late September 2022, in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian-installed officials in Ukraine staged so-called referendums on the annexation of occupied territories of Ukraine by Russia. They were widely described as sham referendums by commentators and denounced by various countries. Currently, the validity of the results of the referendums has only been accepted by North Korea, and no other sovereign state.
The votes were conducted in four areas of Ukraine – the Russian puppet states of the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic in the Russian-occupied Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine, as well as the Russian-appointed military administrations of Kherson Oblast and Zaporizhzhia Oblast, captured and occupied in the first week of the 2022 invasion] – as well as in Russia. Russia does not fully control any of the four regions, where military hostilities are ongoing, and much of the population has fled since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine] The referendums were illegal under international law and have been condemned by the United Nations as violations of the United Nations Charter.
On 30 September 2022, Russia's president Vladimir Putin announced the annexation of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts of Ukraine in an address to both houses of the Russian parliament. The United Nations, Ukraine, and many other countries condemned the annexation.
Since the referendums are unlawful, their outcome does not affect the classification.
Even if Russia announced the annexation of the four regions on Friday 30 September 2022, such a declaration is unlawful and does not have legal effects.
Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson are therefore still part of Ukraine and are occupied by Russia.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russias Lie Machine.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy.
But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology".
Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Priests in Russia arrested.
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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US-Canada products are 99% tariff-free.
“Between Canada and the United States under the USMCA, the deal that we negotiated under President Trump in his first term, Canada and the United States are 99% tariff-free,” Ambassador Kirsten Hillman said on NewsNation’s “CUOMO” hours after meeting with Prime Minister-designate Mark Carney.
Hillman said that the remaining tariffed products are primarily in the agricultural sector and are specifically designed to protect small family farms.
“Canada is your No. 1 customer, and you have a trade surplus with Canada in all manufactured goods,” Hillman said. “We provide affordable, reliable energy that helps fuel the U.S. economy.”
She explained that both nations maintain similar protective measures — the U.S. for sugar, dairy, fruits and vegetables, while Canada primarily restricts dairy imports. These tariffs only activate after agreed-upon import quotas are reached, as negotiated under the USMCA. And as the US dairy industry acknowledges, the US is NOT hitting its allowed zero-tariff maximum in any category of dairy product.
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@upstairs1307 Metro,uk: Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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@johnosullivan2197 (copied from another member): This is a list of wars and atrocities that were committed by Russia since early 20th century until today, and let's remember these are not just wars, many are full on occupations with countless war crimes and total suppression of the indigenous people their language, culture and anything that wasn't russian.... Turkestan, Yakutia, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Tuva, Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
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@alexeyshierman5023 I think it has to do with building a nation. To do so the Ukrainian language was to be the first language.
Russia has conducted hybrid war, falsification of history and other propaganda, interfered with elections, threatened and bribed politicians, said that Ukraine does not exist, for example. I think this has led Ukraine to want to cut all ties with Russia (as any other country would also do in a similar situation).
Besides, the russian language is NOT forbidden, as many claim, but the Ukrainian language is the first language. If Russia hadn't been so aggressive towards Ukraine, the russian language would have been more "acceptable".
NB! Do you think this is the reason, for not to say a good enough reason to start this war??
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@hongry-life Putin's salary is USD 180.000 a year, but he is considered to be one of the richest people of the planet. Some say he IS the richest. What do you say about that? Not bad??
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income.
He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@hongry-life Maybe you should read something else than only russian propaganda. You are just parroting russian lies, are you happy about that?
Zelensky is not a multi billionaire, not even a billionaire! But Putin is, what do you call him then?? Where do you think his wealth come from, his salary is USD 180 000 a year?
Zelensky do NOT have a mansion in Miami!
In 2022, Facebook users published a post claiming that the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, owns a “palace” worth 35 million USD in Miami, as well as “billions of assets” outside the borders of Ukraine. The authors of the post point to Kremlin propagandist Scott Ritter as the source of information.
The claim that Zelenskyy owns real estate worth several tens of millions is without evidence. The overall net worth of the President of Ukraine is estimated at 20-30 million USD, while a 35 million USD villa in Miami is included neither in his property declarations nor in Pandora Papers. In addition, according to PolitiFact, a US fact-checking agency, Florida’s public real estate registry does not include any real estate linked to Zelenskyy or the companies named in the Pandora Papers.
The information that Zelenskyy owns a villa worth 35 million USD in Miami was reported in the Russian media as early as February 23rd. Russian propaganda media, including Риа Новости, Газета.ру, Россиская Газета relied on Ukrainian, pro-Russian oppositionist Illia Kyva, who published the mentioned information on Telegram. Notably, Газета.ру connected Kyva’s statement regarding Zelenskyy’s property with Pandora Papers, the materials of the offshore accounts of politicians and their entourage by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). In addition, one of the publications did not name Illia Kyva as the source of information, but the pro-Kremlin Telegram channel Nezygarь.
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@hongry-life "But letting others do the job that you can do yourself ". And by that you mean searching on russian propaganda sites??
In 2022, social media users claiming that the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, owns a “palace” worth 35 million USD in Miami, as well as “billions of assets” outside the borders of Ukraine. The authors of the post point to Kremlin propagandist Scott Ritter as the source of information.
The claim that Zelenskyy owns real estate worth several tens of millions is without evidence. The overall net worth of the President of Ukraine is estimated at 20-30 million USD, while a 35 million USD villa in Miami is included neither in his property declarations nor in Pandora Papers. In addition, according to PolitiFact, a US fact-checking agency, Florida’s public real estate registry does not include any real estate linked to Zelenskyy or the companies named in the Pandora Papers.
The information that Zelenskyy owns a villa worth 35 million USD in Miami was reported in the Russian media as early as February 23rd. Russian propaganda media, including Риа Новости, Газета.ру, Россиская Газета relied on Ukrainian, pro-Russian oppositionist Illia Kyva, who published the mentioned information on Telegram. Notably, Газета.ру connected Kyva’s statement regarding Zelenskyy’s property with Pandora Papers, the materials of the offshore accounts of politicians and their entourage by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). In addition, one of the publications did not name Illia Kyva as the source of information, but the pro-Kremlin Telegram channel Nezygarь.
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THERE WAS NO ETHNIC CLEANSING IN DONBAS.
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets.
Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press:
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…” The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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RUSSIAS LIE MACHINE:
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset.
All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@pp38pp There are a ton of examples of persecution of both opposition and freedom of speech, can't name them all. It would take a year!
F.Times: Russian law bans journalists from calling Ukraine conflict a 'war' or an 'invasion'.
In order to control what the Russian public knows about invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin has signed a law that imposes stiff sentences on journalists who air "false information."
Journalists could be jailed for up to 15 years.
Standing in the metal cage of a Siberian courtroom, Russian journalist Maria Ponomarenko this week closed her trial, triggered by a social media post about the war in Ukraine, by dismissing the entire process as a sham.
“What is happening to our country? If there’s a war, call it a war,” she told the judge. The next day, Ponomarenko, a mother of two, was sentenced to six years, becoming the first journalist imprisoned under Russia’s tough new censorship laws, which include a ban on the word “war”.
Across Russia, hundreds of other cases related to antiwar speech and protests are now going through the courts, making the past 12 months the worst period for political repression in the country’s modern history.
Around 20,000 people were detained for political and antiwar protests last year, according to human rights group OVD-Info. Most were held only for short stints and issued a minor offence, but receiving a second leaves them open to as much as a five-year jail term.
At least 440 people — artists, priests, teachers, students and doctors — have had criminal cases opened against them, according to OVD-Info. Many are awaiting trial in jail, and some face sentences of up to 15 years. Others have fled the country.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians.
They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected. By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later.
The LPR and DPR are not recognized as legitimate entities under the Minsk Agreements.
The signatures of the leaders of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics were added after they had already been signed by Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE. They were not among the original signatories, and indeed Ukraine would not have signed had their signatures been part of the deal. There is nothing in the content or format of the Agreement that legitimizes these entities and they should not be treated as negotiating partners in any sense. Russia alone controls the forces occupying parts of eastern Ukraine.
Despite that, however, Russia untruthfully claims not to be a party and only a facilitator — and that the real agreements are between Ukraine and the so-called “separatists,” who call themselves the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics (LPR and DPR), but are in fact Russian supplied and directed.
Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision.
Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” (Russian soldiers) woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.) The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
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Ukraine has been willing to negotiate the whole time. Putin has refused. What you read in Russian propaganda, is not true. MINSK I Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015. It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.) YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West. The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations.
That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@OshinNatasha-c5u I have never said Ukrainians are angels. But you don't seem like the brightest star, so I'll skip further explanations.
About the eastern Ukraine, you lie like a russian propagandist!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@АрхиМед-ы5ь Some of Russian wars the last 100 years: Turkestan, Yakutia, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Tuva, Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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Russia has banned all opposition. The lucky ones are being killed, while others are facing torture and many years in prison. That also include media/journalists, not politicians only.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Grayzone is an American fringe, far-left news website and blog.
The website, initially founded as The Grayzone Project, was affiliated with AlterNet before becoming independent in early 2018. It is known for its critical coverage of the US and its foreign policy, misleading reporting, and sympathetic coverage of authoritarian regimes. The Grayzone has downplayed or denied the Chinese government's human rights abuses against Uyghurs, published conspiracy theories about Venezuela, Xinjiang, Syria, and other regions, and published pro-Russian propaganda during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia has taken some children out of harm's way and into recreational facilities". That's a new low, even from you!!
Aljazeera: Ukraine calls for return of ‘abducted’ children as more arrive in Belarus
Ukraine says more than 19,000 children have been taken illegally by Russia since it began its full-scale invasion.
Speaking on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), Zelenska said more than 19,000 Ukrainian children had been forcibly transferred or deported to Russia or the territories it has occupied.
In Russia, “they were told that their parents don’t need them, that their country doesn’t need them, that nobody is waiting for them,” Zelenska said.
“The abducted children were told that they are no longer Ukrainian children, that they are Russian children.”
In March, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s children’s rights commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova. The judges in The Hague said they found “reasonable grounds to believe” the two were responsible for war crimes, including the illegal deportation and transfer of children from occupied parts of Ukraine to Russia.
In June, Belarusian opposition figures gave the ICC materials, which they said showed more than 2,100 Ukrainian children from at least 15 Russian-occupied Ukrainian cities had been forcibly transferred to Belarus with Lukashenko’s approval.
Ukraine says the children are being indoctrinated and deprived of their national identity, which President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described as a genocide in his speech to the UNGA on Tuesday.
“Those children in Russia are taught to hate Ukraine, and all ties with their families are broken,” Zelenskyy told the General Assembly. “This is clearly a genocide.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s (and Percievedreality's) Lie Machine . It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@electro1622 Metro: Deluded Pu tin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Put in initially thought Rus sia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked F SB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Pu tin launched his disastrous 'nvasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: F SB had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the w ar which told Put in exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, Put in’s spi es assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Rus sians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as W'nd of Ch@nge and was initially sent to Vlad imir Osec hkin, a Russ ian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gu la gu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
FS B thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Put in’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Rus sia.’
Russian tr00ps came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kre mlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Nobody among the Russ ian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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@rustyshacklferd1854 You need to get it right!
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@I_Stand_With_RussiaZOV Who said I don't care about the people who died in Odessa? I do, but I don't care about the LIES about it!
Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’.
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed.
Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@legend9805 "it was not invasion it is liberation from nazi oppressor." Why didn't they start with Russia then??
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@legend9805 "it was not invasion it is liberation from nazi oppressor". Why didn't they start with Russia then?
Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”:
It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict.
Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 RUSSIAS LIE MACHINE:
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity.
From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@darkcloud5830 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@ctherats6023 1/ Russian soldiers say hundreds of their number are being killed trying to retake newly liberated Andriivka. Even artillerymen are being sent in as infantry in 'meat assaults', "literally [armed] with shovels" and without artillery support.
2/ The Russian Army's 94th regiment is said to be taking the brunt of the fighting as Ukrainian forces advance south of Bakhmut. The wife of one soldier serving with the regiment, a man called Denis, says they are suffering huge casualties.
3/ "He called on Thursday and said that the Ukrainian armed forces were taking Andriiivka and breaking through to Bakhmut," his wife Vera says.
4/ "And they are being thrown into Andriiivka with almost no weapons. He said: roughly speaking, we are coming at them with shovels and no artillery support. There is nowhere to retreat, because behind them are our own men, who will not spare them either.
5/ "Six hundred didn't return from their missions. And all this in just two days. And the official reports tell us that only two or three people were killed."
6/ Posts on Telegram say that the men are experiencing very heavy incoming fire: "the enemy does not stop attempting a breakthrough using cluster munitions." Denis himself says that "the 94th Regiment is being zeroed out [killed] ... our regiment is here to be put down."
7/ He says that its commander, a man named Zaitsev with the callsign 'Rapira', told the men explicitly that they were there to die. "He's a local, either from the DNR or the LNR. We're his third regiment. He left two regiments here, he said that "I'll leave you here too"."
8/ Denis compares Zaitsev unfavourably to his previous commander, who he says was a more humane man. "Our last commanding officer got us out of it. That's what got him fired. That he didn't send his men out to be butchered."
9/ He confirms that there were originally a thousand men in the regiment but their numbers have been reduced to 400 by the constant fighting. "We are constantly thrown into the area of Andriivka, which is processed by the AFU artillery. Basically, we are driven there for meat.
10/ "You give the coordinates to our artillery, what targets we need to work on. And the artillery does not work, because they have no shells." (It's possible that the artillery itself may have been destroyed – Ukraine has been targeting it heavily – rather than lacking shells.)
11/ Coordination with the artillery has broken down, according to Denis. "There's no co-operation with anyone else. Everything is very slow – either the artillery doesn't fire or you have to wait a long time for a shot."
12/ Now the men are being sent on 'meat assaults' which they are not expected to survive. "The orders are to take over [Andriivka], take what's left of it. Rubble, to put it crudely.
13/ "Although [the commanders] themselves know very well, and there is video confirmation, that the enemy is constantly working throughout the village. The AFU artillery is working constantly. They send men into the village, but they will not let them come out.
14/ "This is perfectly well known to everyone. And when you tell the command that this is exactly what is happening in this direction, you are answered "so what?" That's a quote: "So what?""
.......
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@ctherats6023 ..... 15/ Retreat is impossible, according to Denis, because commanders have positioned 'blocking units' behind the front line to shoot any retreaters. The men believe that they will be killed whatever happens, by one side or the other.
16/ Denis says that the men "are not in the mood to die for nothing. If there is artillery support, co-operation with other units, and there is no ammunition famine, then everyone is ready to fight. But nobody wants to fight like this."
17/ He blames the commanders' insistence on ordering obviously suicidal attacks on their false claims that they have not in fact lost control of Andriivka. It's likely they've also made such claims to their superiors, in another example of the Russian military's culture of lying.
18/ "They tell us in plain words: go and get a foothold there. And we see that our positions there have not been ours for a long time, so we raise a "bird" [drone]. In fact, it is obvious to the naked eye that our positions there have long since ceased to be ours.
19/ "But the command claims that they are.
"We've got 25 men going out on a mission, six coming back. Now we have artillerymen going to the assault. They were told – you don't have ammunition anyway, go with the infantry. And the guys don't know what an assault is.
20/ "Information about our situation does not go anywhere upstairs, it is overridden somewhere on the middle level. That's why we're trying to get the word out now. It's not a good idea to just send people to slaughter.
21/ "Soldiers from other units who don't know us, if you give them our regiment number, they say: "Guys, you are being nullified. That's the way it is."
His wife Vera says that the soldiers and their relatives are afraid to go public with their concerns about the situation.
22/ She says that her mother-in-law "wrote to the group of mothers and wives of the mobilised 94th regiment that our guys are in a difficult situation. That they have no weapons. And she suggested that this information should be "spread" on social networks.
23/ "And everyone jumped on her: don't, they say, don't set everyone up. They're more worried about their salaries than their husbands. They are worried that if the names of the rebels come to light, they will simply be made "missing" and will not receive any payments."
24/ Vera doesn't blame them for this attitude. "I also understand those who are afraid of publicity. If now defamatory information from my husband goes out, if his surname gets publicised, he will simply be recognised as an enemy of the people.
25/ "And then this status will automatically go to the children. My husband is also afraid that it will affect my son."
26/ At home, reports Radio Freedom, "little Fedya, sitting on his mum's lap, taps his finger on the phone. On the screen saver is a picture of a young man with his son on his shoulders."
27/ "Daddy," says the boy.
"Yes, Daddy," Vera nods. "I don't want my son to know his father only from pictures."
Denis's family have not heard from him since his interview on 16 September. On 17 September, Ukraine announced the recapture of Andriivka.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 You continue to post this lie!! Russia’s Lie Machine.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April?"
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion.
According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances.
There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties."
No, they are not. It is the opposite. Russia is trying to break the will in the Ukrainian population by deliberately bombing civilian targets.
May 2023: Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days.
While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on.
"It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes.
Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
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What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@aAverageFan According to me, yes! But those two wars are not comparable at all. Russia is fighting an imperialistic war to gain land.
"United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441 is a United Nations Security Council resolution adopted unanimously by the United Nations Security Council on 8 November 2002, offering Iraq under Saddam Hussein "a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament obligations" that had been set out in several previous resolutions (Resolutions 660, 661, 678, 686, 687, 688, 707, 715, 986, and 1284).[1] It provided a legal justification for the subsequent US-led invasion of Iraq.[2][3][4]
Resolution 1441 stated that Iraq was in material breach of the ceasefire terms presented under the terms of Resolution 687. Iraq's breaches related not only to weapons of mass destruction (WMD), but also the known construction of prohibited types of missiles, the purchase and import of prohibited armaments, and the continuing refusal of Iraq to compensate Kuwait for the widespread looting conducted by its troops during the 1990–1991 invasion and occupation. It also stated that "...false statements or omissions in the declarations submitted by Iraq pursuant to this resolution and failure by Iraq at any time to comply with, and cooperate fully in the implementation of, this resolution shall constitute a further material breach of Iraq's obligations."
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The Russians are deliberately attacking civilians.
Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol.
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
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On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
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@tomekkjaworski1945 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project.
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
-- A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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@tomekkjaworski1945 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@tomekkjaworski1945 The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine.
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued.
“Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this?
The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on.
"It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror."
"Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians".
In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria.
The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings.
By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@upstairs1307 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who didn't want peace? Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April? Hint: someone visited Zelensky in Kiev at that time."
There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who didn't want peace? Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April? Hint: someone visited Zelensky in Kiev at that time."
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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internetresearchagency2238 Businessinsider:
In a sprawling, five-hour interview posted to his YouTube channel over the weekend, Naftali Bennett — Israel's prime minister at the time Russia invaded Ukraine — discussed his efforts to negotiate a ceasefire.
But a reader note appended to Katchanovski's post by Twitter itself highlights some of the missing context: that there was no actual deal to block — and Bennett himself wasn't sure that one would have been desirable, anyway.
The commentary also omitted Bennett's explanation for the ultimate failure to strike a peace agreement: the massacre of civilians in Bucha, Ukraine, which is being investigated as an apparent war crime that led Kyiv to break off talks.
As recounted in the interview, Bennett visited Russia a few months before the war, where he then relayed to Putin a request from Zelenskyy to meet. "They're Nazis, they're warmongers, I won't meet him," Putin responded, in Bennett's telling.
After the war began in February 2022, Bennett said he tried again to work as an intermediary between Putin and Zelensky, acknowledging that his primary interest was his own country's security.
Bennett, who left office in June 2022, was also concerned about the fate of Jews in Russia and Ukraine, he said.
In the weeks following the invasion, Bennett said he spoke with both Putin and Zelenskyy, and even made a secret trip to Moscow, in an effort to negotiate an end to the conflict. At the time, Zelenskyy himself noted that the Israeli prime minister was "trying to find a way of holding talks," a fact for which "we are grateful."
After his interview drew the attention of Musk, the former Israeli prime minister himself went on Twitter to correct some of the commentary.
"It's unsure there was any deal to be made," Bennett said in response to Musk. "At the time I gave it roughly a 50% chance. Americans felt chances were way lower. Hard to tell who was right."
He continued: "It's not sure such a deal was desirable. At the time I thought so, but only time will tell."
In the interview, Bennett himself notes that it was not the US, France, or Germany that put an end to any peace talks. Rather, it was Russia slaughtering hundreds of civilians in a town outside the Ukrainian capital, a war crime discovered just about a month after the full-scale invasion began.
"The Bucha massacre, once that happened, I said: 'It's over,'" Bennett recalled.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Hersh has long been exposed as a Russian asset. Nobody takes him seriously. But how do you think Putin has come to his wealth??
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@WhyWasntIBornInTheMiddleAges Stop the lies!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@avengerpz During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@avengerpz December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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@avengerpz The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming.
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@avengerpz Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days.
While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on.
"It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn.
"It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@avengerpz Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@vicdor1031 Forbes: Russia lost at least 68 armored vehicles in Ukraine over the last four days, including eight tanks. Even by the apocalyptic standards of Russia’s 21-month wider war on Ukraine, it’s a staggering blow. Ukraine’s losses in the same period reportedly are a tenth of Russia’s.
And those 68 destroyed and abandoned Russian vehicles are just the ones that Andrew Perpetua, an open-source intelligence analyst, has verified in photos and videos on social media. Actual Russian losses almost certainly are much, much higher.
The Ukrainian general staff for its part claimed its forces destroyed a shocking 175 Russian armored vehicles just between Thursday and Friday, including 55 tanks. On average, the Russians have been losing just three tanks a day since February 2022; the recent loss rate is nearly 20 times higher. Moscow reportedly also has written off at least five warplanes over Avdiivka.
Manpower losses are commensurate with vehicle losses. The general staff in Kyiv claimed 1,380 Russians died in Ukraine in a 24-hour period ending Friday. That would be one of the greatest single-day losses on either side of the wider war.
It’s obvious what’s driving up Russia’s casualties. For a couple of weeks now, seven or eight Russian regiments and brigades—each with up to 2,000 troops—have been trying, and failing, to surround and cut off one of the best-defended cities in free Ukraine: Avdiivka, which lies just northwest of Russian-occupied Donetsk in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region.
Day after day, the Russians roll out in long columns of tanks and fighting vehicles. Day and day, they run over mines, wander into missile kill-zones, blunder into artillery barrages and fall prey to explosives-laden drones.
But they keep coming.
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@andrehunter1295 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@johnwi-l_l-iamsf3763 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@jimmyc974 I'm sorry, but I don't know what a canadue is. Neither a nzi child.
Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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China praises Ukraine talks in Saudi that Russia said were ‘doomed to fail’
Beijing on Monday praised ongoing talks aimed at finding a formula for peace in Ukraine, after a Chinese envoy attended a weekend summit in Saudi Arabia that was slammed by Russia as “doomed to fail.”
China said the two-day meeting, which took place in the Gulf kingdom’s port sea city of Jeddah, helped “to consolidate international consensus” on finding a peaceful solution to the conflict, Reuters reported, citing a Chinese foreign ministry statement.
The talks brought together more than 40 nations, including Ukraine, the United States, European states, and the BRICS group of countries – perhaps none as closely watched as China, Russia’s most powerful ally.
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@jvs333 UN report Sept 25, 2023: Ukrainian prisoners of war tortured to death. The torture is said to have taken place in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, and mainly in Kherson and Zaporizhzhya.
Russian soldiers are also said to have raped Ukrainian women aged 19 to 83 while their families were forced to listen from the next room.
Another member of the commission, Pablo de Greiff, said it was impossible to know how many cases of lethal torture there have been in Ukraine. - We have limited access, but it is quite a large number and it comes from very different regions across the country, and both near and far from the front lines, de Greiff said.
The International Humanitarian Law prohibits all forms of ill-treatment in war. This international law of warfare has been ignored by Russia ever since the annexation of the Crimean peninsula, according to Lindemann. She believes that the Russian authorities are very aware of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine. - It swems like an order from above, in that the same type of treatment has been carried out systematically, across land areas and military groups.
- Why are the Russians doing this? Russian soldiers are fed a rhetoric of hate, which in turn goes beyond the population that is subjected to torture by the Russian forces. At the same time, they receive no training, so they have no knowledge of which rules apply to war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, 2westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a 2Western backed coup”.
Nuland’s visit to the Maidan took place on December 13, 2013—the day after a violent clash between the protesters and the Berkut riot police trying to clear the square had left dozens injured.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia lie machine:
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@ruiddd956 You're obviously not the brightest one!
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbour, Ukraine.
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@ihs51 Like I said, stupid, he has no mansion in Miami.
But if he had, so what? What about Putin?
Putin has robbed his country for 20 years now. And all you do is clap your hands and say "Genius".
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
(Vladimir Putin's Salary $187 Thousand Per Year)
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports. He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. His children study in western schools, lives in London, own big houses in France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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@jamilgonzaga7081 It's impossible to give full details on Trump's lies. There's simply not enough gigabytes on the internet storage! ; )
Fact checker Washington Post: Trump's false or misleading claims total 30,573 over 4 years as president.
CNN, May 2024: Former President Donald Trump delivered a bombardment of dishonesty in his interviews with Time magazine.
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, made at least 32 false claims in the two April interviews that Time released this week. His serial inaccuracy spanned a wide range of subjects, including the economy, abortion, the NATO military alliance, the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, his legal cases, his record as president and the 2020 election he has relentlessly lied about for more than three years.
Time published its own fact check of some of the 32 claims on Tuesday, when it released its cover story on Trump. Here is an in-depth CNN debunking.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@radiofun232 What a load of crap!!! The postponement of the election in Ukraine is due to the russian invasion and control over 20 % of Ukraine. The election wouldn't be free and fair. Putin on the other hand has stayed in power for over 23 years now, and has amended the constitution so he can hold the power as long as he live. There you could talk about a dictator, you hypocrite!
The opposition in russia is either killed or in jail on false charges. The same with media and ordinary people who dare to speak up against the tyrant. Again, you hypocrite!
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said: "There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer"
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@sumanmajumdar7884 Try to get this into your little head, once and for all.
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties. Praying for the innocent civilians". REALLY??
Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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@trumpforever6706 Metro: Deluded putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
putin initially thought russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukrainians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days.
While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February.
Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes.
Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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M. Sullivan The Guardian: For this millennial tech bro, his performance on the Fox News stage in Milwaukee couldn’t have gone much better.
As a glimpse of America’s future, it couldn’t have gone much worse.
“If you have wondered what Trumpism after Trump looks like, ask no further,”
His night in the spotlight, and its aftermath, shows that neither Republican voters nor many in the mainstream media have learned much since Trump came down the elevator in 2015 and proceeded to wreak havoc on the country.
In case there was any doubt, now we know: they will always fall for the attention-seeking, the policy-unencumbered, the candidate quickest with a demeaning insult. That’s a “winner”, apparently.
And it’s all too familiar.
“Ramaswamy is like Trump in the larva stage, molting toward the full Maga wingspan but not quite there yet,” wrote Frank Bruni in his New York Times newsletter. “His narcissism, though, is fully evolved.”
If Ramaswamy’s real aim – other than to bask in his own glorious reflection – is to get Trump to choose him as his running mate, he made progress toward that end.
Not everyone in the media, of course, was buying it. Charlie Sykes, editor in chief of the right-leaning Bulwark, was blunt, calling Ramaswamy “facile, clownish, shallow, shameless, pandering”, but, then again, “exactly what GOP voters crave these days”.
How can there be “winners” in yet another milestone on the way to fascism?
Losers? That’s easier. I think we already know who they are: Americans who care about democracy.
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@antoninagarkalna1444 "Articles 106 and 107 of the UN Charter give Russia, as the successor to the winner of World War II, the right to all measures, including military, against Germany, Hungary, Austria, Romania, Bulgaria, Finland, Croatia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Ukraine, for attempting to revive Nazism."
What did you smoke this morning? This is totally insane! And if the goal is to fight Nazism, start with Russia, where the Nazi-problem is greatest.
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@Alpha-qh4sb 1/ Russian soldiers say hundreds of their number are being killed trying to retake newly liberated Andriivka. Even artillerymen are being sent in as infantry in 'meat assaults', "literally [armed] with shovels" and without artillery support.
2/ The Russian Army's 94th regiment is said to be taking the brunt of the fighting as Ukrainian forces advance south of Bakhmut. The wife of one soldier serving with the regiment, a man called Denis, says they are suffering huge casualties.
3/ "He called on Thursday and said that the Ukrainian armed forces were taking Andriiivka and breaking through to Bakhmut," his wife Vera says.
4/ "And they are being thrown into Andriiivka with almost no weapons. He said: roughly speaking, we are coming at them with shovels and no artillery support. There is nowhere to retreat, because behind them are our own men, who will not spare them either.
5/ "Six hundred didn't return from their missions. And all this in just two days. And the official reports tell us that only two or three people were killed."
6/ Posts on Telegram say that the men are experiencing very heavy incoming fire: "the enemy does not stop attempting a breakthrough using cluster munitions." Denis himself says that "the 94th Regiment is being zeroed out [killed] ... our regiment is here to be put down."
7/ He says that its commander, a man named Zaitsev with the callsign 'Rapira', told the men explicitly that they were there to die. "He's a local, either from the DNR or the LNR. We're his third regiment. He left two regiments here, he said that "I'll leave you here too"."
8/ Denis compares Zaitsev unfavourably to his previous commander, who he says was a more humane man. "Our last commanding officer got us out of it. That's what got him fired. That he didn't send his men out to be butchered."
9/ He confirms that there were originally a thousand men in the regiment but their numbers have been reduced to 400 by the constant fighting. "We are constantly thrown into the area of Andriivka, which is processed by the AFU artillery. Basically, we are driven there for meat.
10/ "You give the coordinates to our artillery, what targets we need to work on. And the artillery does not work, because they have no shells." (It's possible that the artillery itself may have been destroyed – Ukraine has been targeting it heavily – rather than lacking shells.)
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@Alpha-qh4sb 11/ Coordination with the artillery has broken down, according to Denis. "There's no co-operation with anyone else. Everything is very slow – either the artillery doesn't fire or you have to wait a long time for a shot."
12/ Now the men are being sent on 'meat assaults' which they are not expected to survive. "The orders are to take over [Andriivka], take what's left of it. Rubble, to put it crudely.
13/ "Although [the commanders] themselves know very well, and there is video confirmation, that the enemy is constantly working throughout the village. The AFU artillery is working constantly. They send men into the village, but they will not let them come out.
14/ "This is perfectly well known to everyone. And when you tell the command that this is exactly what is happening in this direction, you are answered "so what?" That's a quote: "So what?""
15/ Retreat is impossible, according to Denis, because commanders have positioned 'blocking units' behind the front line to shoot any retreaters. The men believe that they will be killed whatever happens, by one side or the other.
16/ Denis says that the men "are not in the mood to die for nothing. If there is artillery support, co-operation with other units, and there is no ammunition famine, then everyone is ready to fight. But nobody wants to fight like this."
17/ He blames the commanders' insistence on ordering obviously suicidal attacks on their false claims that they have not in fact lost control of Andriivka. It's likely they've also made such claims to their superiors, in another example of the Russian military's culture of lying.
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@Alpha-qh4sb 18/ "They tell us in plain words: go and get a foothold there. And we see that our positions there have not been ours for a long time, so we raise a "bird" [drone]. In fact, it is obvious to the naked eye that our positions there have long since ceased to be ours.
19/ "But the command claims that they are.
"We've got 25 men going out on a mission, six coming back. Now we have artillerymen going to the assault. They were told – you don't have ammunition anyway, go with the infantry. And the guys don't know what an assault is.
20/ "Information about our situation does not go anywhere upstairs, it is overridden somewhere on the middle level. That's why we're trying to get the word out now. It's not a good idea to just send people to slaughter.
21/ "Soldiers from other units who don't know us, if you give them our regiment number, they say: "Guys, you are being nullified. That's the way it is."
His wife Vera says that the soldiers and their relatives are afraid to go public with their concerns about the situation.
22/ She says that her mother-in-law "wrote to the group of mothers and wives of the mobilised 94th regiment that our guys are in a difficult situation. That they have no weapons. And she suggested that this information should be "spread" on social networks.
23/ "And everyone jumped on her: don't, they say, don't set everyone up. They're more worried about their salaries than their husbands. They are worried that if the names of the rebels come to light, they will simply be made "missing" and will not receive any payments."
24/ Vera doesn't blame them for this attitude. "I also understand those who are afraid of publicity. If now defamatory information from my husband goes out, if his surname gets publicised, he will simply be recognised as an enemy of the people.
25/ "And then this status will automatically go to the children. My husband is also afraid that it will affect my son."
26/ At home, reports Radio Freedom, "little Fedya, sitting on his mum's lap, taps his finger on the phone. On the screen saver is a picture of a young man with his son on his shoulders."
27/ "Daddy," says the boy.
"Yes, Daddy," Vera nods. "I don't want my son to know his father only from pictures."
Denis's family have not heard from him since his interview on 16 September. On 17 September, Ukraine announced the recapture of Andriivka.
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@ЛюдмилаСевастополь-ы4у Depends of whether the regime has use of them or not.
What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@ЛюдмилаСевастополь-ы4у - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- - A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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@ЛюдмилаСевастополь-ы4у Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@walterbrunswick You keep on telling the false story about civilians in Donbas. Isn't the truth convenient enough for you?
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on DISINFORMATION and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main PROPAGANDA message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are UNABLE to PROVE that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy.
But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media.
According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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Russia arrests priests.
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers.
Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed. Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation, and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@@bewt09 Newsweek: At the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, several Russian pundits and analysts, including prominent Russian propagandist and head of the RT channel, Margarita Simonyan, said that Russian troops would take Ukraine's capital within a few days. Russian President Vladimir Putin was considering a strategy to encircle Kyiv earlier on in the war, but Ukrainian troops' defense efforts meant the battle extended to other cities including Odesa, Kherson, and most recently, Bakhmut.
There is a number of video clips that showed several Russian pundits and analysts saying that Kyiv would fall quickly to Russia.
One of those clips showed Simonyan saying that in a "hot war, we would defeat Ukraine in two days." In similar remarks, Simonyan has previously said that Russia "defeated Ukraine in the first two or three days."
U.S. officials also noted at the time that Russia's strategy was based on quickly taking the Ukrainian capital. On March 8, 2022, CIA Director William Burns told lawmakers that Putin's plan was premised upon "seizing Kyiv within the first two days of the campaign." U.S. intelligence assessed that the capital could fall right after the invasion.
Three U.S. officials, who spoke anonymously to Newsweek last year, said that Moscow planned to encircle Ukrainian forces and make them surrender. The officials said that Russians at the time expected Kyiv to be taken within 96 hours, and then the leadership of Ukraine to follow in about a week's time.
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@JocoMarkovic-gf1eh A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@JocoMarkovic-gf1eh What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
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Are the russian nazi's any better???
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@jimmyc974 ...... The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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@Осциллятор Вероятно, мы также можем задать вопросы Грузии, Молдавии, Румынии, Чечне, Таджикистану, Украине, Сирии, Мали, Афганистану, Сомали, Эритрее, Чехии, Словакии, Венгрии, Восточной Германии, Вьетнаму, Корее и некоторым другим.
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@ЯБезымянный-о5ф UN report Sept 25, 2023: Ukrainian prisoners of war tortured to death. The torture is said to have taken place in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, and mainly in Kherson and Zaporizhzhya.
Russian soldiers are also said to have raped Ukrainian women aged 19 to 83 while their families were forced to listen from the next room. Another member of the commission, Pablo de Greiff, said it was impossible to know how many cases of lethal torture there have been in Ukraine.
- We have limited access, but it is quite a large number and it comes from very different regions across the country, and both near and far from the front lines, de Greiff said. The International Humanitarian Law prohibits all forms of ill-treatment in war. This international law of warfare has been ignored by Russia ever since the annexation of the Crimean peninsula, according to Lindemann. She believes that the Russian authorities are very aware of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine.
- It seems like an order from above, in that the same type of treatment has been carried out systematically, across land areas and military groups. - Why are the Russians doing this? - Russian soldiers are fed a rhetoric of hate, which in turn goes beyond the population that is subjected to torture by the Russian forces. At the same time, they receive no training, so they have no knowledge of which rules apply to war.
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@@alextim6961 You're just a pathological liar? You just can't stop, even if you know the truth??
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbass since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 All opposition in russia are either in prison on false charges or are killed.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours? Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports.
Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion. Does this look like "restraint" and being a "gentleman"??
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Further: Arakhamia added that neutrality was the "key point" and that everything else was "simply rhetoric and political ‘seasoning’ about denazification, the Russian-speaking population, and blah-blah-blah."
When Moseichuk asked the party leader why Ukraine did not agree to the offer, the he stated that Ukraine "had no confidence" in the Russians since they were ready to promise anything for Ukraine to agree.
Speaking further and explaining Kyiv's refusal to accept the proposal, Arakhamia added as well that the delegation he led did not have the legal right to sign any agreement. He said that it would require a constitutional change, given that Ukraine’s Constitution states its intention to become a NATO member.
Additionally, he emphasized a lack of trust in the Russian position.
"There is no, and there was no, trust in the Russians that they would do it. That could only be done if there were security guarantees."
Arahamiya clarified that signing such an agreement without guarantees would have left Ukraine vulnerable to a second incursion.
"We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance," he said. "Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty."
But discussions were interrupted after Russian troops withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of crimes committed, notably the Bucha massacre. The torture and murder of innocent civilians.
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@BlindBosnian Blind man, is it necessary with all these lies? "Donbas getting bombed and its civillians killed is not a false pretense"
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbas] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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NATO Summit: G7 countries agrees on long-term security commitment for Ukraine:
"We confirm that the security of Ukraine is an integral part of the security of the Euro-Atlantic region."
NATO allies pledge new military package for Ukraine:
As the specific areas of security and military cooperation, the press release listed providing modern military equipment on land, in the air, and at sea, training, intelligence sharing, developing resistance to cyber and hybrid threats, supporting Ukraine's defense industry, and interoperability with NATO forces.
The U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and Japan governments agreed to provide Ukraine with "modern military equipment across land, air, and sea domains."
The aid will prioritize air defense, artillery, long-range weapon systems, armored vehicles, and air combat capabilities, AFP reported.
G7 also reportedly pledged to provide Ukraine further military and financial assistance in case of a future Russian armed attack.
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@hanna8418 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015). The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings.
By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians.
They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected. By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later.
The LPR and DPR are not recognized as legitimate entities under the Minsk Agreements.
The signatures of the leaders of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics were added after they had already been signed by Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE. They were not among the original signatories, and indeed Ukraine would not have signed had their signatures been part of the deal. There is nothing in the content or format of the Agreement that legitimizes these entities and they should not be treated as negotiating partners in any sense. Russia alone controls the forces occupying parts of eastern Ukraine.
Despite that, however, Russia untruthfully claims not to be a party and only a facilitator — and that the real agreements are between Ukraine and the so-called “separatists,” who call themselves the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics (LPR and DPR), but are in fact Russian supplied and directed.
Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision.
Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” (Russian soldiers) woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.) The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations.
That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@peaceb4 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the ALLEGED “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s PROPAGANDA. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers to Donbas. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@gabrielaslam6884 Tens of thousands civilian lives have been lost, also woman and children. And 20.000 Ukrainian children are abducted to russia.
russia are targeting civilians deliberately. Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@gabrielaslam6884 russia is deliberately targeting civilians to break their will and to destroy their culture. By that, there will be just russian.
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria.
The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@@alextim6961 I think you are a poor victim of Russian propaganda.
Putin has robbed your country for over 20 years now. And all you do is clap your hands? In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income.
He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@peace20241 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@chongkt6469 Putin does not have the right to decide who should join NATO or not. Just like NATO has nothing to say about who'll join CSTO.
NATO hasn't forced Ukraine into anything. Ukraine wanted to join NATO because they knew what a horrible neighbour they had (and now we all see that they were right). But NATO doesn't let anyone in before several criterias has been met. It's a long process, Ukraine has wanted this for at least 15 years now and still isn't a member.
But NATO sees the madness that Putin's regime is doing, so individual NATO countries are donating weapens, so Ukraine can defend themselves. And mind you, they are NOT getting the best and newest equipment (because they are not a member state). And not heavy weapons like ronge range missiles and planes. But thanks to Putin's brutal warfare, they are now starting to recieve that to.
NATO has already strategic weapons in the Baltic states, Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey and soon Finland. THEY DON'T NEED IT IN UKRAINE. Anf IF Russia is to take Ukraine, their borders comes even CLOSER to NATO, so your logic is flawed!
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@COMMANDER-wm9vr The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–present) has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations. In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion. As of July 1, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported. Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
Neither Russia nor Ukarine are signatories of the of the 2008 convention limiting the use of cluster munitions. The use of such weapons against civilians violates the principles of humanitarian law and therefore constitutes a war crime. Reports of Russian attacks have prompted the International Criminal Court to launch an investigation into the commission of war crimes in Ukrainian territory.
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@COMMANDER-wm9vr Publication.
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@JocoMarkovic-gf1eh "Civilized" and "Russia" is an oxymoron!
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@lilidezman624 "If you don't respond, you face a prison sentence." But she responded! She had received an official recommendation from her military unit's medical company that she be temporarily exempted from military service.
Anyways, my response was to another person telling Ukraine drafts pregnant woman to fight. Which is of course untrue. Neither russia nor Ukraine does that.
Fake stories by russia:
"Propaganda telegram channels are disseminating information that Russian soldiers captured the pregnant Ukrainian military. Moreover, pro-Kremlin resources publish a video as evidence in which the Russian military demonstratively shows that this allegedly happened. It's fake.
Experts from the Center for Countering Disinformation began to analyze this case. They found that the video distributed by propagandists contained a number of disinformation features. For example, the woman is wearing ordinary sneakers, which are not standard shoes of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Also, the “prisoner” has a blue ribbon on her leg, while the Ukrainian military does not put identification marks on her legs. In addition, on the military shoulder one can see the chevron of the 65th Missile and Artillery Arsenal, which probably fell to the Russians during the occupation of part of the Kharkiv region.
By spreading information about a pregnant woman in the Ukrainian army, Russian propaganda is trying to discredit the mobilization process. They say that people don’t want to fight, so the authorities have to indulge in extremes and send even pregnant women to fight. With this case of disinformation, propagandists are also nourishing the narrative of “grabbing” in Ukraine or “war until the last Ukrainian”. Previously, we refuted information that Ukraine had created body armor for pregnant women because they were going to be sent to the front."
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@cash-only-por-favor You have clearly not read my posts about the Donbas war and the lies about the Odesa fire. I won't repeat it.
Putin has been unwilling to negotiate on realistic terms all the time. Remember, he's goal is to reestablish the Soviet Union as (Great)-Russia.
As for the Nazi's in the Ukrainian government, the number is exactly zero. In the OPPOSITION there are a few. They united with all the parties on the far right side, but still got only 2 % at the last election (In Italy a far right party got 17 % in comparison).
ADL: As the Russian assault on Ukraine has intensified, the Russian president has escalated rhetoric falsely labeling the Ukrainian government and its leaders as “Nazis.”
Putin has claimed that the military action is aimed at the “denazification of Ukraine” and Lavrov called the Ukrainian president “a Nazi and a neo Nazi.”
"Earlier this week, I spoke to Dr. David Fishman, a professor of Jewish History at The Jewish Theological Seminary, about how Russian propaganda, including rhetoric linking Ukraine and the Nazis, is being used as part of a campaign of disinformation in an attempt to discredit the democratically elected Ukrainian government.
Dr. Fishman: “This propaganda is an attempt to delegitimize Ukraine in the eyes of the Russian public, which considers its war against Nazi Germany its greatest moment, and in eyes of the Western publics who may not know much about Ukraine except that it’s next to Russia. This propaganda isn’t new. Russia has for years highlighted the activity of a marginal group of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists as a way of trying to stigmatize all of Ukraine.
We should also not forget that 10 million Ukrainians fought in the Red Army against Nazi Germany and 1.5 million Ukrainians died in combat."
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russian lie machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building.
Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks. Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
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@peaceb4 Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was much concern in the West about how to contribute to a relatively stable Russia. So they let Russia take over the Soviet Union's place in the UN and other international organizations, poured in billions in investment, pretended that Russia was still a superpower, invited them into the G7, tiptoed around so as not to provoke, looked through their fingers with the most incredible things, etc. All to avoid chaos and warlords in civil war with nuclear weapons on the way.
They were allowed to join trade agreements and many American and European companies invested in Russia. GERMANY was the country that went the furthest in achieving a mutually peaceful relationship. They have invested billions of Euros and they became dependent on Russian gas (despite warnings that the Russians were not to be trusted). As thanks we got Putin's aggressive imperialism and ethno-fascism, and finally a medieval war of aggression in the heart of Europe. They believed that the West was now so dependent on economic and energy conditions, they would not dare protest against the invasion.
Now they just have to be thrown out of Ukraine as soon as possible, preferably without escalating into direct nuclear war, and then you have to deal with what comes when the Muscovy empire finally unravels completely.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3.. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48: India: 2,389
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa
‘Massacre’ Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made
Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”. Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote.
While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture:
Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". - Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Corruption index 2022: 1. Denmark 2. Finland 9. Germany 18. UK 24. USA 85. India 101. Serbia 116. Ukraine 137. RUSSIA 140. Pakistan 171. North Korea 180. Somalia.
How do you think Putin got his fortune??
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income.
He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@walterbrunswick - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- - A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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@walterbrunswick Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@walterbrunswick A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent.
That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@thec0mmnmann822 First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressessiv anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@MrLeadb1 No, they did NOT! Read something else than russian propaganda.
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@Hereford1642 I never said it was simple. In your first post one could get the impression that Russia had not used cluster.
The Interpreter: Concerns over potential breaches of international humanitarian law in cluster munitions use in Ukraine are based on a misguided interpretation of the legal position. More so, the argument against supporting Ukraine with the provision of cluster bombs shows a fundamentally flawed assumption of moral equivalence between Ukraine and Russia, and how each country uses these munitions.
Ample evidence exists of Russia’s deployment of cluster munitions against residential areas in a bid to cause maximum civilian casualties and collateral damage in its campaign against Ukraine – and in repeated instances beforehand.
Ukraine, fighting on its own territory, has pledged to use these weapons judiciously and strictly in accordance with international humanitarian law.
The abuse of cluster munitions by Russia has played a substantial role in the high civilian casualties and the extensive destruction of civilian infrastructure, including residences, healthcare facilities, and educational establishments in Ukraine. This has largely not been the subject of international condemnation, coming as it does in the context of indiscriminate missile attacks by Russia against Ukrainian populated areas and mass atrocities at closer quarters.
Yet agreement by the United States to make up a shortfall in Ukrainian artillery munitions with dual-purpose improved conventional munition (DPICM) has met with widespread criticism.
These concerns are indeed valid. Nevertheless, it is essential to recognise that Russia has not only violated international humanitarian law but also the principles of just war. With Russia persisting in these actions, Ukraine is no longer bound by its strictures in response.
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@holdinmuhl4959 20th March 2022: Foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov of Russia and Dmytro Kuleba of Ukraine met in the Turkish resort town of Antalya earlier this month with Cavusoglu also attending. The discussions DID NOT YIELD CONCRETE RESULTS.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly appealed for peace, urging Russia to accept “meaningful” talks for an end to the invasion.
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”.
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@liongordel9088 "One million soldiers of Ukraine and over 5 hundred thousand dead😂😂".
Strange you find it so funny! Anyways, here are more exact numbers:
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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Six weeks ago, the numbers were this: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
What do you think has changed?
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@Luofeng222 If you trust the Kremlin more: Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
Woman are also serving in russia. In just one year, nearly 3,000 cases have been brought before Russian military courts involving soldiers who have defied President Vladimir Putin's orders to fight.
Now, for the first time, a woman has been sentenced. Madina Kabalojeva, who is pregnant, was sentenced to six years in a penal colony by a military court in Vladikavkaz for defying Putin's 'partial' mobilization orders, according to various Russian and international media outlets, including Kommersant and DOXA.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@Alien_isolationist You brag about having annexed land but controls only 50%??
Why don't you mention the Russian losses from the same report??
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@kayvdb The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet: "Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said.
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@marlysmithsonian5746 No, the numbers are more like U.S 35-40 % (but so far only 30%) and Europe 60-65% financial support for Ukraine. The US has NOT given 500 bn, not even 350 bn. The numbers are between 119 and 175 bn USD, depending on how you do the math (but only $83.4 billion has been sent). And of that total, 75 bn is given to US companies. Only 35 bn is budget support for Ukraine. 69 bn is military support.
That means Ukraine has received 76 bn (35 bn budget support and 41 bn as weapons) The U.S has given 0,3 % of their GDP (0,5 when all that is promised is received). Estonia has given 2,5 % Denmark 2,5 % Lithuania 1,8% Norway 1,7 %.
On top of that, the actual value of the weapons and equipment sent to Ukraine by the USA is about 60% lower than they were priced because the price was for new stock. Much of the military equipment and ammunition sent to Ukraine is old and of limited combat effectiveness because it came from aging US stockpiles, some of the ammunition is expired, and a majority of the equipment isn't even used by the US military anymore (and therefore has an effective value of $0 to the USA). Normally, this stock would have to be disposed of, but giving it to Ukraine means there are effectively no disposal expenses. Furthermore, much of the funding for Ukraine is being spent in the USA, such as employing US workers to manufacture the replacement equipment and supplies for refilling US stockpiles.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.
In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings.
By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@tatyanael2897 I think you and your likes are the psychopaths. Twisting Von der Leyens words to be something else is just pure idiocy. You have to have big delusions if you read it like that. She did NOT say that russia was responsible for the Hiroshima nuclear bomb. She said it could happen again, this time the russians are threatening to use them.
The speech: "There is a Japanese proverb that tells a lot about the country and about its Prime Minister. It says: ‘Onko-chishin'. And it means: ‘Explore the past, to learn new things.' You, dear Prime Minister, showed me the meaning of this proverb during the G7 Summit in Japan last year.
Many of your relatives lost their life when the atomic bomb razed Hiroshima to the ground. You have grown up with the stories of survivors. And you wanted us to listen to the same stories, to face the past and learn something about the future. It was a sobering start to the G7 and one that I will not forget, especially at a time when Russia threatens to use nuclear weapons once again.
It is hei-nous, it is dangerous – and in the shadow of Hiroshima, it is unforgivable. No one is better poised than Japan to warn us of the extreme danger of this recklessness. Right from the beginning of this war, Japan's position was clear. As the only country that has suffered from atomic bombings, you have made the whole world listen."
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@Noddy2750 Countries or part of countries/nations russia has taken or taken control over: Chuvasia, Ingusetia, Kalmykia, Tartarstan, Tsjetsjenia, Dagestan, Mordvina, Udmurtia, Mari, Tsjerkessia, Ossetia, Komi, Bashkiria, Ingria, Karelia, Sakha, Kaliningrad, Kurilene, Khanty, Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Hungary, Transnistria, Romania, Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, East Germany, Korea, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Northern Caucasus, Afghanistan, Georgia, Armenia, Aserbadjan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan.
They luckily are kicked out of Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Afghanistan, Hungary, Tsjekkia and Slovakia and some other.
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich yes, very good and kind. He has no restraints to achieving his goals. Imperialism and restoring the Soviet Union.
In this war he has killed 230.000 and wounded 800.000 - 1.000.000 of his own people.
In 1999 he needed an excuse to invade Checnya.The Russian apartment bombings were a series of five bombings in Moscow and two other Russian towns September 1999. Altogether nearly 300 civilians were killed at night. The bombings, together with the Dagestan War, led the country into the Second Chechen War. Chechen militants were blamed but no Chechen field commander accepted responsibility for the bombings and Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov denied any involvement of his government.
The bombings ceased when a similar bomb was found and defused in an apartment block in the Russian city of Ryazan on September 23. Later in the evening Vladimir Putin praised the vigilance of the Ryzanians and ordered the air bombing of Grozny, which marked the beginning of the Second Chechen War. A few hours later, three FSB agents who had planted the bomb were caught by the local police. This incident was declared to be a training exercise by FSB director Nikolai Patrushev.
Russian Parliament member Yuri Shchekochikhin filed two motions for a parliamentary investigation of the events, but the motions were rejected by the Russian Duma in March 2000. An independent public commission to investigate the bombings chaired by Duma deputy Sergei Kovalev was hampered by government refusal to respond to its inquiries, and its chairmen admitted that he has no evidence to support any version of the events. Two key members of the Kovalev Commission, Sergei Yushenkov and Yuri Shchekochikhin, both Duma members, have since died in apparent assassinations. The Commission's lawyer Mikhail Trepashkin was arrested.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia is trying to minimize civilian casualties. Praying for the innocent civilians". WHAT A JOKE!
"Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But why do this?
The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews.
"The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror."
"Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life." Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes.
Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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@РафаэльСаркисянц-ъ2т Да, Россия – это рай на земле. Наверное, поэтому за то, что войну называют войной, дают много лет тюрьмы. И многие, кто, видимо, выпадают из окон. Оппозиция находится в тюрьме или убита. Свободы прессы не существует, и никто не смеет говорить то, что думает на самом деле. Некоторые из них сверхбогаты (олигархи, которые украли ресурсы после распада Союза), в то время как остальная часть населения живет в бедности. Средняя продолжительность жизни коренного населения в самых северных районах составляет 45 лет. Лидеры страны должны угрожать уничтожить весь мир только потому, что им не разрешено уничтожать соседей, против которых они развязали войну. Да, это рай!
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@РафаэльСаркисянц-ъ2т Да, Россия — рай на земле. Вероятно, поэтому многие люди сидят в тюрьме за то, что называют войну войной. И многие, по-видимому, выпадают из окон. Оппозиция сидит в тюрьме или убита. Свободы прессы не существует, и никто не смеет говорить то, что думает на самом деле. Некоторые очень богаты (олигархи, которые украли ресурсы, когда профсоюз был распущен), в то время как остальное население живет в нищете. Средняя продолжительность жизни коренных народов в самых северных регионах составляет 45 лет. Лидерам страны приходится угрожать уничтожением всего мира только потому, что им не разрешено уничтожать соседей, с которыми они воевали. Да, это рай!
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@mysticone1798 The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@mysticone1798 Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@grissom2023 UN report Sept 25, 2023: Ukrainian prisoners of war tortured to death. The torture is said to have taken place in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, and mainly in Kherson and Zaporizhzhya.
Russian soldiers are also said to have raped Ukrainian women aged 19 to 83 while their families were forced to listen from the next room. Another member of the commission, Pablo de Greiff, said it was impossible to know how many cases of lethal torture there have been in Ukraine. - We have limited access, but it is quite a large number and it comes from very different regions across the country, and both near and far from the front lines, de Greiff said.
The International Humanitarian Law prohibits all forms of ill-treatment in war. This international law of warfare has been ignored by Russia ever since the annexation of the Crimean peninsula, according to Lindemann. She believes that the Russian authorities are very aware of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine. - It swems like an order from above, in that the same type of treatment has been carried out systematically, across land areas and military groups.
- Why are the Russians doing this? - Russian soldiers are fed a rhetoric of hate, which in turn goes beyond the population that is subjected to torture by the Russian forces. At the same time, they receive no training, so they have no knowledge of which rules apply to war.
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@justno4344 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@justno4344 From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@marshalljulie3676 No, I don't realize that at all, but enlighten me with facts! I have no feelings about it, I've posted this several times, it's from a diplomat who was involved in the negotiations, W. Sporrer (do tell me where he is wrong):
"The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity. Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers).
More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "The azov troops trapped in the azovstal steelworks in Mariupol used human shields"
Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@JJ-3033 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@JJ-3033 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@JJ-3033 Other examplea of the love for nazism in russia:
- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@JJ-3033 Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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"has balls and will stand up for it's country!" But he doesn't!!
The terr0r in Mosc0w shows that an offshoot of IS poses a growing danger. It does not fit into Put’ns narrative. Put’n waited a long time to comment on the horrific attack on civilians in the concert venue. The Kreml’n had an explanation problem. In Put’ns false narrative, it is neo-Naz’s in Kyiv, supported by Western Russophobic countries, who threaten Russia. If something goes wrong in Russia, the malicious West is to blame. When Put’n first spoke, he did not mention the so-called Islam’c State (IS) or Islam’st terror. He claimed instead that the terrorists tried to flee in the direction of Ukraine.
The Kreml’n's pr0paganda apparatus followed up by directly accusing the neighboring country. On Monday night, the tone had changed. Put’n said the terror’st attack had been carried out by radical Islam’sts. It was no longer possible to explain away the obvious. The Islam’c State in Khorasan (IS-K) already claimed responsibility for the attack late on Friday. They published photos that had previously been taken of the four perpetrators in front of the black IS flag. They published a video that will show the terrorists' bloody misdeeds in the concert venue. On March 7, the US warned of a high risk that extremists had immediate plans to attack large gatherings of people in M0scow, including concerts. Put’n called the warning a provocation. He said the Americans' intention was to frighten the Russians and destabilize society.
The regime was locked in an image of the enemy and did not see the real threat. And still Put’n says, without any evidence whatsoever, that the terror’st attack is connected to the war in Ukraine. Even if Luka said the terrorists were heading towards Belarus, not Ukraine.
All terror must be condemned, which Western countries also did in strong terms after the attack in M0scow. IS regards both Russia and Western countries as enemies and targets, something we have painfully experienced in Europe. In order to combat terror’st movements, international cooperation is very important. A few years ago, Russia wanted to participate in the fight against terror, but now the distance to the West has become greater than at any time since the Cold War because the fatal attack on Ukraine. There should also be an investigation into whether the preparedness was good enough and whether the terrorist plans could have been revealed. In authoritarian regimes, such as the Russian one, different rules apply. The perpetrators must fit into the official narrative of who threatens the nation. And by all means, a critical spotlight must be avoided on the regime's own handling of security. The responsibility must be placed elsewhere. It must fit into Put’n's narrative about who are Russia's enemies.
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@soccer9199 Yes, Zelensky surrounded his country with Russian troops and invaded his country.
He has killed, raped and looted his country for a year and a half now, while Putin is begging for peace!
One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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@DanieleT.820 No, we have not forgot. We have debunked this story many times. I'll repeat it just for you.
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”. The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict. Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015 )
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@DanieleT.820 And about the nazi-claim: A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media.
According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In November 2013, thiousands of Ukrainians flocked to Kyiv’s Independence square to protest then-President victor Yanukovych’s decision to suspend preparations for the signing of an association and free-trade agreement with EU. Over the following months, the protests grew in size and drew more media attention. In February 2014, clashes between protesters and police became increasingly violent when police attempted to clear the square of protesters. The violents led to the deaths of more then 50, maybe over 100 people.
Angry protesters demanded yanukovych’s immediate resignation. Yanukovych fled the same day the agreement was signed. The Ukrainian parliament then voted 328 – 0 to remove Yanukovych from office.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, "westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a "Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers).
More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
" Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers.
Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
The report also claims that the majority of deaths occurred in 2014-2015, when 2,546 and 1,395 died respectively. In subsequent years the number of casualties in the Donbas war has significantly decreased. In 2016, 348 people were killed, in 2017 – 278, in 2018 – 154, in 2019 – 160 people. In 2020, 44 people died, marking the lowest casualty rate for the entire period of the armed conflict.
Although the casualty rate was quite low in 2020, the Kremlin nevertheless began to intimidate its own population with the specter of the “Ukrainian threat” and thereby discredit Ukraine in the eyes of the occupied territories’ residents. Moreover, UN data also clearly shows that since 2014 the number of civilian deaths in the Donbas has steadily declined on both sides. THERE HAS BEEN NO ESCALATION OF THE CONFLICT IN RECENT YEARS, 90% OF DONBAS CIVILIANS DIED IN 2014-2015
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@PerceivedREALITY999 RUSSIAS LIE MACHINE: It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa.
The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset.
All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression.
Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…” The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well.
The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 After September 1990 when the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution had been unilaterally repealed by the Socialist Republic of Serbia, Kosovo's autonomy suffered and so the region was faced with state-organized oppression: from the early 1990s, Albanian language radio and television were restricted and newspapers shut down.
Kosovar Albanians were fired in large numbers from public enterprises and institutions, including banks, hospitals, the post office and schools. In June 1991, the University of Priština assembly and several faculty councils were dissolved and replaced by Serbs.
Kosovar Albanian teachers were prevented from entering school premises for the new school year beginning in September 1991, forcing students to study at home. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region.
Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
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On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Seymour Hersh is a Russian paid idiot. But how do you think Putin has got his enormous wealth??
Putin has robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income.
He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@mysticone1798 There are not 500k Ukrainians killed. 5 months ago there were 70.000 Ukrainians killed: "The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded."
"The Ukraine navy and air force have been destroyed". Then it's very impressive that they have shot down 5 russian planes and a ship in the last few days.
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Al jaze era: Puteen targets Ukrainian civiIians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Ru ss ia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Ru ss ia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented w a r cr im es with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiIes destroying hospitaIs or mutiIated Syrian chiIdren covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of w a r cr im es in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the N az is in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a bru tal ag gres sor that justifies attacking civiIians and hospitaIs. Inaction in Syria gave Puteen the green light to start another bru tal w ar to swaIIow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated. Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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You are calling what happened in 2022 "meanwhile". We knew you were slow, but that slow!!!!
Johnson didn't stop anything. Russia wasn't going for peace. (What stopped further negotiations was the discovery of the Bucha massacre done by the inhuman russian soldiers)
Johnson: "There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise."
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha.
Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place. An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers.
Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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They will return Hawaii when Russia returns: Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Caucasus, North Ingria, Buryatia, Altai, Karelia, Tuva, Kuril Islands, Crimea, Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhia.
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internetresearchagency2238 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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All opposition in russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@ObjectiveAnalysis The Minsk Agreements have been violated by the fascist Russian regime on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbass since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!)
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared.
The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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All the opposition in russia are either killed or imprisoned on false charges.
A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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You keep on telling this lie even if you know the truth!! Why??
Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@Оксогера Так называемый «переворот» 14 февраля: Он начался уже 13 ноября.
Сначала была попытка государственного переворота со стороны русских. Они оказали давление на президента Януковича, чтобы тот не подписывал уже согласованное соглашение о политической ассоциации и свободной торговле с ЕС. Когда люди услышали об этой афере, они собрались на улицах. Протестующие выступили против того, что они считали широко распространенной коррупцией в правительстве и злоупотреблением властью, влиянием русских и олигархов, жестокостью полиции и нарушениями прав человека. Репрессивные законы, направленные против протестов, лишь усилили гнев.
В январе и феврале 2014 года дальнейшие протесты привели к отставке правительства. 21 февраля Янукович и парламентская оппозиция подписали соглашение о создании временного правительства единства, конституционных реформах и досрочных выборах. На следующий день, 22 февраля, украинский парламент проголосовал за отстранение Януковича от должности 328 голосами против 0.
Затем Россия оккупировала и аннексировала Крым с помощью «зеленых человечков» (российских солдат в масках). Еще больше «зеленых человечков» вместе с российскими вооруженными пророссийскими сепаратистами захватили правительственные здания и провозгласили независимые государства Донецк и Луганск, что спровоцировало войну на Донбассе.
Российская Федерация первоначально отрицала, что это были российские вооруженные силы, но в апреле 2014 года Владимир Путин наконец подтвердил присутствие российских вооруженных сил. Александр Бородай, премьер-министр самопровозглашенной Донецкой Народной Республики, заявил, что до августа 2015 года на Донбассе воевали 50 000 граждан РОССИИ. Российская пропаганда вам расскажет.
Наконец, в России нацистов больше, чем на Украине. Два процента голосов в парламенте достались крайне правым партиям (и, возможно, полпроцента из них — нацисты), и они не прошли в парламент. Так что вы очень дезинформированы, конечно же, промывающим мозги российским режимом.
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@arondebreceni9464 In the city of Uzhhorod.
The Hungarian authorities are strongly critical of a Ukrainian law which means that minority languages are weakened in schools, while the Ukrainian authorities resent the fact that Hungary has granted Hungarian citizenship to ethnic Hungarians in the area.
Early last February, someone tried to set fire to the Hungarian Cultural Center in Uzhhorod. The attempt wasn't that successful, but three weeks later the center was again exposed to arson. Hungarian and Russian authorities blamed Ukrainian nationalists, while Ukrainian authorities pointed the finger at Russian intelligence.
On the same day as the second attack, three men were arrested by ABW, the Polish security service, suspected of being behind the first of the attacks.
According to Polish news channel TVP, one of them, Michał P., recruited and paid the other two to carry out the attack. In the Polish press, the three are only identified by their first names, but according to the British The Guardian, the main man is called Michał Prokopowicz. He is said to be a member of the Falanga movement, which is often described as neo-fascist, and also associated with the micro-party Zmiana. The leader of this strongly pro-Russian party, Mateusz Piskorski, was himself arrested in 2016 on suspicion of espionage.
The purpose of the attack on the Hungarian cultural center in Uzhhorod was, according to Polish prosecutors, to worsen relations between Ukraine and Hungary. To achieve this, the blame was to be placed on Ukrainian ultranationalists. However, the plot was rather clumsily executed, and the investigation quickly tracked down the other two accused Poles, Adrian M. and Tomasz Sz., partly because the two had been caught on surveillance cameras.
The news caused a stir in several countries in Eastern Europe. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pawlo Klimkin has already written about Russian hybrid warfare in Europe. The Romanian newspaper Adevărul has also taken an interest. A summary made by the media project 45North was top story in their online newspaper. This states, among other things, that Romania, which itself has a significant Hungarian minority population, should be prepared to be exposed to Russian hybrid warfare.
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@niklaus9678 A little replay for you: Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@niklaus9678 Some more: A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution. Yanukovych was elected president in 2010, defeating Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. His platform included economic modernisation, increased spending, continuing TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION and non-alignment in defence policy. His years in power saw democratic backsliding, the jailing of Tymoshenko, a decline in press freedom and an increase in cronyism and corruption.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests began in response to President Yanukovych's SUDDEN DECISION NOT TO SIGN an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA HAD PUT MUCH PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government CORRUPTION AND ABUSE POWER, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections. Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, SPARKING THE DONBASS WAR.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the South-Eastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. They are looting and plunder all over. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia. The Russians in the now occupied Donbass has started indoctrination of children. All history books that mention Ukraine as a nation are forbidden and burned. The children have to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian (both languages was teach before). Also many children are kidnapped/deportet to Russia. Mostly those who the authoroties suspects are pro-Ukrainian. Some of them far East in Russia, where they have small chances for returning home.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn.
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Al jazera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Na zis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared.
The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city. According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.”
The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war. In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis.
Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes. According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol. While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible. Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@justwondering147 First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@kahutochishisumi9056 Kremlin propaganda and an excuse to invade.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@kahutochishisumi9056 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbas] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@mikejezek5214 From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@emma9348 "You have a serious lack of knowledge of this region. Look up maidan coup and educate yourself."
In short: The Revolution of Dignity/Maidan: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@IAMYOURHUMBLESERVANT Stop talking nonsense and educate yourself!
There wasn't any realistic peace-deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
Medvedev : "No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one"
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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No they don't. Learn how to read!
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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internetresearchagency2238 You are lying, as always!
Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars.
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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internetresearchagency2238 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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I'm sorry, but you got it all wrong! putin incited and armed the separatists in Donbas and sent in spetnaz to seize the government buildings. Over 40.000 russian soldiers fought in Donbas 2014 to 2015. These soldiers were what the Ukrainian government was fighting against, not civilians.
And there were NOT 14.000 russians living in Donbas killed. 4.400 killed Ukrainian servicemen, 6.500 russian militants, 3400 civilians where killed in this war. Look at the facts!
Merkel did NOT admit that the Minsk was a sham. putin however, violated the agreements right after it was signed (no one was surprised. putin hasn't honored an agreement in his entire life). He didn't withdraw his troops, but used them to attack Ilovaysk. At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops.
In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
Just look at the facts, not at russian propaganda!
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@peaceb4 Since you are mentioning WW2, your most “glory” days with war crimes and looting, this is your fantastic history:
Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940
On 23 August 1939, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, in which Latvia was included in the Soviet sphere of influence. On 17 June 1940, Latvia was occupied by the Red Army. The Kārlis Ulmanis government was removed, and rigged elections were held on 21 June 1940 with only the Communist Latvian Working People's Bloc allowed to participate, "electing" the rubber stamp People's Parliament which made resolution to join the Soviet Union, with the resolution having already been drawn up in Moscow prior the election. Latvia was officially annexed by the Soviet Union on 5 August, and on 25 August all people in Latvia were declared citizens of the Soviet Union. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was closed isolating Latvia from the rest of the world.
In the 1941 June deportation, tens of thousands of Latvians, including whole families with women, children and old people, were taken from their homes, loaded onto freight trains and taken to Gulag correctional labour camps or forced settlements in Siberia. The crime was perpetrated by the Soviet occupation regime on the orders of high authorities in Moscow. Prior the deportation, the People's Commissariat established operational groups who performed arrests, search and seizure of the property. Arrests took place in all parts in Latvia including rural areas.
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@peaceb4 Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@peaceb4 Regarding the myth of Nazi-ruled Ukraine, this is a clear propaganda narrative that became a cornerstone in pro-Kremlin disinformation, which can clearly be challenged with the issue of a 2015 ban on Nazi and Communist ideologies, and with the far-right groups having limited presence during the Euromaidan protests itself and have suffered defeats in every national election after that, with a united front of all radical right-wing parties in the 2019 parliamentary elections winning only 2.15% of the vote falling far short of the 5% minimum guaranteeing entry into parliament.
See similar disinformation cases in our database alleging that far-right coup government in Kyiv emerged from the 2014 Maidan uprising; or that Zelenskyy's regime is based on Nazism; or that Bandera's sympathisers have a large influence on Ukraine; or that Ukraine has established an apartheid regime; or that the US supported the 2014 coup.
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@peaceb4 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@peaceb4 During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@peaceb4 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
Reports on the use of cluster munitions raised concerns about the high numbers of civilian casualties and the long-lasting danger of unexploded ordnance. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, weapons equipped with cluster munitions have been used both by Russian armed forces and pro-Russian separatists, as well as to a lesser degree by Ukrainian armed forces.
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@dragand.5581 Arakha miia, the chief negotiator, denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Johnson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to him, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Zelenskyy and Putin. He added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“
" there was no confidence in the Rus sians, because they were ready to promise anything. ... Secondly, there was no confidence in the Rus sians that they would do it. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax, and then they would [in vade] even more prepared. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“ But discussions were interrupted after Rus sian tr00ps withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of cr'mes committed, notably the B uc ha ma ssa cre. The to rtu re and murder of innocent civi lians.
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@dragand.5581 A statement by more than 3OO historians who study gen oc ide, Naz ism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Naz ifying among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “pr op aga nda.”
“We strongly reject the Rus sian government’s cynical abuse of the term gen oci de, the memory of World War II and the Hol ocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Na zi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Na zism and those who courageously fought against it, including Ru ssian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Na zi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Rus sia”. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But we would consider neo-Na zi groups IN RUS SIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@dragand.5581 The Ukrainian chief negotiator denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Joh nson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to him, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Zele nskyy and Pu tin. He added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“ " there was no confidence in the Rus sians, because they were ready to promise anything. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, relax, and then they would [in va de] even more prepared. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“ But discussions were interrupted after Rus si an troo ps withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of cr'm es comm'tted, notably the B uc ha mas sa cre. The to rtu re and mu rder of innocent civi li ans.
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WoWa-C Ukraines negotiater Arakh amiia denied that the Ukrainian delegation was ready to sign such a document, and that Johnson forced Kyiv’s hand. According to Arakha miia, the delegation did not even have the legal right to sign anything – this could only theoretically happen at a meeting of Zelensky and Pu tin. Ara khamiia added that Western partners knew about the negotiations and saw drafts of documents, but did not attempt to make a decision for Ukraine, but rather gave advice.“ More of what he said, When asked why Ukraine did not agree to this point, Arakh amia replied that there was no confidence in the Russ ians, because they were ready to promise anything. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, relax, and then they would [inv ade] even more prepared. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty.“ But discussions were interrupted after Rus sian troops withdrew from Ky iv, revealing the extent of cr'm es com mitted, notably the B uc ha ma ssa cre. The to rtu re and mu rder of innocent civi li ans.
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@SharlatanShenanigan "what attack?" You have missed the part where russia attacked Ukraine?? Poor guy, you're not the sharpest tool in the shed, are you!? Here's something to help you out:
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology".
Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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nuttywalls8190 Nobody has admitted that they never had any intention to honor the Minsk. You lie, but Russia evidently had no intention to.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@piratesofthebarentssea Arakhamia: Neutrality was the "key point" and that everything else was "simply rhetoric and political ‘seasoning’ about denazification, the Russian-speaking population, and blah-blah-blah."
When Moseichuk asked the party leader why Ukraine did not agree to the offer, the he stated that Ukraine "had no confidence" in the Russians since they were ready to promise anything for Ukraine to agree.
Speaking further and explaining Kyiv's refusal to accept the proposal, Arakhamia added as well that the delegation he led did not have the legal right to sign any agreement. He said that it would require a constitutional change, given that Ukraine’s Constitution states its intention to become a NATO member.
Additionally, he emphasized a lack of trust in the Russian position.
"There is no, and there was no, trust in the Russians that they would do it. That could only be done if there were security guarantees."
Arahamiya clarified that signing such an agreement without guarantees would have left Ukraine vulnerable to a second incursion.
"We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they have, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance," he said. "Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty."
But discussions were interrupted after Russian troops withdrew from Kyiv, revealing the extent of crimes committed, notably the Bµcha massacre. The torture and murder of innocent civilians.
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OMG, what a bunch of lies!!!
Your narrative stranded in the first line already. Gorbachev said "no such promise was made".
And Merkel did NOT say the Minsk (which Russia broke BTW) was to fool Putin. That's lie number 2.
Yanukovych didn't become president before 2010 (Ukraines independence came in 1991). And he and the parliament negotiated a political association and trade deal with EU. The deal was already brokered when Russia pressured him to not sign the deal. Of course Ukraine protested and finally Yanukovych had to go. (your lie number 3)
EU didn't say that Ukraine had to deal with them only (your lie number 4)
Nor did they say that Ukraine had to be a member of NATO (your lie number 5)
Biden (who was NOT the President of the time), CIA and EU didn't remove Yanukovych. Ukraine did! The parliament VOTED him out! (your lie number 6)
"the US and the EU promised to protect Poroshenko". They had already guaranteed Ukraine's security along with Russia, in the Budapest Memorandims in 1994.
The Russian speaking people were NOT randomly bombarded for 8 years, killing 14.000 people. (your lie number 7) The Ukrainian government fought against RUSSIAN soldiers and Russian armed separatists since 2014.
"WEF / EU Globalists want Putin be removed and replaced by some Russia corrupt traitor doing the wishes of the WEF Globalists. " (your lie number 8)
That's exactly what Russia was trying to do with Ukraine. Install their own corrupt puppet. when that didn't succeed, they invaded.
"If Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine would have formed a neutral zone situated between de EU / NATO and Russia there would never be war again !!! "
You're mistaken, if Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were neutral, they would have been invaded by Putin's Russia. (Don't you remember Putin's big wish about reestablish the Soviet Union? This time as Great Russia, with him as Tsar Peter/Putin the Great.)
"But this is made impossible because of evil people who love to hate, kill and destroy, and because of their love for power over others and their love for money, rather than to live in peace with each other. "
You just described Putin's Russia. Run like a mafia with him as Don. I couldn't have said it better myself! He has looted his country for over 20 years, and now he need more resources.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@festekj Contracts and treaties mean absolutely nothing to Putler!
Ukrainians: To those with short memories: Between 2014 and 2022, Ukraine held about 200 rounds of talks with Russia. During this period, 20 cease-fire agreements were reached, all of which were quickly violated by Russia. None of the 200 rounds of talks or the 20 ceasefires have prevented Putin from launching a brutal all-out invasion of Ukraine on February 24th, 2022. Those who argue that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia now are either uninformed or misled, or they side with Russia and want Putin to take a pause before an even larger aggression. We should not and will not fall into this trap.
Russia violates: UN Charter 45 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, 70 Helsinki Accords, 75 Belovezha Accords, 91–92 Budapest Memo, 94 Black Sea Fleet Treaty, 97 Friendship Treaty, 98 Treaty on Azov Sea & Kerch Strait, ‘03 Karkiv pact ‘10. Invasion of Crimea 2014. RUSSIA: " But Ukraine won’t negotiate with us. Why?"
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yanksbiglywvil Of course there are many killed in this senseless war Putin started.
The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol.
However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis. Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes.
According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths. The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol.
While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible. Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Russia has taken some children out of harm's way and into recreational facilities, where the children are safe."
Do you really believe that? THIS IS CALLED KIDNAPPING.
The Ukrainian government has identified over 19,000 children unlawfully deported or otherwise separated from their parents or guardians. This number continues to grow with recent transfers from the Zaporizhzhia region. Russia has seized children from their schools, and their homes – including those living in institutions, while others have been separated from their families during Russia’s so-called ‘filtration’ process. Very few have been returned. This trauma will affect these children and their families for the rest of their lives.
Human Rights Watch: The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion. It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.”
The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names. Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
Russia should comply with its international obligations and ensure the immediate return of Ukrainian children to their country and families.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 " Remember the incident last year. I will not use the name of the event due to censorship. I will refer to the event as "incident" and the place as "B"."
Yes, I remember the incident, as you call it. The rest of the civilized world are calling it horrendous war crimes!
The Bucha massacre was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the fight for and occupation of the city of Bucha as part of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes, possibly related to the occupation. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and GIRLS AS YOUNG AS FOURTEEN REPORTED BEING RAPED by Russian soldiers.
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@kamizumoku First of all, there were no genocide in Donbas (I know you are being told this lie by the Russian authorities, but that doesn't make it true).
And what do you know about Minsk? Here is a short summary:
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighboring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999
However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Take a look at the tattoos that some azov fighters have"
- Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work". Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal. Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. “In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich. Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor. - A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth.
I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.” Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies. Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday. The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel. They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand. The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti. Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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Why not stick to the schools? Study finds Russia deliberately targeting schools in Kharkiv There's a strong feeling in Kharkiv that schools and other educational facilities have been deliberately targeted by Russian missiles as a way of eroding Ukrainian culture and identity. When you look at the numbers, it's hard to argue against this theory. "Six-hundred-and-thirty-four educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged throughout the network," says Oleksiy Litvinov, the director of the Kharkiv Department of Science and Education. "Among them, almost the majority are institutions of general secondary education, that is, schools.
To date, the number of them destroyed and damaged in the entire region is almost 500." "Universities, academies, schools, institutes and kindergartens, 44 per cent of these are damaged or destroyed. Among them, 74 were destroyed in total." "Sixty killed in Russian airstrike on Ukraine school " Russia bombs school where flood evacuees were sheltering after Zelenskyy visits Kherson There are reports of multiple casualties, with eyewitness telling POLITICO: ‘They are shelling evacuation spots.’
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During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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@thecoin5394 The quote from you is two years old.
APnews dec, 2022: More than 10,000 new graves now scar Mariupol, the AP found, and the death toll might run three times higher than an early estimate of at least 25,000.
Espreso nov 2023: Casualty count in Mariupol could be ten times higher than reported.
"Unfortunately, I can confirm the information provided by Yuriy Bielousov, Head of the Department for Combating Crimes in the Context of Armed Conflict within the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine. Indeed, the number of victims is ten times higher than is officially known now. I still don't understand why international organizations record a much lower number of victims than is actually the case, even when it is officially stated in Ukraine. We see an example in Gaza now, they count the actual number of victims, and for some reason the number of Ukrainians killed by Russian terrorists is underestimated in Ukraine," Zabavin said.
He spoke about the criminal actions and intentions of the Russian occupying forces in Mariupol.
"The Russians dropped FAB bombs chaotically, conducting “carpet” bombings and actually destroying everything they saw in front of them. Every Mariupol resident who went through that hell will confirm this. That is, they did not have military objectives, but the goal was to destroy the entire city along with those who were there. Being there with my family, unfortunately, I saw all the horrors caused by the Russian terrorist army," Zabavin said.
Russians are hiding the traces of their crimes, he added.
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@humbleindian6303 Well, Notsohumbleindian, this is what the U.S. estimates says: US estimates almost 500,000 Russian and Ukrainian military casualties in fighting in the conflict so far.
The number of battlefield casualties in Ukraine is approaching nearly 500,000 Russian and Ukrainian soldiers, US officials have told the New York Times, marking a significant rise in the death toll this year following intense fighting in the east of the country.
Russia’s military casualties are approaching 300,000, the officials claimed, with as many as 120,000 killed in action.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@clase1015 "where have you seen Russian imperialism?"
Really?? You haven't seen any? The latest example is in Ukraine.
This is a list of wars and atrocities that were committed by Russia since early 20th century until today, and let's remember these are not just wars, many are full on occupations with countless war crimes and total suppression of the indigenous people their language, culture and anything that wasn't russian.... Turkestan, Yakutia, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Tuva, Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!
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What does fascism mean? (my "check" paranthesis regarding RuZZia)
Fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism (check), militarism (check), and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen (check). This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent. In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies (check). However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority (check). And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests. (check)
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@frankrenda2519 "how many wars?" I haven't counted, you tell me! But here is a few just the last 100 years: Turkestan, Yakutia, Bukhara, Khiva, North Ingria, Buryatia, Georgia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bukovina, Tuva, East Prussia, Hungary, Transnistria, Romania,Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, East Germany, Korea, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Northern Caucasus, Kuril Islands, Afghanistan.
saw this from another member (lifeisharditsharderifyoure6822): "This is a list of wars and atrocities that were committed by Russia since early 20th century until today, and let's remember these are not just wars, many are full on occupations with countless war crimes and total suppression of the indigenous people their language, culture and anything that wasn't russian.... Crete, China, Georgia, Korean peninsula, WW1, Central Asia, Russian Revolution, Russian civil war, Ukrainian war of independence, Kazakhstan, Finland, Sochi conflict, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ossetia, Poland, Turkish war of independence, invasion of Azerbaijan, invasion of Armenia, invasion of Georgia, Mongolia, East Karelian, August uprising, Urtatagai conflict, sino soviet conflict, Soviet Afghanistan war, Chechen, Japanese border conflict, Xinjiang conflict, Poland 2, Winter war, Bessarabia, Bukovina, Romania, Estonia 2, Lithuania 2, Latvia 2, Ukranian guerrilla war, Soviet Japanese war, First Indochina war, Korean war, Vietnam war, German uprising, Hungarian revolution, invasion of Czechoslovakia, Zhenbao island, war of attrition, Eritrean war, Angolan war, ethio-somali war, Georgian civil war, South Ossetian war, war in Abkhazia, Transnistria war, East Prigorodny Conflict, Tajikistani Civil War, First Chechen War, War of Dagestan, Second Chechen War, Russo-Georgian War, Insurgency in the North Caucasus, Russo-Ukrainian War!!"
I think you lose! ; )
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@anonanon7235 On 16 and 17 January 2022, at least 65 civilians were killed by Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group who were supported by armed forces in the villages of Aïgbado and Yanga near Bria in the Central African Republic.
Russian mercenaries behind slaughter of 500 in Mali village, UN report finds.
Investigators from the UN human rights office concluded that there are strong indications that more than 500 people were killed – the majority in extrajudicial killings – by Malian troops and foreign military personnel believed to be from Wagner, a mercenary outfit run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, which was linked to the massacre by internal messages obtained by the Guardian last year.
Central African Republic: Abuses by Russia-Linked Forces
Killings, Torture of Civilians
Forces in the Central African Republic, whom witnesses identified as Russian, appear to have summarily executed, tortured, and beaten civilians since 2019, Human Rights Watch said today.
National authorities, the country’s Special Criminal Court (SCC), or the International Criminal Court (ICC), should investigate these incidents as well as other credible allegations of abuse by Russia-linked forces with a view to criminal prosecution.
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Aljazera: Russian mercenaries are Putin’s ‘coercive tool’ in Africa
Russia has deployed the Wagner Group in military operations across at least half a dozen African nations.
When abuses were reported in recent weeks in Mali – fake graves designed to discredit French forces; a massacre of some 300 people, mostly civilians – all evidence pointed to the shadowy mercenaries of Russia’s Wagner Group.
Even before these feared professional soldiers joined the assault on Ukraine, Russia had deployed them to under-the-radar military operations across at least half a dozen African countries. Their aim: to further President Vladimir Putin’s global ambitions, and to undermine democracy.
In sub-Saharan Africa, Wagner has gained substantial footholds for Russia in the Central African Republic (CAR), Sudan and Mali. Wagner’s role in those countries goes way beyond the cover story of merely providing a security service, experts say.
“They essentially run the Central African Republic” and are a growing force in Mali.
Russia’s game plan for Africa, where it has applied its influence as far north as Libya and as far south as Mozambique, is straightforward in some ways, say analysts. It seeks alliances with governments shunned by the West or facing armed uprisings and internal challenges to their rule.
The African leaders get recognition from the Kremlin and military muscle from Wagner. They pay for it by giving Russia prime access to their oil, gas, gold, diamonds and valuable minerals.
Russia also gains positions on a strategically important continent.
But there is another objective of Russia’s “hybrid war” in Africa, said Joseph Siegle, director of research at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies.
Siegle said Russia is also waging an ideological battle, using Wagner as a “coercive tool” to undermine Western ideas of democracy and turn countries towards Moscow. Putin wants to challenge the international democratic order “because Russia can’t compete very well in that order”, Siegle said.
“If democracy is held up as the ultimate aspirational governance model, then that is constraining for Russia,” Siegle said.
Rather, Wagner promotes Russian interests with soldiers and guns, but also through propaganda and disinformation, as Prigozhin has done for Putin before.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@MuantanamoMobile Do you only have access to Russian censored media?
AP: Here in the dirt of one of the world's most radioactive places, Russian soldiers dug trenches. Ukrainian officials worry they were, in effect, digging their own graves.
For more than a month, some Russian soldiers bunked in the earth within sight of the massive structure built to contain radiation from the damaged Chernobyl nuclear reactor. A close inspection of their trenches was impossible because even walking on the dirt is discouraged.
Workers kept the Russians from the most dangerous areas, but in what Semenov called the worst situation he has seen in his 30 years at Chernobyl, the plant was without electricity, relying on diesel generators to support the critical work of circulating water for cooling the spent fuel rods.
“It was very dangerous to act in this way,” said Maksym Shevchuck, the deputy head of the state agency managing the exclusion zone. He was scared by it all.
After watching thousands of Soviet soldiers work to contain the effects of the 1986 accident, sometimes with no protection, Harms and others were shocked at the Russian soldiers' disregard for safety, or their ignorance, in the recent invasion.
Some soldiers even stole highly radioactive materials as souvenirs or possibly to sell.
He believes hundreds or thousands of soldiers damaged their health, likely with little idea of the consequences, despite plant workers' warnings to their commanders.
“Most of the soldiers were around 20 years old,” he said. “All these actions proves that their management, and in Russia in general, human life equals like zero.”
The full extent of Russia's activities in the Chernobyl exclusion zone is still unknown, especially because the troops scattered mines that the Ukrainian military is still searching for. Some have detonated, further disturbing the radioactive ground. The Russians also set several forest fires, which have been put out.
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Not a russian lie and propaganda at all🤣.
But can you morons tell me how putin got to be the richest man in the world?? His salary for the last 20 years have been about USD 120.000 - 180.000 a year.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@Ozspeak THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0 votes.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022.
These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion.
For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories. Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education.
Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities. Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence.
Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable.
Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the strikes on Kyiv and other cities a long way from the front suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives.
Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews.
"The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure." Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President.
"Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life."
Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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Study by Krylova-Grek: Hate speech towards Ukraine began to gain momentum since 2014, after the “Revolution of Dignity” took place and the country was taking a political course towards European integration.
Against the background of horror stories about Europe and the US dictatorship, the main target was Ukraine, and everything related to the Ukrainian language, culture and “Ukrainianness”,1. a concept used in the Russian media with a negative meaning. 2. Almost every day, hate rhetoric was spread through the Russia’s main state channels, reaching the audience in Russia, occupied Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk regions.
Investigating the activities of the Russian media in 2014—2021, I wrote that the systematic character and the scale of the creation and distribution of such materials in the information space have signs of preparation for genocide. But no one could have imagined that this crime could happen in the center of Europe in the 21st century.
It is important to note that after gaining control over these regions in 2014, Russia launched active propaganda activities, an integral part of which were the materials aimed at dehumanization, demonization and marginalization of Ukraine and Ukrainians.
Eight years of systematic spread of negative narration have done their job and led to a dehumanized, demonized, and marginalized image of Ukraine and Ukrainians in the minds of Russians. The image of a dangerous and aggressive enemy was created using a range of methods and techniques, the most common of which was the use of archetypes of the Second World War and Soviet stereotypes. Ukrainianness in Russian content was equated with Nazism and fascism, and people were called Nazis, fascists, Banderas, whom Russian journalists described as aggressive creatures with a low level of intelligence.
AFTER FEBRUARY 24, 2022, Russian main stream mass media continue to actively spread hatred, dehumanizing, demonizing, and marginalizing Ukraine and Ukrainians: from accuzations about the terror of the Russian-speaking population, to the call for “desatanization of Ukraine” and “war against absolute evil”, which the Russian journalist V. Solovyov associates with Ukraine and NATO. And some Russian journalists allow themselves to talk publicly about the extermination of Ukrainians, for example, journalist Anton Krasovsky, who said that children complaining about the Russian occupation should be destroyed, “drown in the Tysyna (river)” or “burn them up”. The conducted study showed that since 2014, the Russian mass media have been systematically working to create a dehumanized, marginalized, and demonized image of Ukraine and Ukrainians, which became the basis for war crimes and an approving attitude to the aggression of the majority of Russian citizens.
Moreover, Russian journalists who had actively used indirect and manipulative hate speech until February 24, 2022, a few weeks after the start of the war, began to use direct appeals and insults against everything related to Ukraine (state, language, culture) and Ukrainians.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
19/05/2022
Fake News
Facebo ok Linkedin T(w)itt er Print :
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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He hasn't canceled any peace agreements.
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@Valkron11 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@peaceb4 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@bedientvondeutschland1779 How about this: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@Мадамвсережках "There is still a KANZ... LER in Germany now and he is a great-grandson of a Nazi, how is that?" And there is a TZAR in Kreml, so what? Do you believe everything you read in russian propaganda? No, Olof Scholz is NOT a grandson of a nazi. He is a grandson of an ordinary railway man. Even if he was, so what?? I judge people on their doings, not their ancestors. But again, he is not. I don't know how to comment about your story of ww2, I didn' understand a thing about what you said, but I will try. Most of Europe fought 6 years against the nazis, Soviet fought 4 years (they supported the nazis for 2 years), USA fought 4,5 years.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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All opposition in Russia are suppressed. They are either in jail on false charges, poisoned or killed.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995
In March 1992, in a referendum boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, more than 60 percent of Bosnian citizens voted for independence. Almost immediately, in April 1992, Bosnian Serbs rebelled with the support of the Yugoslav People’s Army and Serbia, declaring the territories under their control to be a Serb republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through overwhelming military superiority and a systematic campaign of persecution of non-Serbs, they quickly asserted control over more than 60% of the country. Bosnian Croats soon followed, rejecting the authority of the Bosnian Government and declaring their own republic with the backing of Croatia.
The conflict turned into a bloody three-sided fight for territories, with civilians of all ethnicities becoming victims of horrendous crimes.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995 when a peace deal was initialled in Dayton.
Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped. Notorious detention centres for civilians were set up by all conflicting sides: in Prijedor, Omarska, Konjic, Dretelj and other locations. The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić. During a few days in early July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
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Kosovo - 1998-1999
The next area of conflict was centered on Kosovo, where the ethnic Albanian community there sought independence from Serbia. In 1998 violence flared as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) came out in open rebellion against Serbian rule, and police and army reinforcements were sent in to crush the insurgents.
In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia.
NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians. Ultimately, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević agreed to withdraw his troops and police from the province. Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs - roughly half the province's Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals. In June 1999, Serbia agreed to international administration of Kosovo with the final status of the province still unresolved.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 " Bosnian War and Kosovo war were civil wars. War crimes were committed by all sides."
Finally you admit war crimes from the Serbian side.
If it was ethnic cleansing and war crimes, why shouldn't the international community intervene?
It is widely believed that mass murders against Bosniaks in Bosnia and Herzegovina escalated into genocide. On 18 December 1992, the United Nations General Assembly issued resolution 47/121 condemning "aggressive acts by the Serbian and Montenegrin forces to acquire more territories by force" and called such ethnic cleansing "a form of genocide". In its report published on 1 January 1993, Helsinki Watch was one of the first civil rights organisations that warned that "the extent of the violence and its selective nature along ethnic and religious lines suggest crimes of genocidal character against Muslim and, to a lesser extent, Croatian populations in Bosnia-Hercegovina"
A telegram sent to the White House on 8 February 1994 by U.S. Ambassador to Croatia, Peter W. Galbraith, stated that genocide was occurring. The telegram cited "constant and indiscriminate shelling and gunfire" of Sarajevo by Karadzic's Yugoslav People Army; the harassment of minority groups in Northern Bosnia "in an attempt to force them to leave"; and the use of detainees "to do dangerous work on the front lines" as evidence that genocide was being committed. In 2005, the United States Congress passed a resolution declaring that "the Serbian policies of aggression and ethnic cleansing meet the terms defining genocide"
A trial took place before the International Court of Justice, following a 1993 suit by Bosnia and Herzegovina against Serbia and Montenegro alleging genocide. The ICJ ruling of 26 February 2007 indirectly determined the war's nature to be international, though clearing Serbia of direct responsibility for the genocide committed by the forces of Republika Srpska in Srebrenica. The ICJ concluded, however, that Serbia failed to prevent genocide committed by Serb forces in Srebrenica and failed to punish those responsible, and bring them to justice.[108]
War crimes were conducted simultaneously by different Serb forces in different parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, especially in Bijeljina, Sarajevo, Prijedor, Zvornik, Višegrad and Foča. The judges however ruled that the criteria for genocide with the specific intent (dolus specialis) to destroy Bosnian Muslims were met only in Srebrenica in 1995.[108] The court concluded that other crimes, outside Srebrenica, committed during the 1992–1995 war, may amount to crimes against humanity according to the international law, but that these acts did not, in themselves, constitute genocide per se.[109]
The crime of genocide in the Srebrenica enclave was confirmed in several guilty verdicts handed down by the ICTY, most notably in the conviction of the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić.[
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ethnic cleansing was a common phenomenon in the wars in Croatia, Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina. This entailed intimidation, forced expulsion, or killing of the unwanted ethnic group as well as the destruction of the places of worship, cemeteries and cultural and historical buildings of that ethnic group in order to alter the population composition of an area in the favour of another ethnic group which would become the majority. These examples of territorial nationalism and territorial aspirations are part of the goal of an ethno-state. Detention camps such as Omarska and Trnopolje were also designated as an integral part of the overall ethnic cleansing strategy of the authorities.
According to numerous ICTY verdicts and indictments, Serb and Croat forces performed ethnic cleansing of their territories planned by their political leadership to create ethnically pure states (Republika Srpska and Republic of Serbian Krajina by the Serbs; and Herzeg-Bosnia by the Croats).
According to the ICTY, Serb forces from the SAO Krajina deported at least 80–100,000 Croats and other non-Serb civilians in 1991–92. The total number of exiled Croats and other non-Serbs range from 170,000 (ICTY) up to a quarter of a million people (Human Rights Watch). Also, at least 700,000 Albanians in Kosovo in 1999. Further hundreds of thousands of Muslims were forced out of their homes by the Serb forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina. By one estimate, the Serb forces drove at least 700,000 Bosnian Muslims from the area of Bosnia under their control.
Survivors of the ethnic cleansing were left severely traumatized as a consequence of this campaign
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@PerceivedREALITY999 War rape occurred as a matter of official orders as part of ethnic cleansing, to displace the targeted ethnic group. According to the Trešnjevka Women's Group, more than 35,000 women and children were held in such Serb-run "rape camps". Dragoljub Kunarac, Radomir Kovač, and Zoran Vuković were convicted of crimes against humanity for rape, torture, and enslavement committed during the Foča massacres.
The evidence of the magnitude of rape in Bosnia and Herzegovina prompted the ICTY to openly deal with these abuses. Reports of sexual violence during the Bosnian War (1992–1995) and Kosovo War (1998–1999) perpetrated by the Serbian regular and irregular forces have been described as "especially alarming". The NATO-led Kosovo Force documented rapes of Albanian, Roma and Serbian women by both Serbs and members of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
Others have estimated that during the Bosnian War, between 20,000 and 50,000 women, mostly Bosniak, were raped. There are few reports of rape and sexual assault between members of the same ethnic group.
War rape in the Yugoslav Wars has often been characterized as a crime against humanity. Rapes which were perpetrated by Serb forces served to destroy the cultural and social ties which existed between the victims and their communities. Serbian policies allegedly urged soldiers to rape Bosniak women until they became pregnant as an attempt towards ethnic cleansing. Serbian soldiers hoped to force Bosniak women to carry Serbian children through repeated rape. Often Bosniak women were held in captivity for an extended period of time and only released slightly before the birth of a child conceived of rape. The systematic rape of Bosniak women may have carried further-reaching repercussions than the initial displacement of rape victims. Stress, caused by the trauma of rape, coupled with the lack of access to reproductive health care often experienced by displaced peoples, led to serious health risks for victimized women
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Kosovo War, thousands of Kosovo Albanian women and girls became victims of sexual violence. War rape was used as a weapon of war and it was also used as an instrument of systematic ethnic cleansing; rape was used to terrorize the civilian population, extort money from families, and force people to flee their homes.
According to a report by the Human Rights Watch group in 2000, rape in the Kosovo War can generally be subdivided into three categories: rapes in women's homes, rapes during flight, and rapes in detention.
The majority of the perpetrators were Serbian paramilitaries, but also included Serbian special police or Yugoslav army soldiers. Virtually all of the sexual assaults Human Rights Watch documented were gang rapes involving at least two perpetrators. Since the end of the war, rapes of Serbian, Albanian, and Roma women by ethnic Albanians – sometimes by members of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) – have been documented, but they have not occurred on a similar scale. Rapes frequently occurred in the presence, and with the acquiescence, of military officers. Soldiers, police, and paramilitaries often raped their victims in the full view of numerous witnesses.
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@NaSaSh1087 The most prominent fascist country is Russia.
World101: What does fascism mean? Many experts agree that fascism is a mass political movement that emphasizes extreme nationalism, militarism, and the supremacy of both the nation and the single, powerful leader over the individual citizen. This model of government stands in contrast to liberal democracies, which support individual rights, competitive elections, and political dissent.
In many ways, fascist regimes are revolutionary because they advocate the overthrow of existing systems of government and the persecution of political enemies. However, when it advances their interests, such regimes can also be highly conservative in their championing of traditional values related to the role of women, social hierarchy, and obedience to authority. And although fascist leaders typically claim to support the everyman, in reality their regimes often align with powerful business interests.
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@rebelpride6892 You have no clue of what you're talking about.
Ambassador Hillman: “Between Canada and the United States under the USMCA, the deal that we negotiated under President Trump in his first term, Canada and the United States are 99% tariff-free,” said on
Hillman said that the remaining tariffed products are primarily in the agricultural sector and are specifically designed to protect small family farms.
“Canada is your No. 1 customer, and you have a trade surplus with Canada in all manufactured goods,” Hillman said. “We provide affordable, reliable energy that helps fuel the U.S. economy.”
She explained that both nations maintain similar protective measures — the U.S. for sugar, dairy, fruits and vegetables, while Canada primarily restricts dairy imports. These tariffs only activate after agreed-upon import quotas are reached, as negotiated under the USMCA. And as the US dairy industry acknowledges, the US is NOT hitting its allowed zero-tariff maximum in any category of dairy product.
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@rebelpride6892 Ambassador Hillman: “Between Canada and the United States under the USMCA, the deal that we negotiated under President Trump in his first term, Canada and the United States are 99% tariff-free,”
Hillman said that the remaining tariffed products are primarily in the agricultural sector and are specifically designed to protect small family farms.
“Canada is your No. 1 customer, and you have a trade surplus with Canada in all manufactured goods,” Hillman said. “We provide affordable, reliable energy that helps fuel the U.S. economy.”
She explained that both nations maintain similar protective measures — the U.S. for sugar, dairy, fruits and vegetables, while Canada primarily restricts dairy imports. These tariffs only activate after agreed-upon import quotas are reached, as negotiated under the USMCA. And as the US dairy industry acknowledges, the US is NOT hitting its allowed zero-tariff maximum in any category of dairy product.
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@rebelpride6892 Canadian ambassador: “Between Canada and the United States under the USMCA, the deal that we negotiated under President Trump in his first term, Canada and the United States are 99% tariff-free,”
Hillman said that the remaining tariffed products are primarily in the agricultural sector and are specifically designed to protect small family farms.
“Canada is your No. 1 customer, and you have a trade surplus with Canada in all manufactured goods,” Hillman said. “We provide affordable, reliable energy that helps fuel the U.S. economy.”
She explained that both nations maintain similar protective measures — the U.S. for sugar, dairy, fruits and vegetables, while Canada primarily restricts dairy imports. These tariffs only activate after agreed-upon import quotas are reached, as negotiated under the USMCA. And as the US dairy industry acknowledges, the US is NOT hitting its allowed zero-tariff maximum in any category of dairy product.
WHAT IS IT THAT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND OF THE ABOVE??
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas (Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: but Moscow denies it has any forces there. Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces) and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@hhvictor2462 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
(Euro Area: 14.041,00)
3. Japan: 4,231.10
4. Germany: 4,072.00 (GDP is projected to be 4121.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 4199.00 USD Billion in 2025)
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40 (GDP is projected to be 2290.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 2308.00 USD Billion in 2025)
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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@naas699 Putin has NEVER been interested in REAL peace talks!
There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@naas699 People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@conniekabasharira7084 In 2004, Ukraine was recognized as providing "excellent support" in the American administration's campaign against "terrorists" in Iraq. In 2006, they shifted their operational focus and down-sized to a peacekeeping force of about 40 soldiers.
These nations fought in Iraq: USA, UK, Australia, Poland, South Korea, Georgia, Ukraine, Romania, Denmark, Bulgaria, El Salvador, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Albania, Mongolia, Singapore, Latvia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Tonga, Armenia, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Japan, Thailand, Honduras, Dominican Republic, Hungary, Nicaragua, Norway, Portugal, Lithuania, Slovakia, New Zealand, Philippines and Iceland.
AND YOUR POINT WAS???
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@EhsanMusic Russian President Vladimir Putin lied when he said that a peace agreement was allegedly signed at the Ukrainian-Russian talks in Istanbul in March 2022, but Ukraine broke it itself.
The leader of the Crimean Tatar people Mustafa Dzhemilev said this during the ceremony of rais-ing the Crimean Tatar flag near the building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.
"A few days ago, the Kremlin dictator Putin, speaking to the heads of several African countries, said that a peace agreement was allegedly signed at the Ukrainian-Russian talks in March 2022 in Istanbul, but Ukraine itself broke it and continued hostilities. Of course, Putin was lying in his usu-al manner. I say this responsibly because I was present at the final part of the negotiations in Tur-key. In fact, we handed over a letter to the Russian side as a condition for the cessation of hostili-ties, with a position to withdraw to the border as of February 24. And on the issues of Crimea and Donbas, to start a negotiation process, while committing not to use force to liberate these territo-ries. But the very next day after the talks in Turkey, Putin said that there could be no negotiations on Crimea, because it is allegedly the territory of Russia," Dzhemilev said.
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@EhsanMusic There wasn't any deal. Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@MrLeadb1 According to Russian propaganda, they have not. But everyone else speaks the truth. EDIT: Most others in the free press are telling the truth about this.
The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@rerbitd7094 The representative of the Czech Republic, speaking on behalf of the European Union, recalled that, for many European countries, the end of the Second World War did not bring freedom but further occupation and crimes against humanity by other totalitarian regimes. Rejecting the term denazification, used by the Russian Federation to justify its illegal invasion of Ukraine, she said such distortion erodes understanding of the Holocaust.
Reiterating her commitment to the global fight against racism, xenophobia and temporary forms of all extremist ideologies, including neo-Nazism, she noted that member States of the European Union will vote against the resolution.
The representative of the United States categorically condemned the glorification of Nazism. Describing the resolution as an attempt to legitimize long-standing disinformation narratives, she stressed that Moscow’s resolution is not a serious effort to combat Nazism and antisemitism; instead, it is a shameful ploy to justify its war of aggression in Ukraine. The United States fully supported the amendment that passed and became a part of the adopted resolution, she recalled, categorically rejecting the notion that the draft has turned into a country-specific resolution.
The representative of Ukraine reminded all that his country fought fascism and Nazism during the Second World War, with millions of Ukrainians sacrificing their lives. In response to the Russian Federation, he quoted the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, who presented his report today. “Russian soldiers executed civilians in makeshift places of detention. Others were summarily executed on the spot following security checks in their houses, yards and doorways, even where the victim had shown clearly that they were not a threat, for example by holding their hands in the air. There are strong indicators that the summary executions by the Russians in Ukraine, documented in the report, may constitute the war crime of wilful killing.” This is the fascism of today, the glorification of fascism and Nazism being executed by the Russian Federation and what the international community must stop, he stressed. Turning to operative paragraph 4, he noted that it does not speak about the special operation but rather the Russian Federation’s endeavours to justify its military invasion and territorial aggression on the purported basis of eliminating neo-Nazism. “That is why we do not allow rapists to lecture us about how to fight rape”, he emphasized.
The representative of China reiterated her firm opposition to attempts to deny, distort and falsify the history (my comment: like russia do) of the Second World War; her firm opposition to acts of glorifying Nazism, fascism and militarism and acts fuelling their resurgence; and her opposition of all forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance. She said the practice of adding country-specific content to thematic resolutions by means of amendments is inconsistent with the established practice of the Third Committee. Among sponsors of the respective amendment, there are certain countries that seek to falsify the history of the Second World War and refuse to admit such war crimes as massive sexual violence, she stressed, expressing concern about the practice of a small number of countries creating division and politicizing relevant agenda items. In view of the above, she disassociated herself from the consensus on operative paragraph 3.
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@Павел-ь2ш2с After the German occupation of Prague in March 1939 the Chamberlain government in Britain sought Soviet and French support for a Peace Front.
The goal was to deter further German aggression by guaranteeing the independence of Poland and Romania.
However, Stalin refused to pledge Soviet support for the guarantees unless Britain and France first concluded a military alliance with the Soviet Union. Although the British cabinet decided to seek such an alliance, the western negotiators in Moscow in August 1939 lacked urgency. The talks were conducted poorly and slowly by diplomats with little authority, such as William Strang, an assistant under-secretary.
Stalin also insisted on British and French guarantees to Finland, the Baltic states, Poland and Romania against indirect German aggression. Those countries, however, became fearful that Moscow wanted to control them. Although Hitler was escalating threats against it, Poland refused to allow Soviet troops to cross its borders for fear that they would never leave. Historian Michael Jabara Carley argues that the British were too committed to anticommunism to trust Stalin.
Meanwhile, both Great Britain and USSR were separately involved into secret negotiations with Germany. Eventually Stalin was attracted to a much better deal by Hitler, the control of most of Eastern Europe, and decided to sign the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Then Hitler attacked Poland from the west and Stalin attacked from the east. Soviet also took the Baltic states.
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@istudios225 There is no proxy war. Russia has attacked Ukraine! And many other countries are sending Ukraine weapons so they can defend themselves against the russian cowards.
And about the shelling of Donbas:
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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"This happens in every war. How do we characterize ethnic cleansing?"
@PerceivedREALITY999 In their campaign, the Serb forces heavily targeted civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. As the attempt at an internationally-brokered deal to end the crisis failed in early 1999 at the Rambouillet peace talks, NATO carried out a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against targets in Kosovo and Serbia. NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians.
It is estimated that more than 100,000 people (Bosnia and Herzegovina) were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes. Thousands of Bosnian women were systematically raped.
The single worst atrocity of the war occurred in the summer of 1995 when Srebrenica, a UN-declared safe area, came under attack by forces lead by the Bosnian Serb Ratko Mladić. During a few days July, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Serb forces in an act of genocide. The rest of the town’s women and children were driven out.
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@darkcloud5830 "When did the war actually start?" In 2014 when russia took Crimea and sent unmarked soldiers and heavy weapons to Donbas.
"but the mess wasn't started by Russia." Of course it was! You have to be brainwashed with russian propaganda to see otherwise.
"Who started the coup?"
Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports!
The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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All opposition in russia are either killed or put in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative.
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@fred4687 Cepaorg: Don’t Let Russia Fool You About the Minsk Agreements
1. There are two Minsk Agreements, not just one. The first “Minsk Protocol” was signed on September 5, 2014. It mainly consists of a commitment to a ceasefire along the existing line of contact, which Russia never respected. By February 2015, fighting had intensified to a level that led to renewed calls for a ceasefire, and ultimately led to the second Minsk Agreement, signed on February 12, 2015. Even after this agreement, Russian-led forces kept fighting and took the town of Debaltseve six days later. The two agreements are cumulative, building on each other, rather than the second replacing the first. This is important in understanding the importance, reflected in the first agreement, of an immediate ceasefire and full monitoring by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), including on the Ukraine-Russia border, as fundamental to the subsequent package of agreements.
2. Russia is a Party to the Minsk Agreements. The original Minsk signatories are Russia, Ukraine, and the OSCE. Russia is a protagonist in the war in Ukraine and is fully obliged to follow the deal’s terms. Despite that, however, Russia untruthfully claims not to be a party and only a facilitator — and that the real agreements are between Ukraine and the so-called “separatists,” who call themselves the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics (LPR and DPR), but are in fact Russian supplied and directed.
3. The LPR and DPR are not recognized as legitimate entities under the Minsk Agreements. The signatures of the leaders of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics were added after they had already been signed by Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE. They were not among the original signatories, and indeed Ukraine would not have signed had their signatures been part of the deal. There is nothing in the content or format of the Agreement that legitimizes these entities and they should not be treated as negotiating partners in any sense. Russia alone controls the forces occupying parts of eastern Ukraine.
4. Russia is in violation of the Minsk Agreements. The deals require a ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign military forces, disbanding of illegal armed groups, and returning control of the Ukrainian side of the international border with Russia to Ukraine, all of this under OSCE supervision. Russia has done none of this. It has regular military officers as well as intelligence operatives and unmarked “little green men” woven into the military forces in Eastern Ukraine. The LPR and DPR forces are by any definition “illegal armed groups,” that have not been disbanded. The ceasefire has barely been respected by the Russian side for more than a few days at a time.
5. Russian-led forces prevent the OSCE from accomplishing its mission in Donbas as spelled out in the Minsk Agreements. It is an unstated irony in Vienna — understood by every single diplomatic mission and member of the international staff — that Russia approves the mandate of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine when it votes in Vienna, but then blocks implementation of that same mission on the ground in Ukraine. Because Russia is a member of the OSCE, and the SMM wants to preserve what little access it has to the occupied territories, the mission is guarded in what it says about ceasefire violations and restrictions on its freedom of movement. Privately, however, they acknowledge that some 80% of such violations and restrictions come from the Russian-controlled side of the border, and those that occur on the Ukrainian side are largely for safety reasons (e.g., avoiding mined approaches to bridges.)
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@fred4687 6. Ukraine has implemented as much of Minsk as can reasonably be done while Russia still occupies its territory. The agreements require political measures on Ukraine’s side, including a special status for the region, an amnesty for those who committed crimes as part of the conflict, local elections, and some form of decentralization under the Ukrainian constitution. But the form of these measures is not specified, and Ukraine has already passed legislation addressing every point. It has passed – and extended with renewals – legislation on special status and amnesty, and already has legislation on the books governing local elections. It has passed constitutional amendments. The Minsk Agreements do not require Ukraine to grant autonomy to Donbas, or to become a federalized state. It is Russia’s unique interpretation that the measures passed by Ukraine are somehow insufficient, even though the agreements do not specify what details should be included, and Ukraine has already complied with what is actually specified to the degree it can.
What is lacking in Ukraine’s passage of these political measures is not the legislation per se, but implementation — which Russia itself prevents by continuing to occupy the territory. For example, international legal norms would never recognize the results of elections held under conditions of occupation, yet that is exactly what Russia seeks by demanding local elections before it relinquishes control. Moreover, the elections would not be for positions in the illegitimate LPR and DPR “governments” established under Russian occupation, but for the legitimate city councils, mayors, and oblast administrations that exist under Ukrainian law. Who would vote in such elections? Ukrainian law says all displaced citizens should vote. But would Russian occupation authorities allow this? These are matters for resolution under international supervision – not for Russia to dictate terms.
7. Some form of neutral peacekeeping or policing force could help bridge between Russian control and Ukrainian control of the occupied territory – but Russia has rejected such proposals. Because of the impossibility of Ukraine implementing political measures while Russia still occupies its territory, the United States — as well as Ukraine, with support from others —proposed deployment of an UN-mandated peacekeeping force to Donbas, so that Russian forces could withdraw, and an UN-backed force could deploy, without an immediate hand-over to Ukrainian control. This could allow time and space for local elections to occur, and for the implementation of special status and amnesty legislation. Russia, however, has consistently rejected such proposals, even labeling an UN-supported peacekeeping force a “military takeover” of the region, when of course it is Russia that has actually taken over the region militarily and unilaterally.
8. The US diplomatic role is essential. Germany and France lead the “Normandy Format,” which brings Russia and Ukraine to the negotiating table under their leadership. In this format, however, Germany and France treat Russia and Ukraine as bearing equal responsibility for the conflict, even though Russian forces are occupying and fighting inside Ukraine, and Ukraine is acting in self-defense. Privately, French and German diplomats acknowledge Russia’s responsibility for the ongoing war, but for diplomatic reasons do not often state this publicly. There are signs that this Franco-German unwillingness to identify the aggressor is feeding through into a refusal to consider detailed sanctions at this juncture and even to deny defensive weaponry to Ukraine.
These are bleak signals. This is why the US diplomatic role in Ukraine negotiations is so important. Only the United States can publicly shine a light on and condemn Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine. Germany and France will not do it. The United States has the military, political, and economic weight that can force Russia to pay attention, and embolden European policies. Exercising this power can shift the diplomatic dynamic onto a more level playing field. Failure to do so means the playing field defaults to Russia.
9. The only way to end the war is to change Russia’s calculations. Whether it is peacekeeping or police forces to provide local security; elections under international supervision; creating humanitarian corridors respected by all sides; unfettered freedom of movement for the OSCE’s SMM; or other ideas still to be explored, there is nothing preventing implementation of the Minsk Agreements other than Russia’s continued occupation. As soon as Russia chooses to end the war, the rest follows in swift order.
What this means is that the focus should not be on details of the agreements themselves, but on whatever will change Russia’s calculations. Unwinnability, high economic and military cost, improvements in Ukrainian defense forces — all of these can affect Russia’s decisions on whether to end the war, or to escalate further using the overwhelming military force it has deployed inside Ukraine and around its borders. Today, Russia calculates that it has all the cards. The West needs to convince Russia that it is wrong.
The job of US diplomacy is not merely to engage in talks, but to illuminate a reality that changes Russian assumptions, so that the Kremlin understands that Ukrainian independence is a fire, that it can be fed, and that reaching into the flames will be a painful — and scarring — experience.
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Putin was never gonna respect the Minsk agreements, in fact he has never held any agreements. It was just a game to fool Ukraine and the rest of the world.
He has initialized the separatist group in Donbas, armed them, sent in his own armed men etc etc. The goal has always been to take Ukraine. He announced many years ago that he would bring back the Soviet Union. That is his plan.
By the way, what do you think will happen to a potential separatist group working inside Russia? How long do you think they will live? One day? Two days? Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putins wet dream of reestablish the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In 2014 they invaded Crimea. Right after that, they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
However, Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@RAHULGANDHI-pr9op Source, United Nations:
According to the UN's Joint Coordination Centre, 57% of the foodstuffs exported from Ukraine over the past year went to developing countries and 43% to developed countries.
Almost 33 million tonnes of grain were shipped from Ukraine under the deal, and world food prices declined by roughly 20% as a result, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization.
Russia cited Ukraine's failure to export more grain to poorer countries as one of the reasons it pulled out of the deal.
However, the UN says that Ukraine has supplied 725,000 tonnes of grain to the World Food Programme (WFP), which was sent as humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
The EU says that over the past year, Ukraine supplied the WFP with more than 80% of all its grain, compared to 50% before the war.
The US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, called Russia's cancellation of the grain deal an "act of cruelty".
It is estimated that more than 50 million people across Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Sudan are currently in need of food aid because of successive years of failed rains.
The grain deal expired on 17 July, 2023. Since then, Russia has launched a series of air attacks on Ukraine's ports, destroying an estimated 60,000 tonnes of grain.
The Russian defence ministry also said it would regard all cargo ships in the Black Sea bound for Ukraine as potential military targets.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident.
He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians.
On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming.
In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Moscow denies attacking Ukrainian civilians, but the recent torrent of strikes on Kyiv suggest a concerted strategy with clear objectives. Russian missiles and drones rained down on the Ukrainian capital 17 times in May. That's equivalent to a near non-stop rate of once every two days. While Moscow was hit by a rare attack on Tuesday, Russia's relentless strikes point to a concerted campaign to bombard Ukrainian civilians.
But why do this? The Kremlin denies deliberately targeting civilians - which can be considered a war crime under international law - however the UN estimated in May that more than 24,000 non-combatants had been killed since fighting began last February. Russian strikes have also been documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards, theatres - the grim list goes on. "It's terror bombing," Dr Jade McGlynn, Research Fellow in War Studies at King's College London, told Euronews. "The purpose is to make Ukrainians feel unsafe and place them under considerable psychological pressure."
Behind Russia's "terror" campaign lies a clear objective, says McGlynn. "The ultimate intention is to break the will of the population so that they will at some point give in and accept Russia," she explained, claiming it was personally "directed" by the Russian President. "Putin believes the West will give up and Ukrainians will just be grateful for an end to the terror." "Civilians have always been targeted in all of Russia's wars," said McGlynn. "It's long been understood that civilians are collateral damage." "They've never had much care for individual human life."
Ahead of the Second Chechen War in 1999, Russia launched a devastating bombing campaign against breakaway Chechnya, reducing vast areas to rubble and forcing at least 100,000 to flee their homes. Russian airstrikes have also hammered rebel-held areas in Syria's ongoing civil war, with Human Rights Watch describing them as "reckless, indiscriminate and deliberately targeting civilians". In Ukraine, McGlynn says Russia's willingness to indiscriminately bombard civilian areas stems from a colonial view of the country. "For Russia, there are two types of Ukrainians: The good little brother/ sort of sidekick who speaks Russian... and the bad Ukrainians who embrace Ukrainian identity." "That's who they want to destroy".
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Putin has robbed his country for over 20 years now.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@Damon-007 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@Damon-007 The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications.
Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@Damon-007 Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target] and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets.
As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." The same lies again and again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 NATO's intervention was prompted by Yugoslavia's bloodshed and ethnic cleansing of Albanians, which drove the Albanians into neighbouring countries and had the potential to destabilize the region.
Yugoslavia's actions had already provoked condemnation by international organisations and agencies such as the UN, NATO, and various INGOs. Yugoslavia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords was initially offered as justification for NATO's use of force. NATO countries attempted to gain authorisation from the UN Security Council for military action, but were opposed by China and Russia, who indicated that they would veto such a measure. As a result, NATO launched its campaign without the UN's approval, stating that it was a humanitarian intervention.
A multi-state coalition began a military intervention in Libya to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 (UNSCR 1973), in response to events during the 2011 Libyan civil war.
the UN Security Council's intent was to have "an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute 'crimes against humanity'
Russia DID NOT vote against this intervention in the Security Council.
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During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv.
The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April?"
There wasn't any real deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 : Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@АрхиМед-ы5ь Putler?? He has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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@@alextim6961 Amnesty International:
One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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@@alextim6961 The number of civilians killed in Mariupol may even be three times higher than the earlier estimates of the Ukrainian government that set the number at 25,000 dead, a recent Associated Press report, published on Thursday, stated.
Since March, 10,300 new graves have appeared in the devastated, Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. However, many of them have at least a few bodies buried in them, according to an AP analysis.
Based on interviews with Mariupol residents, the AP estimated that thousands of bodies have never been buried and many are still in the city’s ruins. Similar reports were given by a pro-Ukrainian advisor to the city’s mayor, Petro Andriushchenko, according to whom the Russians are demolishing dilapidated apartment blocks in Mariupol to hide the true scale of their crimes.
According to Andriushchenko, many buildings, especially near the Azovstal metallurgical combine, hide between 50 and 100 human remains. He added that these people will never be buried in a dignified manner and that these are unregistered deaths.
The agency estimates that Russians plan to demolish up to more than 50,000 residential houses in Mariupol.
While working on the report, the AP analysed hundreds of satellite images, as well as video footage, including drone footage. 30 residents of Mariupol were interviewed, including 13 people still in the city. Three forensic pathologists with experience in examining mass graves for war crimes investigations confirmed that the conclusions presented by the AP are credible.
Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the population of Mariupol was around 430,000. According to the UN, around 350,000 civilians have left the city. Ukrainian authorities speculate that tens of thousands of people may have died there between February and May.
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@tia904 Bombing of Chernihiv
On 3 March 2022, six unguided aerial bombs were filmed falling in a residential area in Chernihiv. Analysis by Amnesty International found that (at least) eight bombs fell. Two schools (No.18 and No.21) and 8 private houses in the intersection between the Viacheslava Chornovila and Kruhova streets were destroyed, 7 more houses were also heavily damaged. Local emergency services recorded 38 men and 9 women killed (47 in total) by the bombing and 18 people injured. As Amnesty International was unable to identify a legitimate military target nearby, it said the attack could be a war crime.
On 16 March 2022, a Russian attack killed 14 civilians who were waiting in a line for bread in the city.
Chaplyne railway station strike
On 24 August 2022, the Independence Day of Ukraine, Russian forces struck Chaplyne, damaging a railway station, a utility building, and a residential neighborhood. Several passenger rail cars were set on fire and destroyed. Ukrainian sources described multiple rockets or missiles being used in several attacks. At least 25 people (including 2 children) died and about 31 were injured.
Vuhledar cluster bomb attack
On 24 February 2022, Vuhledar was attacked with an 9M79 Tochka missile, which landed next to a hospital and killed four civilians and injured ten.
Siege of Mariupol
Between 1–2 March 2022, Russian artillery reportedly shelled a densely populated neighbourhood in the city for nearly 15 hours, causing significant destruction. On 16 March the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that Russian forces continued to commit war crimes in Mariupol including "targeting civilian infrastructure". On 18 March, Lieutenant General James Hockenhull, Chief of Defence Intelligence for the United Kingdom (UK), described "continued targeting of civilians in Mariupol". As of 20 March local authorities have estimated that at least 2,300 people were killed during the siege.
On 9 March 2022, the Children's and Maternity Hospital No. 3, a hospital complex functioning both as a children's hospital and maternity ward, was bombed several times by Russian forces during a ceasefire, killing at least four people and injuring at least seventeen
On 20 March 2022, Ukrainian authorities announced that Russian troops had bombed an art school in the city where hundreds (about 400) were sheltering. The Mariupol City Council made the announcement through the instant messaging service Telegram, highlighting that many of those sheltering in the school were women, children and elderly .
On 16 March, Russian forces are shelling civilian areas in Mariupol. Artillery hit numerous locations, including a swimming pool building and the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre that was being used as an air raid shelter with a large number of civilians inside, the building was reduced to rubble. The bomb shelter in the basement of the theatre survived the bombing, but many people were still trapped underneath the burning rubble. A member of the Ukrainian parliament from Mariupol, Dmytro Gurin, said that the rescue efforts were hampered due to continued attacks on the area by Russian forces. On 4 May, Associated Press published an investigation with evidence pointing to 600 dead in the airstrike. Many survivors estimated around 200 people–including rescuers–escaping through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed. Estimates of civilian deaths vary, ranging from at least a dozen (Amnesty International) to 600 (Associated Press)
During shelling of Mariupol by Russian forces, a number of attempts to establish a humanitarian evacuation corridor to evacuate civilians from the city were made, but failed when the corridor was targeted by Russian forces. On 5 March, a five-hour ceasefire was declared, but evacuations were quickly halted after shelling continued during the declared time. The next day, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced that a second attempt to establish an evacuation corridor had failed.
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@tia904 On 8 April 2022 a missile attack on the railway station building in Kramatorsk. Between 1000 and 4000 civilians, mainly women and children, were present at the station awaiting evacuation from the region, which was being subjected to heavy Russian shelling. The attack left at least 60 dead and 110+ wounded.
On 9 July 2022, a missile strike on two residential buildings in Chasiv Yar was carried out by the Russian Armed Forces at 21:17 local time. At least 48 people were killed
On 14 April 2023, on Orthodox Christian Good Friday, Russian forces launched eight S-300 missiles at Sloviansk. One struck a five-storey residential building, killing 15 civilians, including a child, and wounding 24 .
On 3 March 2022, Russian forces bombed the central hospital in Izium, Eight people died and the hospital sustained "significant damage". On 8 March, the same recently refurbished hospital in the city was destroyed during shelling, this was followed on 11 March by an attack to a psychiatric hospital. On 15 September 2022, after Ukrainian forces had retaken Izium, several mass graves were discovered of more than 440 bodies buried in a forest northeast of the city. among the dead, some had reportedly died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to a HRW report published on 4 March, on 28 February, at around 10:00 AM, Russian forces fired cluster munitions with Grad rockets into at least three different residential areas in Kharkiv, killing at least nine civilians and injuring another 37. The city's mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that four people were killed when they left a shelter to get water and a family of two parents and three children were burned alive in their car. The locations hit were residential buildings and a playground, dispersed between Industrialnyi and Shevchenkivskyi District.
On 3 May 2023, Russian artillery struck a supermarket, a train station and residential buildings Kherson, killing 23 people and wounding 46. Among those killed were three engineers repairing damage inflicted on the power grid in earlier Russian strikes.
On 27 June 2022, the Russian Armed Forces fired two Kh-22 anti-ship missiles into central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, hitting the Amstor shopping mall. A fire broke out, and, according to Dmytro Lunin, Governor of Poltava Oblast, the attack killed at least 20 people and injured at least 56.
On 6 March 2022, the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly shelled an intersection in Irpin that hundreds of civilians were using to escape to Kyiv, whilst a Ukrainian artillery position was located nearby. They killed at least eight Ukrainian civilians (including 2 children).
According to preliminary information, on the morning of 1 July 2022 three Tu-22M3 strategic bombers of the Russian Air Force flew from the Volgograd Oblast to Crimea and after 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) fired three Kh-22s, supersonic anti-ship missiles designed for use against aircraft carriers, into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. At least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children .
On 3 March 2022, the nearby villages of Zatoka and Bilenke were shelled, killing at least one civilian in Bilenke. On 23 April, a Russian missile strike hit two residential buildings, killing eight civilians and wounding 18 or 20. One missile that struck a residential building killed a three-month old baby, the mother, and the baby's maternal grandmother.
On 27 February 2022, Amnesty International stated that it had analysed evidence showing that Russian cluster munitions from a 220 mm BM-27 Uragan rocket had hit a preschool in Okhtyrka where civilians were taking shelter on 25 February, killing three, including a child.
On 14 March 2022, Russian troops carried out two airstrikes against the Rivnenska TV Tower, as a result of which 21 people were killed and 9 were injured. Rockets hit the television tower and administrative buildings nearby. On 25 June, a rocket attack was carried out on civilian infrastructure in the city of Sarny, at least four people were killed and seven others were injured.
On 14 January 2023, a Russian Kh-22 type missile hit a nine-story residential building in Dnipro on the Naberezhna Peremohy St [uk], Sobornyi District in the right-bank part of the city, destroying one entrance and 236 apartments. On 19 January the official casualty rate was stated as 46 people killed, 80 injured (12 in critical condition) and 11 people reported missing. 14 children were reported among the injured, and 39 inhabitants were rescued.
Destroyed residential buildings in Borodianka, March 2022
As Russian forces fought in and near Kyiv, Borodianka, was targeted by numerous Russian airstrikes. Most of the buildings in the town were destroyed, including almost all of its main street. Russian bombs struck the centers of buildings and caused them to collapse while the frames remained standing. Many civilians were also reportedly killed by cluster munitions during the attacks. Oleksiy Reznikov, minister of defense, said many residents were buried alive by airstrikes and lay dying for up to a week. Some residents hid in caves for 38 days.
Only a few hundred residents remained in Borodianka by the time the Russians withdrew, with roughly 90% of residents having fled, and an unknown number dead in the rubble. Borodianka's mayor estimated at least 200 dead.
Bilohorivka school bombing
On 7 May 2022, Russian forces bombed a school in Bilohorivka where about ninety people were seeking shelter from the ongoing fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. The building caught on fire and trapped large numbers of people inside. At least 30 people were rescued. Two people were confirmed to have been killed, but Governor of Luhansk Oblast Serhiy Haidai said that the 60 remaining people were believed to have been killed.
Bombing of Mykolaiv
Main article: Mykolaiv cluster bombing
Cluster munitions were repeatedly used also on Mykolaiv during separate attacks on 7, 11 and 13 March 2022, causing civilian casualties and extensive destruction of non-military objects. In the 13 March attack nine civilians, including two children, were killed and 13 injured while waiting in line on the street at a cash machine. The explosions also damaged houses and civilian buildings.
1 July 2022 Russian missiles were fired into a 9-store apartment building and a recreational center in the settlement of Serhiivka, Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi Raion, Odesa Oblast. A missile hit the apartment, one section of the building was completely destroyed. The fire also spread from the apartment building to an attached store. at least 16 Ukrainian civilians were killed in the residential building. Two missiles hit the recreational center, killing at least 5 (including a 12-year-old boy). 38 more were also wounded, including 6 children.
Uman apartment block strike
On 28 April 2023, Russian forces launched 23 cruise missiles and two suicide drones at targets across Ukraine. Two missiles hit an apartment block in Uman, killing 23 people, including four children. Nine other residential buildings were damaged in the city. Shortly after, the Russian Defense Ministry posted a photo of a missile launch on its Telegram channel with the caption "Right on target".
14 July 2022 Missiles were hitting Vinnytsia
two missiles struck civilian buildings, including a medical center, offices, stores and residential buildings in the center of the city. The attacks killed at least 28 people (including three children), and injured at least 202 others.
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@tia904 Bombing of Zhytomyr
Emergency servicemen carry a dead body found under rubble in Malyn city, Zhytomyr Oblast, after a Russian airstrike on 8 March 2022.
On 1 March 2022, late in the evening, Russian troops hit a residential sector of the city. About 10 residential buildings on Shukhevych street and around the city hospital were damaged. A few bombs were dropped on the city. As a result, at least two Ukrainian civilians were killed and three were injured. On 2 March, shells hit the regional perinatal center and some private houses. On 4 March, rockets hit the 25th Zhytomyr school destroying half of the school.
Bombing of Zaporizhzhia
Several attacks from 12 August to 9 October. Zaporizhzhia was hit by eight Russian rockets in its industrial and residential areas. Followed by another rocket attack in the morning, striking the regional center near the Dnieper river.[304] Two days later the city was again hit by two Russian rockets during the night, followed by another five rockets attacks in the daytime. The regional center was hit an additional two times while other infrastructure and residential houses were damaged, two of the projectiles landed in a field on the outskirts of the city.
The following day on 22 September, nine more rockets were fired at the city. One of the projectiles hit a hotel in the city's central park, killing one civilian and injuring five others. An electrical substation and several high-rise residential buildings were also damaged. Later that same day, ten more rockets struck the city and damaged about a dozen private homes.
At 5.08am on 6 October, seven Russian rockets were fired towards the city center of Zaporizhzhia. Several residential buildings were destroyed and fires broke out due to the attack, killing 17 civilians and injuring 12 more. Zaporizhzhia was attacked once more during the night of 7 October, but this time by Iranian Shahed-136 kamikaze drones used by the Russian forces. The attack resulted in the deaths of 12 civilians with a further 13 injured and 15 missing
Around 3am on 9 October, 12 Russian tactical missiles were launched against civilian infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia. Most missiles hit both high-rise buildings and residential houses, with a nine-story building being partially destroyed after the attack. A further five high-rise buildings, 20 residential houses and four schools were damaged alongside 20 cars. A total of 13 civilians were killed in the attack, while 89 more were injured. The following day at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. On 23 November, Russian missile strikes destroyed a maternity ward in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, in the town of Vilnyansk, killing a newborn baby.
On 30 September 2022, a Russian S-300 missile hit a civilian convoy of civilian cars near Zaporizhzhia killing 32 people, including a three-month-old child. and injuring around 88. People in cars had gathered in a logistic hub to register for entering Russian-occupied territories in the south, such as the cities of Mariupol and Melitopol, and they were planning either to return home or to meet relatives and take them back to government-controlled territory. According to a spokesperson for the local governor's office, the attack on civilians was deliberate as no military objective was placed near the site. It occurred hours before Russia formally annexed four regions of Ukraine, including Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
On 9 October 2022, six missiles were launched at a residential area in Zaporizhzhia, destroying an apartment building and damaging 70 other buildings. The attack resulted in the deaths of 13 people, including a child. Another 89 were injured, 11 of whom are children.
On 10 October, at 1.45am, about seven Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missiles struck the city resulting in the deaths of eight civilians. Later on the day, an apartment block was destroyed and a kindergarten was damaged by shelling. 5 people were killed and 8 were injured in that shelling.
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Why does this mean that russia is not attacking civilians??
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.” Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo. “In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
- During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria.
The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable.
Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@jkenneth4986 It is only in YOUR (and Putin's) mind that the Budapest Memorandum is interpreted this way. Putin’s decision to invade is in direct violation of the Budapest Memorandum.
The memoranda prohibited the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States from threatening or using military force or economic coercion against Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, "except in self-defence or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations."
In exchange for giving up its nuclear arsenal, Ukraine initially sought legally binding guarantees from the US that it would intervene should Ukraine’s sovereignty be breached. But when it became clear that the US was not willing to go that far, Ukraine agreed to somewhat weaker – but nevertheless significant – politically binding security assurances to respect its independence and sovereignty which guaranteed its existing borders.
According to the three memoranda, Russia, the US and the UK confirmed their recognition of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine becoming parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and effectively abandoning their nuclear arsenal to Russia, and that they agreed to the following:
1. Respect the signatory's independence and sovereignty in the existing borders (in accordance with the principles of the CSCE Final Act).
2. Refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of the signatories to the memorandum, and undertake that none of their weapons will ever be used against these countries, except in cases of self-defense or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.
3. Refrain from economic coercion designed to subordinate to their own interest the exercise by Ukraine, the Republic of Belarus and Kazakhstan of the rights inherent in its sovereignty and thus to secure advantages of any kind.
4. Seek immediate Security Council action to provide assistance to the signatory if they "should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used".
5. Not to use nuclear weapons against any non - nuclear-weapon state party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, except in the case of an attack on themselves, their territories or dependent territories, their armed forces, or their allies, by such a state in association or alliance with a nuclear weapon state.
6. Consult with one another if questions arise regarding those commitments.
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You are lying!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled.
They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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A Russian journalist was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on Wednesday (15 February) for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol last April where women and children were sheltering. “Patriotism is love for the motherland, and love for one’s motherland should not be expressed by encouraging crime,” Ponоmarenko told the court before her sentencing, according to the RusNews outlet where she worked. “Attacking your neighbour is a crime.” “If it is a war – then call it a war,” she said from a cage in the courtroom. “This is a state crime against the army – it is like spitting on the graves of veterans.”
The Europe and Central Asia coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gulnoza Said, issued a statement on Ponomarenko’s sentencing. “Russian authorities should be ashamed of the six-year prison sentence given to journalist Maria Ponomarenko, whose sole so-called crime was publishing information about the war in Ukraine that did not conform to the official narrative. “Authorities should not contest Ponomarenko’s appeal, drop all the charges against her, and stop jailing independent voices.” The verdict is the latest in a series of rulings in Russia that ban criticism of the war.
In the early days of the conflict, the Kremlin approved legislation that penalised the spread of “false information” or criticism about the country’s military campaign, which Moscow calls a “special military operation”. Some members of Russia’s political opposition, activists, journalists, and bloggers have previously been convicted and imprisoned under the law.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”.
“There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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@LisaKing-ve8py BS! There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
Putin are lying about signing a peace deal: People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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All opposition in Russia are either killed or in prison on false charges.
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
Russia 2016: Christians in Russia are now banned from discussing their faith outside of churches and other designated places under new anti-terror laws.
From Wednesday onwards it is illegal to preach, teach or share faith outside state-controlled set-tings.
Senior Protestant church leader in Russia, Sergei Ryakhovsky, said the law 'creates the basis for the mass persecution of believers'.
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Lies: Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria. The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from.
Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony. The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbor, Ukraine.
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@НастоящийИсторик United Nations Charter, Chapter XVII: Transitional Security Arrangements.
Article 106:
Pending the coming into force of such special agreements referred to in Article 43 as in the opinion of the Security Council enable it to begin the exercise of its responsibilities under Article 42, the parties to the Four-Nation Declaration, signed at Moscow, 30 October 1943, and France, shall, in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 5 of that Declaration, consult with one another and as occasion requires with other Members of the United Nations with a view to such joint action on behalf of the Organization as may be necessary for the purpose of maintaining international peace and security.
Article 107:
Nothing in the present Charter shall invalidate or preclude action, in relation to any state which during the Second World War has been an enemy of any signatory to the present Charter, taken or authorized as a result of that war by the Governments having responsibility for such action.
YOU HAVE TO BE A RUSSIAN TO THINK THAT THESE ARTICLES GIVE YOU THE RIGHT TO INVADE AND ANNEX OTHER COUNTRIES.
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@pmp2559 About Biological weapons claim:
In March 2022, during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian officials falsely claimed that public health facilities in Ukraine were "secret U.S.-funded biolabs" purportedly developing biological weapons, which was debunked as disinformation by multiple media outlets, scientific groups, and international bodies.
Russian scientists, inside and outside Russia, have publicly accused the Russian government of lying about evidence for covert "bioweapons labs" in Ukraine, saying that documents presented by Russia's Defense Ministry describe pathogens collected for public health research. The "bioweapons labs" claim has also been denied by the US, Ukraine, the United Nations, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
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@moodymood28 "When USA and it's fleet, britan and somw other nations joined hands with Pakistan and invading India, we were helpless at that time." This is a falsification of history! USA didn't invade India together with Pakistan. Us troops never set foot in India. And India did not risk losing the war, quite the opposite!
Wiki: At the onset of hostilities between India and Pakistan which led to the two-week December Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, President Nixon urged Yahya Khan to restrain Pakistani forces, in order to prevent escalation of the war, and to safeguard Pakistan's interests – Nixon feared that an Indian invasion of West Pakistan would lead to socialist India's domination of the subcontinent, thereby strengthening the position of the Soviet Union. Yahya Khan feared that an independent Bangladesh would lead to the disintegration of West Pakistan. However, Indian military support for Bengali guerrillas and a massive flood of Bengali refugees into India led to the escalation of hostilities and declared war between India and Pakistan.
USA sent weapons to Pakistan (Pakistan and the United States established relations on 15 August 1947, a day after the independence of Pakistan, when the United States became one of the first nations to recognize Pakistan. ), but also threatened to cut off aid to pressure Pakistan to end hostilities.
Near the end of the war, USA recognized Pakistan's imminent defeat, but sent the USS Enterprise and the Task Force-74 of the United States Seventh Fleet into the Indian Ocean, which was regarded as a warning to India to resist escalating attacks against West Pakistan.
Declassified CIA intelligence documents stated that "India intended to dismember Pakistan and destroy its armed forces, a possible loss of U.S. ally in the Cold war that the United States cannot afford to lose." Nixon termed India a "Soviet stooge" before ordering the Enterprise to lead the Task Force-74
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wiki: In late September 2022, in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian-installed officials in Ukraine staged so-called referendums on the annexation of occupied territories of Ukraine by Russia. They were widely described as sham referendums by commentators and denounced by various countries. Currently, the validity of the results of the referendums has only been accepted by North Korea, and no other sovereign state.
First there was an attempted coup by the Russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger. In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation.
On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@Peter-xg5fq Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”. As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@jaimhaas5170 From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@lagubrok92 Why these lies about Donbas over and over again??! You're delusional, and your double standards and hypocrisy are off the scale!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Recurring pro-Kremlin narrative falsely casting Ukraine as a Nazi turned country after the Euromaidan described here as a coup d'etat planned by the United States and often painted as colour revolutions. There was no coup, let alone a Western-sponsored coup, in Ukraine; this is a longstanding pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about Ukraine's Euromaidan.
The spontaneous onset of the Euromaidan protests was a reaction by numerous segments of the Ukrainian population to former president Viktor Yanukovych’s sudden departure from the promised Association Agreement with the European Union in November 2013.
Regarding the myth of Nazi-ruled Ukraine, this is a clear propaganda narrative that became a cornerstone in pro-Kremlin disinformation, which can clearly be challenged with the issue of a 2015 ban on Nazi and Communist ideologies, and with the far-right groups having limited presence during the Euromaidan protests itself and have suffered defeats in every national election after that, with a united front of all radical right-wing parties in the 2019 parliamentary elections winning only 2.15% of the vote falling far short of the 5% minimum guaranteeing entry into parliament.
See similar disinformation cases in our database alleging that far-right coup government in Kyiv emerged from the 2014 Maidan uprising; or that Zelenskyy's regime is based on Nazism; or that Bandera's sympathisers have a large influence on Ukraine; or that Ukraine has established an apartheid regime; or that the US supported the 2014 coup.
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. -
That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner. It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target] and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.
A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at.
Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 -Russia arrested priests.
"Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 We need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative.
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In February 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putin's wet dream of reestablishing the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In March they invaded Crimea. Right after they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
In February 2014, Putin asked for and got permission by the Russian Federation Council to use Russian forces on Ukrainian territory. This was BEFORE the Minsk agreement. Putin's wet dream of reestablishing the Soviet Union started the war. Nothing else. In March they invaded Crimea. Right after they infiltrated and armed a group of separatists in Donbas.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
YAVORIV, Ukraine, Sept 20- Ukraine began joint military exercises with U.S. and other NATO troops on Monday, at a time when neighbouring Russia and Belarus have been holding large-scale drills that alarmed the West.
The exercise comes on the heels of huge war games staged by Moscow near NATO and EU borders of Russia and Belarus in recent weeks, which Russia says involved 200,000 troops. Kyiv and NATO also accuse Russia of having deployed extra troops this year near Ukraine's frontiers. Around 20 Russian warships began large-scale live fire exercises in the Black Sea.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple.
But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work. Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.”
Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote.
While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy.
But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner.
He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@flamintasty Geneva Solutions: Mothers will produce more sons’: Russia’s long history of sacrificing soldiers.
Poorly prepared operations, frontal attacks, wounded soldiers left on the battlefield. During the first two months of the invasion of Ukraine, the Russians lost an estimated 21,000 members of its troops. The horrific figures do not faze the Russian leadership in any way. After all, that's how they have always fought.
The Battle of Narva in 1700 was a terrible defeat for the Russian army against the Swedes in the Great Northern War. The battlefield was dotted with the bodies of the guards of Tsar Peter the Great. Dozens of Peter’s childhood friends, people he had grown up with, were killed. The story goes that seeing this carpet of corpses, Peter could not hold back tears. He was reassured by one of his closest associates. He put his hand on his shoulder and said: “Don't cry, my lord, Russian mothers will produce more sons.”
Historical anecdote? It seems that every Russian war proves it to be true.
Every war in Russia has been a bloody slaughter, including mass sacrifices of its own soldiers.
In just one day in the Crimean War, the Russians lost up to 10,000 soldiers. The enemy? Two hundred.
In the Soviet Union, killing their own people was taken to a new level. In the Soviet-Finnish war of 1940, there were eight Red Army soldiers killed per Finn. In the Second World War, this ratio only increased. Until the last day of the war, Soviet generals overwhelmed their opponents with the bodies of their soldiers.
“Marshal Zhukov gave me a matter-of-fact statement of his practice, which was, roughly, ‘there are two kinds of mines; one is the personnel mine and the other is the vehicular mine. When we come to a minefield our infantry attacks exactly as if it were not there…” – Wartime memoirs Crusade to Europe by 34th US President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Soviet Marshal Konev later admitted that during the storming of Berlin in 1945 he lost 150,000 killed. The real numbers exceeded 300,000 dead. In one battle. By comparison, total US military losses during the whole war were 290,000.
Now it is obvious that Russian generals honor the traditions of their ancestors. Every victory of theirs, as well as every defeat, is a bloody sacrifice. After all, the mindset of the Russian army has been unchanged for hundreds of years safe in the knowledge that “mothers will produce more sons”.
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@arundavid8231 The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@stephenwood6663 Amnesty International:
One year on from the beginning of the Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine many people, including children, are dying, and many more at risk.
As Russia continues its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Amnesty International is exposing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and gathering evidence from our researchers on the ground and our Crisis Evidence Lab. From the devastation of Izium to the siege of Mariupol, from shelling in Kyiv to displaced people in Lviv, we’re helping to keep the world informed about what is happening in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, his government and the Russian armed forces are desperate to hide the truth about the invasion, including the possible war crimes they are committing in Ukraine.
On 24 February 2022, Russian military forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a move that Amnesty International called “an act of aggression and human rights catastrophe”. Since then, Russian forces have committed war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law, including extrajudicial executions, deadly strikes on civilian infrastructure and places of shelter, deportations and forcible transfers of civilians, and unlawful killings committed on a vast scale through shelling of cities.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Amnesty International has documented war crimes, including the targeting of critical civilian infrastructure and blocking of aid for civilians. Civilians in conflict-affected areas have been exposed to constant attacks and often cut off from water, electricity and heating. Many people living in Russian-occupied areas remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance or medical care, yet are being denied the right to travel to Ukrainian government-controlled territories.
“The people of Ukraine have suffered unimaginable horror during this war of aggression over the last 12 months. Let us be clear: the hands of Vladimir Putin and his armed forces are stained with blood. Survivors deserve justice and reparations for all they have endured. The international community must stand steadfast to see this through to the end so that justice is served. One year in, it’s patently clear more must be done.”
Tens of thousands of cases of war crimes have been filed, including of sexual and gender-based crimes, but the number of victims of the ongoing conflict will be much higher.
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@dandare3627 You forgot to quote the rest of the article, I'll help you:
"In his daily video address on Thursday evening, President Volodymyr Zelensky angrily and strongly criticized this as an "attempt to give amnesty to a terrorist country," which places "the victim and the aggressor on equal footing in a certain way." He recalled that Russian strikes have destroyed nearly 200 churches and places of worship, 2,200 educational institutions and 900 hospitals and clinics.
For her part, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar emphasized how much the NGO ignored tactical realities: "The Ukrainian army fortifies and defends towns and villages. If we wait for the Russian enemy on the battlefield, as some people advise us, the Russians will occupy all our houses." Russia's considerable superiority in firepower and artillery leaves the Ukrainian defense no choice but to use the buildings as protection. The cities remain very difficult for the invader to take, although Russia is ready to raze them, as its army already demonstrated in Mariupol and a dozen other Ukrainian cities."
Amnesty: Statement on publication of press release on Ukrainian fighting tactics
Amnesty International deeply regrets the distress and anger that our press release on the Ukrainian military’s fighting tactics has caused. Since Russian’s invasion began in February 2022, Amnesty International has been rigorously documenting and reporting on war crimes and violations committed in Ukraine, speaking to hundreds of victims and survivors whose stories illuminate the brutal reality of Russia’s war of aggression. We have challenged the world to demonstrate its solidarity with Ukrainians through concrete action, and we will continue to do so.
The laws of war exist in part to protect civilians, and it is for this reason that Amnesty International urges governments to comply with them.
This does not mean that Amnesty International holds Ukrainian forces responsible for violations committed by Russian forces, nor that the Ukrainian military is not taking adequate precautions elsewhere in the country.
We must be very clear: Nothing we documented Ukrainian forces doing in any way justifies Russian violations. Russia alone is responsible for the violations it has committed against Ukrainian civilians. Amnesty’s work over the last six months and our multiple briefings and reports on Russia’s violations and war crimes reflect their scale and the gravity of their impact on civilians.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13. First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU.
When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war. The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda tells you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0. Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants.
The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small.
Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries. The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia's lie machine:
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists.
The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state. The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@ElectronicaStation1 Yes, that's correct. They also write about that, but the conclusion is this: " .... but I would consider the neo-Nazi groups in Russia a much bigger problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
The far right also gained some traction after popular uprisings in 2013 and 2014 when Ukraine’s pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, suspended an agreement passed by Ukraine’s Parliament to establish closer economic ties to the European Union. After Yanukovych ultimately fled the country, Russian troops invaded and then annexed Crimea and supported Russian separatists who fought against Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine.
One of the volunteer paramilitary regiments at the forefront of the battle with Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine was a group called the Azov battalion, which was founded by members of two neo-Nazi groups.
The battalion’s success in 2014 in helping to win back the city of Mariupol from separatists has made them heroes to many in Ukraine, Izabella Tabarovsky of the Wilson Center told us.
“If they [Ukrainian citizens] value them, it is not because of any Nazi ideology,” said Tabarovsky, who manages the Wilson Center’s Russia File and Focus Ukraine blogs. “They value its patriotic stance. They value a group that fights an enemy that thinks their country has no right to exist.”
The Azov battalion, which had about 1,000 members, represents a small minority of the overall Ukrainian military. As the BBC reported, the Ukrainian armed forces number some 250,000 (March 2022)
And some say the ultra-nationalist, neo-Nazi leanings of the Azov regiment have become less prevalent. In 2015, a spokesman for the Azov brigade told USA Today that 10% to 20% of the group’s members are Nazis. The leader of the Azov regiment, Biletsky, has since left to start a political party. And while there are still some far-right ties remaining in the unit, there have also been a flow of new recruits “who mostly are not there because of the regiment’s ideology, but because of its reputation as a particularly tough fighting unit.
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@ElectronicaStation1 Russian claims about neo-Nazi influence in Ukraine did not begin just prior to the invasion of Ukraine this year. Putin and other Russian officials have been characterizing Ukrainians as neo-Nazi fascists since Russia invaded Crimea eight years ago, Tabarovsky (Wilson Center) said.
“There has been an intensive campaign of demonization,” Tabarovsky told us. And, she said, referencing Nazism has “a certain resonance for Putin’s core supporters in Russia” because “there is a national historical memory formed around World War II and the victory over Nazis. It is a strong part of the [Russian] national identity.”
Umland, an expert in Ukrainian nationalism who until recently was based in Kyiv, agreed.
“The primary reason that the Kremlin is doing this is because the defeat of the Nazis is the high point of modern Russian history,” Umland said. “It is a major reference point for the Russian national identity. ‘We secured the victory over Hitler’ — is a principal source of Russian pride.”
Putin’s propaganda cherry-picks the problematic parts of Ukrainian civil society and government, Umland said.
“Far right extremists do exist in Ukraine,” he said. “The Ukrainians are not a nation of angels.” But Russian propaganda “gives the altogether minor Ukrainian right-wing extremist groups a disproportionate political relevance as an allegedly dominant phenomenon. In principle, you can do something like that with any country, make minor problematic aspects look salient and demonize every country of the world.”
“It’s a fairly obvious and rather successful political-psychological trick to justify the war among ordinary Russians,” Umland said.
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@ElectronicaStation1
What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
And then we have the Wagner group, with several leaders who are known neo-Nazis
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than Ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
I
n May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbas] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Human Rights Watch has extensively documented how Russian officials and their proxies used coercive measures to forcibly transfer Ukrainian civilians, including those fleeing hostilities, to Russia or Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
We have also documented the forced transfer of children and the war’s devastating impact on children in residential institutions.
Although the new report, issued under the OSCE’s Moscow Mechanism, acknowledges uncertainty regarding exact numbers, its conclusions are certain: Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia or transferred within Russian-controlled territory. This constitutes a war crime.
It also concluded that forcibly deported Ukrainian children had been subjected to “numerous and overlapping violations” of their rights. The report noted that forcibly deported children were placed in an unfamiliar environment far removed from Ukrainian language, culture, customs, and religion.
It also found that many such children were exposed to military training and “to pro-Russian information campaigns often amounting to targeted reeducation.” The report also underscores how changes in Russian law enabled authorities to swiftly give Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their guardianship and adoption by Russian families in Russia, even though many of the children may have living relatives, including in Ukraine.
The report found that Russian authorities didn’t promote the return of Ukrainian children to their home country or the reunification of Ukrainian children separated from their families. In fact, the report says, Russia seems to be creating obstacles for reunification. Russia has no centralized list of transferred children. Additionally, the children are repeatedly moved from place to place, and sometimes referred to by Russian, not Ukrainian, names.
Even if Ukrainian families manage to locate a child, they encounter numerous logistical and financial difficulties in returning that child to Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
The agency indicated that the attacks damaged medical facilities, including 50 hospitals. As of August 2022, there have already been hundreds of cases of Russian use of cluster munitions in at least 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.
Although the Russian side denies accusations of using cluster munitions in residential areas, international and non-governmental organizations have reported such attacks. By the beginning of April, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies were reporting cluster munition shelling in Kharkiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Donetsk, Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. By July 1, Cluster Munition Coalition reports shelling in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. Testimony from independent weapons experts confirmed that a number of cluster rounds were dropped on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. This is proved by photos and videos of eyewitnesses of the events, as well as journalists on the ground.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 In November 2013, thousands of Ukrainians flocked to Kyiv’s Independence square to protest then-President victor Yanukovych’s decision to suspend preparations for the signing of an association and free-trade agreement with EU. Over the following months, the protests grew in size and drew more media attention. In February 2014, clashes between protesters and police became increasingly violent when police attempted to clear the square of protesters. The violents led to the deaths of more then 50, maybe over 100 people.
Angry protesters demanded Yanukovych’s immediate resignation. Yanukovych fled the same day the agreement was signed. The Ukrainian parliament then voted 328 – 0 to remove Yanukovych from office.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@corvus4135 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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@corvus4135 Jerusalempost: A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@ashig5683 Why didn't you say so in the first place? ; )
It's a bit suspect when India expels 41 Canadian diplomats, when they need to find a diplomatic solution. And that they won't tell the real reason. India’s foreign ministry said it would be demanding that Canada reduce the number of its diplomatic staff in India, claiming it was for reasons of “parity” as Canadian diplomats in Delhi far outnumbered India diplomats in Ottawa.
Theguardian: Trudeau had called on India to cooperate with the investigation into the killing but India dismissed the allegations as “absurd” and politically motivated. It swiftly escalated into a diplomatic row, as the two countries engaged in a tit-for-tat expulsion of top diplomats and India suspended all visa applications for Canadians.
Aurel Braun, a professor of international relations and political science at the University of Toronto, described India’s expulsion of Canadian diplomats as an “extremely significant step” against another democracy.
“The prime minister started this in a way that was clever, rather than strategically intelligent,” said Braun. “You do not make this kind of accusation against a fellow democracy, not to one that is as influential as India, unless you have very solid incontrovertible evidence. And if you don’t publish something credible, you run the risk of walking into an Indian nationalistic trap.”
Braun said Canada might have clear evidence that India was complicit in the assassination of Nijjar amid reports that the US shared key intelligence.
“But having evidence is not enough. International relations are very unforgiving. For a long time, our prime minister has enjoyed a Teflon-like reputation. But once you lose that, you have to be extremely careful.”
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@Tititheos1983 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Back in early May, Russia launched an PSYOP claiming that Zaluzhnyi and Budanov had died, and now the information campaign has only gained new momentum.
Today, despite numerous videos and photographic evidences to the contrary, Russia continues to convince everyone that the Ukrainian commanders-in-chief are dead. Moreover, they call the published videos "using corpses" and "video editing".
The main reason for the spread of these myths is the high level of support in Ukrainian society for the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. That is why Russia chose Zaluzhnyi as the main target for its propaganda. However, the information campaign failed miserably, and Russia soon launched a new wave of fakes, burying Budanov. 🤣
In addition, experts emphasize that the russian PSYOP works not only beyond the borders of russia, but also for russian citizens. For example, the "successful destruction of the Commanders-in-Chief" was supposed to dampen the russians' discontent with the failures at the front. Therefore, the world will observe such fakes on a regular basis, because we have all already seen that russia is a fictional fake country.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "...... Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." As you're well aware of by now, RUSSIA broke the Minsk agreements.
They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who didn't want peace? Who advised against the 2022 peace talks in April? Hint: someone visited Zelensky in Kiev at that time."
There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognizing the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimize regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Who didn't want peace? "
Putin lies about signing a peace deal:
Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine. It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@bhabigbig2391 Six-seven weeks ago: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@lilacer6841 Russian forces have used cluster bombs in Ukraine on a number of occasions, according to observers and humanitarian groups. And human rights groups have said Ukraine has also used them.
During the early days of the war, there were repeated instances of Russian cluster bombs cited by groups such as HRW, including when they hit near a preschool in the northeastern city of Okhtyrka. The open-source intelligence group Bellingcat said its researchers found cluster munitions in that strike as well as multiple cluster attacks in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, also in the northeast.
More recently, in March, a Russian missile and drone barrage hit a number of urban areas, including a sustained bombardment in Bakhmut, in the eastern Donetsk region. Just west of there, shelling and missile attacks hit the Ukrainian-held city of Kostiantynivka and journalists in the city saw at least four injured people taken to a local hospital. Police said Russian forces attacked the town with S-300 missiles and cluster munitions.
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@josephsmith688 The use of cluster bombs during the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–present) has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations. In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
As of July 1, hundreds of attacks with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported. Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
Josephsmith688, do you need more?
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Why do you believe the lying son of a b..tch, Putin? There is strong evidence that Moscow has already used cluster munitions against Ukraine despite the Russian president’s denial.
Putin: “Until now, we have not done this, we have not used it, and we have not had such a need,” the president said. He said that he regarded the use of cluster bombs as a crime.
There is strong evidence, however, suggesting that Moscow has used cluster bombs in its war against Ukraine. In a report in May, Human Rights Watch said that “since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russian armed forces have used cluster munitions in attacks that have caused hundreds of civilian casualties and damaged civilian objects, including homes, hospitals, and schools.”
wiki: The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–present) has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations. In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion. As of July 1, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported. Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@et2709 A variety of cluster bombs have been used by Russia on the battlefield in Ukraine, both against Ukrainian troops and in urban areas, Sidharth Kaushal, a research fellow at the defense and security think tank RUSI, told CBS News. He said Ukraine also has a limited number of cluster munitions from Turkey.
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
In particular, cluster weapons have been a terror in Syria, where at least 1,435 civilians—including 518 children—have been killed due to their indiscriminate use. Both Russian occupying forces and the Russian-controlled regime of dictator Bashar al-Assad have blanketed cities with these weapons. Russia has used these weapons in attacks on Ukrainian cities.
For Russia, civilian deaths due to cluster weapons aren’t a bug: They’re a feature.
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Russian lies and propaganda as usual! They always claim military targets when killing civilians.
Aljazeera: Putin targets Ukrainian civilians because he could in Syria The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again. In 2015, when Russia began its military intervention in Syria, it seemed that the barbarism in the region was too significant for the international community to turn away from. Abundant reports by United Nations commissions, as well as accountability, human rights, and humanitarian organisations, documented war crimes with pictures, videos, and firsthand testimony.
The world has watched countless incidents of missiles destroying hospitals or mutilated Syrian children covered in dust and blood being pulled from the rubble of destroyed apartment buildings. By some accounts, the documentation of war crimes in Syria is the strongest evidence since the crimes of the Nazis in World War II. And yet, the international community failed to act. No one was held accountable. Syria was a test case for the resolve of the world on how to respond to a brutal aggressor that justifies attacking civilians and hospitals. Inaction in Syria gave Putin the green light to start another brutal war to swallow another big chunk of territory from his neighbour, Ukraine.
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The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued. “Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
During the first 4 weeks of the war: Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year: More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups. A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@upstairs1307 ...... The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FS B officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FS B thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Every opposition politician in russia are either killed or in jail on false charges. Even journalists have been killed and jailed. Still you are supporting this terrible regime!!
Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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@peaceb4 Why was the coup deadly? Because of the snipers that the russian friendly president has placed to shoot the protesters.
There has been no lacking of real peace talks from Ukraine, but from russia. putin has denied all realistic peace talks. After all, his mission is to restore the Soviet Union. So why would he want peace!? A free and independent Ukraine stands in the way of his wet dream.
- July 19, 2022 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
"No negotiations are possible until the Kyiv govt has been replaced with a russian one" = medvedev
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
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bjornsjostrom3800 Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the Euromaidan in Ukraine in 2014. There was no coup, nor a western orchestrated protest in Ukraine.
The demonstrations which began in Kyiv in November 2013 – called "Maidan", or "Euromaidan" – were a result of the Ukrainian people's frustration with former President Yanukovych. The protesters' demands included constitutional reform, a stronger role for parliament, the formation of a government of national unity, an end to corruption, early presidential elections and an end to violence.
Ukraine's government changed its relations toward Russia after the latter illegally annexed Crimea, which is part of Ukraine, through a non-recognised referendum, announced on 27 February 2014, and held on gunpoint on 16 March 2014. The UN described it as not valid and stated that it could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. In its turn, the EU continues to strongly condemn this violation of international law and has responded by imposing restrictive measures against the Russian Federation.
The prehistory of the 2014 revolution includes the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05, in which massive protests on the Maidan against an (actual) stolen election that handed Yanukovych the victory over pro-Western rival Viktor Yushchenko ended with Ukraine’s Supreme Court throwing out the results and with Yushchenko winning the re-vote. (During the campaign, Yanukovych had been explicitly backed by Putin and had flown to Moscow for several meetings with his patron; meanwhile, Yushchenko had nearly died from dioxin poisoning in an apparent assassination attempt.)
In 2010, an ostensibly new and improved Yanukovych, now advised by Paul Manafort—, later Donald Trump’s campaign chair and Russiagate star—prevailed over Yushchenko, whose popularity had been undercut by failed reforms and bickering with allies.
Yanukovych’s victory had been achieved by a clever rebranding as a modern liberal democratic leader who would ensure Ukraine’s integration into Europe while also preserving good relations with Russia. In particular, he promised to pursue a free trade agreement with the European Union, seen as putting Ukraine on the path to EU membership.
Vladimir Putin responded with what Jacobin’s Marcetic aptly calls “a one-man good-cop, bad-cop routine,” wielding both the carrot of a no-strings loan and the stick of punitive trade measures to strong-arm Yanukovych into backing out of the agreement. In November 2013, Yanukovych reneged on the deal, sparking massive protests dominated by the slogan, “Ukraine is Europe.”
“Europe” was not just about trade or job opportunities but, in the words of one activist featured in the book, “a question of values: the value of freedom of choice, the value of dignity.” Shore asserts that, despite the participation of Ukrainian nationalists, the “Euromaidan” was an extraordinary example of interethnic and interreligious cooperation between different groups brought together by common liberal values.
Yanukovych’s violent response to the Maidan demonstrations—sending brutal riot cops to disperse the protesters and ramming through a package of repressive legislation—only spurred on the protests.
By the time Yanukovych had signed a Europe-brokered deal with opposition leaders agreeing to give more power to the parliament and hold new elections later in the year, nearly a hundred Maidan protesters were dead at the hands of the Berkut riot police—48 of them in a half-hour-long massacre by snipers on February 20 (based on extensive video footage, by the Center for Human Rights Science at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that the victims were indeed shot by Berkut members.) —and many Maidan activists saw the deal as a betrayal. The crowd cheered nationalist speakers who demanded Yanukovych’s immediate removal and threatened violence. The parliament moved to impeach him, and on February 22 the beleaguered Yanukovych fled to Russia, where he has lived ever since. There is evidence that he had been preparing his flight and moving his property for days if not weeks before his departure.
Since Yanukovich ouster, Russian state sponsored media have frequently claimed that the Maidan Revolution was in fact a coup orchestrated by Western powers. The claim is that US had spent USD 5 billion to fund the uprising against Yanukovych. The real story is that V. Nuland said that US had invested more than 5 billion in Ukraine since their independence in 1991. To support democracy-building programs and institutions. To build health-care systems and a wide area of activities, including nuclear nonproliferation efforts. NOT to provoke the uprising in 2014, as the false Russian propaganda tells.
The GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, also carried out a disinformation campaign reframing Maidan as a coup perpretated by armed nationalists. GRU created fake personas made to look like ordinary Ukrainins on Facebook and Vkontakte. These accounts called demonstarters “fascist”, “westerners” and “Nazis”, and voiced fears of what perotesters would do to Pro-Russia citizens.
Other fake personas made physical threats against Yanukovych’s political allies and posted articles claiming that they lived in Klyiv and that what happened there was a violent coup.
To this day, Russian state media are still referring to the Maidan Revolution as a “Western backed coup”.
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@GegeDxD I'm glad I made an impression on you!
The Cuba crisis is over 60 years ago. The world has moved on, except russia. But back then Soviet/russia was about to place NUCLEAR missils in Cuba. The US has not placed either nuclear missiles or other missiles in Ukraine, or has any plans to do that. In addition they sent over 50.000 troops to Cuba. The russians also shot down an American surveillance aircraft (and without the knowledge or permission by the Cuban leadership)
In contrast to Cuba in October 1962, the Ukrainian government is not hosting any foreign troops except for some individuals and small groups supporting the Ukrainians as volunteers. (As do russia and the mercenary pro-Russian forces of the “Wagner Group” which have many former Russian common prisoners in their ranks) Until this moment, there does not seem to be nuclear arms on either side of the conflict. At the same time, Ukraine depends on the military and economic help that NATO countries have supplied, especially the United States. Although the military direction and tactical decisions at the front are in the hands of Ukrainian officers (unlike Cuba), this outside provision of weapons, munitions, training, intelligence, military strategy, and general economic assistance has been indispensable for Ukraine.
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@user1qaz2wsx3edc Kleptocracy is the correct name for Russia's system of government.
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country (along with a few regime loyal oligarchs) for over 20 years now.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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Russia violates the Minsk agreements on a regular basis.
The Minsk Agreements are a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal. However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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"Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements." You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.” Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements.
Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months (March, 2023) of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the first 4 weeks of the war:
Between February 24 and March 21, 2022, sixty-four medical facilities and their personnel were targeted by Russian forces in Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported. The facilities were being hit at rate of two to three a day, inflicting 15 deaths and 37 injuries.
- During the first year:
More than 700 attacks on hospitals, health workers, and other medical infrastructure in Ukraine have been reported in the year since the Russian invasion began, according to an investigation by human rights groups.1 A report—Destruction and Devastation: One Year of Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Health Care System—found there were an average of two attacks every day between 24 February and 31 December 2022. These included hospitals being bombed, medics being tortured, and ambulances being shot at. Over that period, there were 292 attacks that damaged or destroyed 218 hospitals and clinics, 181 attacks on other health infrastructure (such as pharmacies, blood centres, and dental clinics), and 65 attacks on ambulances. There were also 86 attacks on healthcare workers, with 62 killed and 52 injured. “Healthcare workers, who became witnesses, talk about the horrific crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine,” said Lyubov Smachylo, analyst for the Media Initiative for Human Rights. “Some were held hostage by the Russian military, others were under fire, and some were forced to work under occupation.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas.
Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@jimmyc974 Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. And the russians are cheering hail putin.
In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed.
Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@@Pehwr The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@@Pehwr No sources? just like I thought!
Leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@swissbiggy There has been no US coup.
The so called “coup” in Feb -14: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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@colmcmillan173 Well, I don't believe RUSSIAN fantasies. "Russia did not wage war". GO HOME then!
Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative:
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally themselves.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Publication
“HIDING BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN”: CIVILIANS USED BY RUSSIA AS HUMAN SHIELDS DURING OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA
27.02.2019
On 21 February 2019, a new submission was sent to the International Criminal Court regarding the use of civilians during the capture of strategic targets in the Crimean Peninsula by Russian soldiers in 2014. The submission was prepared by the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union NGO (UHHRU) and the Regional Center for Human Rights NGO (RCHR) in cooperation with the Prosecutor’s Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The authors established that Russian Federation’s forces were not only intentionally and deliberately moving civilians closer to the facilities of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, but were also standing behind these people during the blocking and capture of these facilities. Under such circumstances, Ukrainian soldiers were unable to use force to defend against the attacks.
These human shields were made up of 4 categories of civilians, among them Crimeans with pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian views, civilians brought from Russia to take part in the peninsula’s occupation, as well as representatives of the Cossacks and the so-called “Crimean Self-Defense”. “There were also people among the civilians that did not belong to neither of the above categories. For instance, we established that Serbian Chetniks were involved in the assaults,” says Maksym Tymochko, UHHRU lawyer. “Based on our information, at least 10 military facilities belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine were captured in this manner with the use of at least 1,000 civilians.”
Particularly indicative is the capture of the naval base in the town of Novoozerne, carried out with the use of at least 300 people, men and women as well as adolescents and the elderly.
Among the civilians used as human shields were people with pro-Russian views whose participation was encouraged as well as those who gathered in front of military targets as a result of threats or blackmail. “In such cases, the occupying power is required to prevent the presence of civilians in potentially dangerous places. Furthermore, representatives of the Russian Federation should have refrained from using civilians for protecting their own armed forces”, summarizes Vitaliy. @colmcmillan173
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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bjornsjostrom3800 GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
Euro Area: 14.041,00
3. Japan: 4,231.10
4. Germany: 4,072.00 (GDP is projected to be 4121.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 4199.00 USD Billion in 2025)
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40 (GDP is projected to be 2290.00 USD Billion in 2024 and 2308.00 USD Billion in 2025)
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015. THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "Zelensky, Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that Ukraine had no intention to honor the Minsk agreements."
You are lying again, is it a habit of yours?
Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv. The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@PerceivedREALITY999 "During the nato bombing of Yugoslavia, nato bombed the Chinese embassy, television station, passenger train"
Russia’s cluster munition strike on the crowded Kramatorsk train station in eastern Ukraine in April 2022 killed dozens of civilians in violation of the laws of war, and was an apparent war crime, Human Rights Watch and SITU Research said in a report and video released today.
On the morning of April 8, several hundred civilians were waiting at the station when a ballistic missile equipped with a cluster munition warhead exploded and released dozens of bomblets, or submunitions, killing at least 58 civilians and injuring over 100 others.
MYKOLAIV, Ukraine, July 20 (Reuters) - At least three people were killed and a Chinese consular building was damaged on Thursday in a third successive night of air strikes on southern Ukrainian port cities.
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@Memovox A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@Matrix-ik2tr Educate yourself, fascist boy!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@Aaa-mv6rd Crimea was governed by the Constitution of Crimea as an autonomous republic of Ukraine.
They had their freedom as an autonomous Republic until Russia annexed them.
Russia has no more historic right to Crimea than Ukraine. Besides, Soviet/Russia has replaced a large part of the population. Their background is this, briefly:
The Cimmerians, Bulgars, Greeks, Scythians, Goths, Huns, Khazars, Kievan Rus', Byzantine Greeks, Kipchaks, Ottoman Turks, Golden Horde Tatars, the Mongols , the Venetians, the Genoese, Crimean Khanate, Ottoman Empire, the Russian Empire, Germany, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, and later the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Each controlled Crimea until Crimea became part of independent Ukraine with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
When the Soviet Union broke up, Ukraine held a significant number of nuclear weapons. In fact, the country had more nuclear warheads than China, the UK and France combined, making it the third-largest nuclear power in the world. Three years later, Ukraine reached an agreement with Russia and the US to hand over its nuclear weapons to be destroyed. In return, Russia promised to forever recognize the independence of the whole of Ukraine, including Crimea.
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@MasterMind75427 Who's behind your estimates? Baghdad Bob?🤣
Leak from the Kremlin:
Russia: Losses 340,968. Sunday, August 13, 2023, in a morning report to Putin: irrecoverable military-operational losses of living personnel of the RussianArmy - 264,776 people. Data as of 6 am Moscow time today. This figure does not include the data on losses of PMCs.
As of Tuesday, August 1, there were 76,192 dead. Most of the Russian PMCs have come under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and their losses are now a part of the total losses. Starting from August 1, there is no separate count.
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@ObjectiveAnalysis NATO is no threat to Russia, you are lying! You are also lying about murders in Eastern Ukraine, and also about Nazis.
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@ObjectiveAnalysis Regarding the myth of Nazi-ruled Ukraine, this is a clear propaganda narrative that became a cornerstone in pro-Kremlin disinformation, which can clearly be challenged with the issue of a 2015 ban on Nazi and Communist ideologies, and with the far-right groups having limited presence during the Euromaidan protests itself and have suffered defeats in every national election after that, with a united front of all radical right-wing parties in the 2019 parliamentary elections winning only 2.15% of the vote falling far short of the 5% minimum guaranteeing entry into parliament.
See similar disinformation cases in our database alleging that far-right coup government in Kyiv emerged from the 2014 Maidan uprising; or that Zelenskyy's regime is based on Nazism; or that Bandera's sympathisers have a large influence on Ukraine; or that Ukraine has established an apartheid regime; or that the US supported the 2014 coup.
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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Why repeat the lie about Minsk??
The Minsk Agreements are/were a basis for political resolution of the conflict in Donbas. They have been violated by the Russian Federation on a regular basis. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine:
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’:
It is several years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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- The "Bucha massacre" was the mass murder of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war by the Russian Armed Forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photographic and video evidence of the massacre emerged on 1 April 2022 after Russian forces withdrew from the city.
According to local authorities, 458 bodies have been recovered from the town, including 9 children under the age of 18; among the victims, 419 people were killed with weapons and 39 appeared to have died of natural causes.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented the unlawful killings, including summary executions, of at least 73 civilians in Bucha. Photos showed corpses of civilians, lined up with their hands bound behind their backs, shot at point-blank range, which ostensibly gave proof that summary executions had taken place.
An inquiry by Radio Free Europe reported the use of a basement beneath a campground as a torture chamber. Many bodies were found mutilated and burnt, and girls as young as fourteen reported being raped by Russian soldiers. Ukraine has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate what happened in Bucha as part of its ongoing investigation of the invasion to determine whether a series of Russian war crimes or crimes against humanity were committed.
Russian authorities have denied responsibility and instead claimed that Ukraine faked footage of the event or staged the killings itself as a false flag operation,] and have claimed that the footage and photographs of dead bodies were "fake news". These assertions by Russian authorities have been debunked as false by various groups and media organizations. Eyewitness accounts from residents of Bucha said that the Russian Armed Forces carried out the killings.
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Aljazeera: Why we need to challenge Russia’s human shields narrative
Decades of repetition, without any significant state or non-state challenge, have created a customary legal consensus whereby the human shields provisions can be used to justify the killing of civilians.
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theatres, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating consequences of its actions, Russia has increasingly fallen back on a single legal justification: human shields. Indeed, Moscow repeatedly suggested that Ukraine’s military is deliberately using civilians as a screen to defend legitimate military targets.
On February 25, just hours after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin appealed directly to the personnel of the armed forces of Ukraine: “Do not allow neo-Nazis and [Ukrainian right-wing radical nationalists] to use your children, wives and elders as human shields.”
Echoing his leader, Major General Igor Konashenkov, chief spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defence, stated in a news conference on February 28 that “the armed forces of the Russian Federation strike only at military targets”. Discussing the capital, Kyiv, he added that “the leadership of Ukraine and the authorities of the city, having announced a curfew, are persuading the residents of the capital to stay in their homes”. This, he concluded, “once again proves that the Kyiv regime uses the residents of the city as a ‘human shield’ for the nationalists who have deployed artillery units and military equipment in residential areas of the capital”.
Then on March 3, Moscow accused Ukrainian authorities of holding a group of 6,000 Indian students and other foreign nationals as “human shields”. Indian authorities themselves denied the claim. A couple of days later, Putin declared that “the neo-Nazis” were obstructing the creation of humanitarian corridors requested by the Ukrainian government to evacuate civilians trapped in the line of fire, claiming “the militants” were keeping the potential evacuees as human shields.
Russia has repeated similar claims in diplomatic arenas such as the United Nations Security Council. On social media too, Russian diplomats have attempted to shape perceptions of the battlefield, portraying the Ukrainian resistance as guilty of war crimes by insisting that they have used “human shields”.
Thus, alongside the war on the ground, we have been witnessing an intense information war, which, as the Russian ambassador at the UN exclaimed, appears to be a vital element of Russia’s so-called “special operation”.
The human shield accusation has actually become an increasingly common defence when states act immorally. As we show in our recent book on human shields, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel, Sri Lanka, and India are just some of the states that have deployed the argument to justify high civilian casualties in recent years.
This is partly because legally it appears to be such a useful get-out clause. The legal provision within international law pertaining to human shields states that “the presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations”.
According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them. Indeed, the very day Russia invaded Ukraine, Human Rights Watch published a Q&A – On Occupation, Armed Conflict and Human Rights – stating that if an attack is proportionate, armed forces can legitimately strike “a military target that is making use of human shields” – though HRW also notes that “it is shielding only when there is a specific intent to use the civilians to deter an attack”.
Hence, by accusing Ukraine of using human shields Russia is in effect claiming that it is not legally responsible for the civilians it kills. And while Russia might be losing the info-war, the legal Trojan Horse of its aggression – the human shielding accusation – is not yet receiving significant opposition. Not merely states, but also human rights organisations have largely failed to voice a consistent critique of the allegations. When the United States and Sri Lankan governments accused ISIL (ISIS) in Mosul or the Tamil Tigers in the safe zones of using hundreds of thousands of people as human shields, for example, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch did not dismiss or raise any significant doubts against such narratives.
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Lies: "Petro Poroshenko Promised that Children from Donbas would be Sitting in Cellars"
On November 14, Russian Channel One informed in its evening news broadcast that, while officially speaking about peaceful settlement of the Donbas problem, in fact the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko was going to strangle Donbas economically and to put Donbas children into cellars. This is not true, and proofs of it were obtained by the Channel One by means of taking Poroshenko’s words out of context and falsely interpreting them from Ukrainian.
In his full speech Poroshenko does not say that Ukraine will put residents of Donbas under pressure, but that the occupation of Donbas by pro-Russian militants makes the locals, who have to live without pensions and to hide in cellars, suffer.
“This war can’t be won with weapons. Every bullet produces two enemies. And every peaceful day Ukrainian state demonstrates on the liberated territories that citizens, who sang praises to false separatist regime a month ago, receive heat, electricity, at last they can send their children to school, they started to receive pensions, survivorship and disablement payments, they have jobs, they have salaries.
“My dear people of Odesa! This is what we avoided thanks to your wisdom, your solidarity. And thanks to – now we all are confident about this – your pro-Ukrainian position. I was full of joy, when after visiting Odesa the delegation of the OSCE made a conclusion that Odesa is a city of harmony, the city of peace. There can’t be a better compliment. I was very happy about it. Thank you for your wisdom, people of Odesa!
“And we win together by means of peace! Because we have jobs, and they have not. We have pensions, and they have not. We have support of children and pensioners, they have not. Our children would go to kindergartens and schools, theirs would be sitting in cellars. Because they do not know anything how to do! That’s how we are going to win this war. Because wars are won in minds, and not on the combat fields! They do not know this, but I know. And I have your support, I need it very much in order we win this war without perished Ukrainians, without perished inhabitants of Odesa.”
It should be pointed out that Poroshenko speaks about the present situation in Donbas, not about situation possible in future. He describes it using the present tense, not the future one used by Russian journalists in their interpretation of his words. That’s why the Channel One not only took his words out of context, but also falsely interpreted them in order to produce wrong impression as if the President says that the residents of the Donbas will not receive pensions in future.
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@kiyarimuhammadu9095 which country did US push its allies to surround, ringed with full of US military bases?
- I don’t know, you tell me!
which country did US directed it cold war with?
- Soviet Union.
which country led to USSR break down?
- Gorbachev’s decision to loosen the Soviet yoke on the countries of Eastern Europe created an independent, democratic momentum that led to the collapse of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, and then the overthrow of Communist rule throughout Eastern Europe. While Bush supported these independence movements, U.S. policy was reactive. Bush chose to let events unfold organically, careful not to do anything to worsen Gorbachev’s position.
With the policy review complete, and taking into account unfolding events in Europe, Bush met with Gorbachev in early December 1989. They laid the groundwork for finalizing START negotiations, completing the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty, and they discussed the rapid changes in Eastern Europe. Bush encouraged Gorbachev’s reform efforts, hoping that the Soviet leader would succeed in shifting the USSR toward a democratic system and a market oriented economy.
Following the May 1990 elections, Gorbachev faced conflicting internal political pressures: Boris Yeltsin and the pluralist movement advocated democratization and rapid economic reforms while the hard-line Communist elite wanted to thwart Gorbachev’s reform agenda.
Gorbachev’s decision to allow elections with a multi-party system and create a presidency for the Soviet Union began a slow process of democratization that eventually destabilized Communist control and contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
which country is now leading in support to Ukraine to fight Russia?
- USA. (Why shouldn’t they?)
raised military, political, economically against Russia physically?
- The sanctions came AFTER the illegal invasion of Ukraine.
Are such actions not a threats, are you trying to say that there is any nation that is above US in open enmity to the Russian federation than the US? State it.
- Again, this came AFTER the illegal invasion.
To your information: in the United Nations General Assembly, only 5 nations has approved russias illegal invasion. 143 voted against Russia. What does that tell you???
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russiapost/republicru: In December 2022, Angela Merkel, in an interview with Die Zeit, said that the Minsk agreements “bought time” for Ukraine to strengthen its army: “it was obvious to us that the conflict would only be frozen without the problem being solved,” though thanks to the agreements Ukraine won “precious time.”
Later, the former chancellor was echoed by former French President François Hollande, who noted the strength of the Ukrainian army and attributed that to the Minsk agreements. Moscow was predictably delighted by these comments, DISTORTING them to make it seem that Merkel and Hollande had perfidiously been preparing Ukraine for a new war with Russia, even though they had only been talking about a well-used window of opportunity by Kyiv.
The resurgent topic of the Minsk agreements demonstrates the cognitive chasm separating today’s Russia and the West, which calls into question the durability of any future peace negotiations. Nevertheless, Putin broke the Minsk agreements right after it was signed
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@peaceb4 Who said there were peace? Russia started the war In Donbas.
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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NATO is for protection of nations from the imbecile Russia.
"40.000 kids missing". I don't know if your number is correct, but yes, Russia has kidnapped several thousands of children! They want to brainwash and mold them in the fascist Russian mold.
From August: The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded.
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@mrobocop1666 There wasn't any realistic deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: "There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer", Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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Zelensky is not a multi billionaire, not even a billionaire! But Putin is. Where do you think his wealth come from, his salary is USD 180 000 a year?
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed Vladimir Putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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@СергейБакуров-к1э В заявлении, подписанном более чем 300 историками, изучающими геноцид, нацизм и Вторую мировую войну, говорится, что риторика Путина о денацификации фашистов среди избранного руководства Украины является «пропагандой». «Мы решительно отвергаем циничное злоупотребление российским правительством термином «геноцид», памятью о Второй мировой войне и Холокосте, а также приравнивание украинского государства к нацистскому режиму для оправдания его неспровоцированной агрессии», — говорится в заявлении.
«Эта риторика фактически неверна, морально отвратительна и глубоко оскорбительна для памяти миллионов жертв нацизма и тех, кто мужественно с ним боролся, в том числе российских и украинских воинов Красной Армии. «Неонацистские, крайне правые и ксенофобские группы действительно существуют в Украине, как и практически в любой другой стране, включая Россию», — сказал Финкель. «Они громогласны и могут быть склонны к насилию, но они малочисленны, маргинальны, и их политическое влияние на государственном уровне отсутствует. Это не значит, что в Украине нет проблемы крайне правых. Оно делает. Но я бы посчитал неонацистские группы В РОССИИ ГОРАЗДО БОЛЬШОЙ проблемой и угрозой, чем украинские крайне правые».
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@MrLeadb1 "... Ukraine has a sweet spot for killing civilians.."
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,200 and 16,500 civilians. On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable".
From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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@peace12344 You are a liar!
THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.)
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A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
"We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@enitivy No, they did not!
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@enitivy In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
(According to UN and Human Rights Watch reports, 3,400 civilians have died in Donbas since 2014. And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015))
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@troffmad Official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. (And 84 percent of them were killed by Russian and separatist artillery. Read the reports! The vast majority of deaths were in the first two years of the war (2014 and 2015)).
The figure russia operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but in April 2014 russia finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. The Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbas”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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In the beginning 4 months of the war, The Russians destroyed over 300 bridges in Ukraine.
The Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Adedeji Ebo, May 2023: “After almost 15 months of the Russian Federation’s military offensive into Ukraine, suffering, loss, displacement and destruction continue to form part of an unbearable routine”, said Mr. Ebo.
“In addition to the thousands of civilians killed and injured, the destruction of essential critical infrastructure and services is particularly alarming. Homes, schools, roads, and bridges have been destroyed and damaged”, he continued.
“Attacks on energy infrastructure have interrupted power, heating, drinking water supply and sewage facilities, as well as mobile and internet communications. Hospitals and health facilities have been attacked, killing and injuring healthcare workers and disrupting essential services. Explosive remnants of war have resulted in widespread land contamination rendering land unusable for agriculture, while impeding the movement of people.”
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@wolfswinkel8906 1/ Russian soldiers say hundreds of their number are being killed trying to retake newly liberated Andriivka. Even artillerymen are being sent in as infantry in 'meat assaults', "literally [armed] with shovels" and without artillery support.
2/ The Russian Army's 94th regiment is said to be taking the brunt of the fighting as Ukrainian forces advance south of Bakhmut. The wife of one soldier serving with the regiment, a man called Denis, says they are suffering huge casualties.
3/ "He called on Thursday and said that the Ukrainian armed forces were taking Andriiivka and breaking through to Bakhmut," his wife Vera says.
4/ "And they are being thrown into Andriiivka with almost no weapons. He said: roughly speaking, we are coming at them with shovels and no artillery support. There is nowhere to retreat, because behind them are our own men, who will not spare them either.
5/ "Six hundred didn't return from their missions. And all this in just two days. And the official reports tell us that only two or three people were killed."
6/ Posts on Telegram say that the men are experiencing very heavy incoming fire: "the enemy does not stop attempting a breakthrough using cluster munitions." Denis himself says that "the 94th Regiment is being zeroed out [killed] ... our regiment is here to be put down."
7/ He says that its commander, a man named Zaitsev with the callsign 'Rapira', told the men explicitly that they were there to die. "He's a local, either from the DNR or the LNR. We're his third regiment. He left two regiments here, he said that "I'll leave you here too"."
8/ Denis compares Zaitsev unfavourably to his previous commander, who he says was a more humane man. "Our last commanding officer got us out of it. That's what got him fired. That he didn't send his men out to be butchered."
9/ He confirms that there were originally a thousand men in the regiment but their numbers have been reduced to 400 by the constant fighting. "We are constantly thrown into the area of Andriivka, which is processed by the AFU artillery. Basically, we are driven there for meat.
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@wolfswinkel8906 10/ "You give the coordinates to our artillery, what targets we need to work on. And the artillery does not work, because they have no shells." (It's possible that the artillery itself may have been destroyed – Ukraine has been targeting it heavily – rather than lacking shells.)
11/ Coordination with the artillery has broken down, according to Denis. "There's no co-operation with anyone else. Everything is very slow – either the artillery doesn't fire or you have to wait a long time for a shot."
12/ Now the men are being sent on 'meat assaults' which they are not expected to survive. "The orders are to take over [Andriivka], take what's left of it. Rubble, to put it crudely.
13/ "Although [the commanders] themselves know very well, and there is video confirmation, that the enemy is constantly working throughout the village. The AFU artillery is working constantly. They send men into the village, but they will not let them come out.
14/ "This is perfectly well known to everyone. And when you tell the command that this is exactly what is happening in this direction, you are answered "so what?" That's a quote: "So what?""
15/ Retreat is impossible, according to Denis, because commanders have positioned 'blocking units' behind the front line to shoot any retreaters. The men believe that they will be killed whatever happens, by one side or the other.
16/ Denis says that the men "are not in the mood to die for nothing. If there is artillery support, co-operation with other units, and there is no ammunition famine, then everyone is ready to fight. But nobody wants to fight like this."
17/ He blames the commanders' insistence on ordering obviously suicidal attacks on their false claims that they have not in fact lost control of Andriivka. It's likely they've also made such claims to their superiors, in another example of the Russian military's culture of lying.
18/ "They tell us in plain words: go and get a foothold there. And we see that our positions there have not been ours for a long time, so we raise a "bird" [drone]. In fact, it is obvious to the naked eye that our positions there have long since ceased to be ours.
19/ "But the command claims that they are. "We've got 25 men going out on a mission, six coming back. Now we have artillerymen going to the assault. They were told – you don't have ammunition anyway, go with the infantry. And the guys don't know what an assault is.
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@wolfswinkel8906 20/ "Information about our situation does not go anywhere upstairs, it is overridden somewhere on the middle level. That's why we're trying to get the word out now. It's not a good idea to just send people to slaughter.
21/ "Soldiers from other units who don't know us, if you give them our regiment number, they say: "Guys, you are being nullified. That's the way it is."
His wife Vera says that the soldiers and their relatives are afraid to go public with their concerns about the situation.
22/ She says that her mother-in-law "wrote to the group of mothers and wives of the mobilised 94th regiment that our guys are in a difficult situation. That they have no weapons. And she suggested that this information should be "spread" on social networks.
23/ "And everyone jumped on her: don't, they say, don't set everyone up. They're more worried about their salaries than their husbands. They are worried that if the names of the rebels come to light, they will simply be made "missing" and will not receive any payments."
24/ Vera doesn't blame them for this attitude. "I also understand those who are afraid of publicity. If now defamatory information from my husband goes out, if his surname gets publicised, he will simply be recognised as an enemy of the people.
25/ "And then this status will automatically go to the children. My husband is also afraid that it will affect my son."
26/ At home, reports Radio Freedom, "little Fedya, sitting on his mum's lap, taps his finger on the phone. On the screen saver is a picture of a young man with his son on his shoulders."
27/ "Daddy," says the boy.
"Yes, Daddy," Vera nods. "I don't want my son to know his father only from pictures."
Denis's family have not heard from him since his interview on 16 September. On 17 September, Ukraine announced the recapture of Andriivka.
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internetresearchagency2238 Fact sheet:
• Crimea was transferred to Ukraine on 19 February 1954.
• Ukraine gained its independence with the dissolution of the Soviet Union on 26 December 1991.
• Russia invaded Crimea on 20 February 2014, officially marking the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
• The 2014 Crimean referendum is regarded by the UN as illegal because the whole of Ukraine is required to vote and both options on the ballot would have resulted in a separation from Ukraine.
When the Soviet Union broke up, Ukraine held a significant number of nuclear weapons. In fact, the country had more nuclear warheads than China, the UK and France combined, making it the third-largest nuclear power in the world. Three years later, Ukraine reached an agreement with Russia and the US to hand over its nuclear weapons to be destroyed. In return, Russia promised to forever recognize the independence of the whole of Ukraine, including Crimea.
Crimea was governed by the Constitution of Crimea as an autonomous republic of Ukraine. They had their freedom as an autonomous Republic until Russia annexed them. Russia has no more historic right to Crimea than Ukraine. Besides, Soviet/Russia has replaced a large part of the population. Their background is this, briefly: The Cimmerians, Bulgars, Greeks, Scythians, Goths, Huns, Khazars, Kievan Rus', Byzantine Greeks, Kipchaks, Ottoman Turks, Golden Horde Tatars, the Mongols , the Venetians, the Genoese, Crimean Khanate, Ottoman Empire, the Russian Empire, Germany, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, and later the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Each controlled Crimea until Crimea became part of independent Ukraine with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
(The Crimean Tartars was the main ethnic group at Crimea when the Soviets replaced them with russians. Stalin ordered the deportation of all of the Crimean Tatars from Crimea, including the families of Crimean Tatars who had served in the Soviet Army. The deportees were transported in trains and boxcars to Central Asia, primarily to Uzbekistan. The Crimean Tatars lost 18 to 46 percent of their population as a result of the deportations.)
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internetresearchagency2238 Crimea was transferred to Ukraine on 19 February 1954: The decision on Crimea adopted by the Supreme Soviet on 19 February 1954. The Supreme Soviet was, as is well known, the legislative national assembly of the Soviet Union.
In this context, it is worth noting that the decision came about after a process that had stretched over some time, and was shortly afterwards approved by the Russian and Ukrainian Soviet Republics respectively. As an official justification for the transfer, reference was made to economics, geography and cultural ties between the Crimean Peninsula and the mainland.
After all, Crimea is not self-sufficient and does not have a land connection with Russia - the peninsula has therefore always been dependent on getting necessary supplies from the Ukrainian mainland, including electricity, water for agriculture via artificial canals, etc.
It is also worth noting that Russia NEVER made any claim on the Crimean Peninsula in terms of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. But neither have the Russian authorities subsequently made any such demand, be it in relation to the negotiations on the Budapest memorandum in 1994, the Ukrainian-Russian friendship agreement in 1997 or in The Kharkiv Agreement in 2010. On the contrary, as late as 2008, in an interview with German ARD, in connection with the then military conflict Russia had with Georgia over Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Putin specified that RUSSIA DOES NOT lay claim to Crimea - and became slightly indignant when the interviewer referred to the French foreign minister, who had expressed concern that Crimea could be Russia's next target. To this Putin replied: "I think talking about something like 'the next goal' is inappropriate. […] Crimea is not a disputed area.
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@peace12344 Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@peace12344 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@jonmoate4184 This coming from someone who is supporting Vladolf Putler!
A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@JimmyJenkinJohnson MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were russian forces.)
Signing of the first documents in September 2014 followed direct incursion of the Russian regular troops in Donbas and intense hostilities near the city of Ilovaysk — the place of one of the most shameful crimes, committed by the Russian Army in Donbas.
At least 366 Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 429 were wounded there while leaving the city in the so-called “green corridor” under the guarantees of commanders of Russian troops. In violation of the Minsk Memorandum, Russian troops and Russia-backed illegal armed formations seized 8 pieces of land 1696 km² in area, which had to be on the Ukrainian government-controlled territory according to the line of contact, defined by the Memorandum.
Debaltseve is one of the most telling examples of how Russia violates the Minsk Agreements. Combined Russian-terrorist forces attacked and seized the city and the outskirts on 16–18 February 2015, immediately after the Minsk Package of measures, establishing the comprehensive ceasefire since 15 February, had been signed.
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@aaronrule333 The use of cluster munitions during the Russian invasion has been recorded by a number of eyewitnesses and journalists, as well as representatives of the UN, humanitarian and public organizations.
In particular, the head of the UN Human Rights Council, Michelle Bachelet, reported on March 30 (2022) at least 24 cases since the beginning of the invasion.
Russian armed forces have indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and wrecking hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure, actions that may amount to war crimes. “What we saw in Government-controlled Kramatorsk on 8 April (2022) when cluster sub-munitions hit the railway station, killing 60 civilians and injuring 111 others, is emblematic of the failure to adhere to the principle of distinction, the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks and the principle of precaution enshrined in international humanitarian law,” Bachelet said
As of July 1 2022, hundreds of attacks by Russian forces with cluster munitions have already been recorded in the settlements of the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions. 215 civilians are known to have been killed in these shellings and 474 injured, many of which may go unreported.
Both Russia as well as Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the conflict, however, Russian use has been extensive while Ukrainian use has been more limited.
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@ilovejesusalways
Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
The real reason for Putin's war is that he wants to recreate the Soviet Union as Great Russia.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukranian government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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@bennadinayandex1207 There wasn't any deal in Turkey.
Johnson said this to his own parliament: There is absolutely no sign that Russia wants to reach a deal with Ukraine, and it could not be trusted even if one was on offer, Boris Johnson has told the Commons.
And he was right, Russia had broken all the agreements so far, including Minsk. The former prime minister warned against a "land for peace" deal, and said he doubted Volodymyr Zelensky or any Ukrainian government would agree to any such compromise.
(While in 2014-2017 the implementation of the Minsk Accords could have led to a negotiated reintegration of Donbas into Ukraine under international supervision, the international situation and Russia’s intentions have changed. In fact, by late 2021 Russian authorities had all but integrated the breakaway republics into the Russian political, military and economic space, precluding any meaningful possibility of the region’s peaceful reintegration into Ukraine. Whilst the Ukrainian leadership pursued a ceasefire in Donbas from the summer of 2020, the Kremlin used it as a bargaining chip to put pressure on Zelensky’s government and to create a flimsy pretext for an invasion. Zelensky’s last-ditch attempts to return to the negotiations in late 2021 were rejected by Putin, who tore up the Minsk Accords by recognising the independence of the breakaway regions. Thus, instead of a roadmap to future peace, the Minsk Accords had largely become a military-diplomatic tool in the hands of Russian leadership to legitimise regime change and the dismemberment of Ukraine.)
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@bennadinayandex1207 Russia and Ukraine never signed a peace agreement In 2022.
People are sharing a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin showing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a document, claiming that Russia signed a peace agreement with Ukraine in the spring of 2022! This is yet another example of FAKE NEWS created by Vladimir Putin himself, and propagated by his supporters to diminish support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
- On 7 April 2022, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Moscow rejected a draft peace deal from Ukraine, saying that it contained “unacceptable” elements that deviated from proposals that both sides’ negotiators had earlier agreed on.
- July 19 : Dmitry Medvedev said that “Russia will achieve all its goals. There will be peace – on our terms”
- On September 14, 2022, Reuters reported that Vladimir Putin rejected a provisional deal, in which Ukraine agreed to stay out of NATO. His own chief envoy on Ukraine, Dmitry Kozak, told him that the deal would remove the need for Russia to pursue a large-scale occupation of Ukraine, and recommended that Putin adopt the peace deal.
However, PUTIN DECIDED TO REJECT the provisional peace agreement Kozak hammered out with the Ukrainians, and pressed ahead with his “special military operation”.
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@faridnajam "How come they never oppose decision of awarding Nato status to Ukraine?" Why should they??? Europe doesn't discriminate!
" There's a big need of sensible and powerful European countries to bring Russia, USA & China to the table talk instead." putin doesn't want peace, he wants Ukraine!!
But this war has nothing to do with NATO in the first place. Ukraine wanted to cooperate closer with the rest of Europe on a political and economical level and putler didn't like that.
Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat.
In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final. Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself. Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past two years of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country. Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@mamtashukla6350 I don't think he was the first to lecture India. Are you sure it's not your hate for him that speaks? If you're referring to the CNN interview, then it's exactly that. He responds to the QUESTIONS he is asked.
CNN and indianexpress: "If he had a conversation with PM Modi, who he knew well, Obama said, part of his argument would be that if you do not protect the rights of ethnic minorities in India, there is a strong possibility that India, at some point, starts pulling apart. “And we have seen what happens when you start getting large internal conflicts… That would be contrary to the interests not only of the Muslim India, but also Hindu India. I think it’s important to be able to talk about these things honestly,” he said.
In January 2015, during his speech at Delhi’s Siri Fort Auditorium, a day after attending the Republic Day ceremony as Chief Guest, Obama had expressed his views on freedom of religion in India as well as in America. “Across our two great countries, we have Hindus and Muslims, Christians and Sikhs, and Jews and Buddhists and Jains and so many faiths. And we remember the wisdom of Gandhiji, who said, ‘for me, the different religions are beautiful flowers from the same garden, or they are branches of the same majestic tree’.”
“Our freedom of religion is written into our founding documents. It’s part of America’s very first amendment. Your Article 25 says that all people are ‘equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practice and propagate religion.”
"In both our countries — in all countries — upholding this fundamental freedom is the responsibility of the government, but it’s also the responsibility of every person.
The peace we seek in the world… finds its glorious expression when we look beyond any differences in religion or tribe, and rejoice in the beauty of every soul. And nowhere is that more important than India,” he had said.
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@Ouiper 1. "Genocide of Russians in Donbas (Constant bombings, various war crimes, total blockade) and Crimea(water supply)"
Russia went to war against Ukraine by initiating the conflict in Donbas. They sent unmarked Russian soldiers and armed the separatist movement. It’s those Ukraine has fought, that’s not called genocide.
Crimea water supply block came AFTER Russian invasion of Crimea.
2. "Odessa massacre"
False claims of Odessa massacres began when Russia presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
3. "Nuclear threats by Ukraine (19.02.2022) and UK(Liz Truss)"
This is of course a lie, Ukraine doesn’t have Nukes. And Uk has never threathened russia.
4. "Discrimination of Russian ethnicity/language in Ukraine (Ban on Russian language and culture(Cultural genocide btw))"
There is no bans. But after the Russian invasion, they have banned Ukrainian language and culture. Burning Ukrainian books etc. There is even kidnapping of children. They are taking away from their parents and sent to “summer camps” in Crimea and indoctrinated of Russian culture. Even worse, several thousands of children is sent to far east in Russia, with little hopes of ever returning. THIS IS CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY
5. "NATO expansion (They refused to even discuss continental security system in Dec. 2021)"
They have never refused to discuss anything, but Putin is making impossible demands. That is his tactic, he WANTS this war. Besides, Ukraine is a sovereign Country, not a republic in Russia, they decide for themselves in their own country.
6. "Illegal western sanctions against Russia"
Why is they illegal? It’s a substitute for war. Do you prefer the West to go to direct war against Russia?
7. "Illegal occupation of Donbas (DPR's and LPR's) territories by Ukraine"
It is the Russian annexation that is illegal by international law.
8. "Terrorist attacks by Ukraine (Melitopol, Dugina, Tatarskiy etc.)"
Why is it terrorist attacks? Russia has gone to war against Ukraine. Besides, these attacks has been carried out by Russian people which disagree with Putin’s regime.
9. "Minsk agreements"
Russia broke the Minsk agreements, because Putin has already decided to take Ukraine.
10. "Grain deal".
What about the grain deal? Russia controls most ports and the Black Sea and have chosen to not fulfill those deals.
11. "Nord Stream"
What about Nord Stream? No evidence yet, but so far the investigation points to Russia.
12. "Neo-nazi regime in Ukraine - Bandera is officially a "national hero" (He supported holocaust) i probably forgot something, but you got the point"
How can there be a nazi regime when there was 2 % support of far-right parties last election. And the president himself is a JEW? There are more nazi’s in Russia than in Ukraine.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS. From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”.
Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war. Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014.
But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides. The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sent unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 The Minsk agreements did not address the root cause of the conflict. It was stipulated, so to speak, that there was or had been some kind of ethnic conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, and that this was the reason for the outbreak of violence. And by settling this alleged ethnic conflict, the conflict could be pacified. THIS WAS PURE FICTION.
The ethnic conflicts that existed in Ukraine were no more serious than ethnic tensions in many other countries. Moreover, the dividing lines in this conflict, if one insists on understanding them in ethnic terms, are incredibly blurred. This is not about the Russian versus the Ukrainian language or Ukrainian versus Russian national identity.
Nor is it about religion, not even in the slightest. At most, one could find something like an eastern Ukrainian Donbas identity. But this regional identity of the Donbas is not much stronger than strong regional identities in other countries. What this conflict is fundamentally about is RUSSIA WANTING TO EXERT INFLUENCE OVER THE DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN POLICY ORIENTATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN KYIV.
In the Minsk agreement, however, this fiction of an ethnic conflict was constructed instead, although Russia actually had no particular interest in obtaining any autonomy rights for eastern Ukraine, for Russian-speaking or ethnically Russian Ukrainian citizens. Russia was not really interested in these issues, but Ukraine was not at all eager to grant such rights either, for fear of a supposed fifth column.
However, Moscow was not only concerned with what was happening in the Donbas, but above all with what was happening in Kyiv. The Ukraine conflict is about the orientation of Ukraine, pure and simple. But the Minsk agreement addresses completely different issues. That’s why the process didn’t work.
Moreover, a major blockage has been Russia's insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms. Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there. (Later Putin admitted there were Russian forces.)
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”. Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles.
Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Russia lie machine:
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity.
From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries. It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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@PerceivedREALITY999
Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years. Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame.
In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.” “We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says.
“This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army. “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth". -
Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood.
Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized. They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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@PerceivedREALITY999 Ever since the early years of his reign, Putin has made no secret of his bitterness over the Soviet collapse, which he has always viewed as a Russian defeat. In 2005, when he famously referred to the disintegration of the USSR as “the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century,” he stressed that it was a tragedy for “the Russian people” and the millions of Russians who suddenly found themselves living beyond Russia’s borders in newly independent countries such as Ukraine.
Putin went even further in 2021, lamenting the fall of the USSR as “the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union.” In other words, he regards the entire Soviet era as a continuation of the Czarist Russian Empire, and sees the settlement of 1991 as anything but final.
Putin’s sense of historical injustice has led to an unhealthy obsession with Ukraine, which he insists is an inherent part of historical Russia that has been subjected to artificial separation. He is fond of claiming that Ukrainians are in fact Russians (“one people”), and took the unusual but revealing step in July 2021 of publishing a lengthy essay arguing against the legitimacy of Ukrainian statehood.
This fixation has been further fueled by fears that the emergence of a democratic Ukraine could serve as a catalyst for similar changes inside Russia itself.
Putin remains haunted by the pro-democracy uprisings that swept Central Europe in the late 1980s while he was a young KGB officer in East Germany, and views modern Ukraine’s embrace of democracy as a direct threat to his own authoritarian regime. It is no coincidence that in the buildup to last year’s invasion, Putin began referring to Ukraine as an intolerable “anti-Russia.”
Over the past 13 months of full-scale war, Putin’s imperial objectives in Ukraine have become increasingly evident. He has compared his invasion to the eighteenth century imperial conquests of Russian Czar Peter the Great, and has repeatedly spoken of returning historical Russian lands while attempting to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian regions representing almost 20% of the war-torn country.
Meanwhile, his army has imposed brutal policies of russification throughout occupied Ukraine, complete with summary executions, forced deportations, the suppression of Ukrainian national symbols, and widespread use of torture against anyone deemed a potential opponent of Russian rule.
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@truth959 Forbes: Despite social media reports claiming he’s a billionaire, Zelensky doesn’t come close to making Forbes’ global wealth rankings.
A popular internet meme currently making the rounds claims without evidence that the Ukrainian president is worth $1.4 billion. The insinuation is clear. For Zelensky, a former comedian, to have accumulated a fortune of this size, there must be corruption involved. And while this claim has been parroted by its fair share of anonymous Twitter eggs, a number of blue checks have gotten in on the action.
Forbes’ answer: he’s not. The Russian invasion has hit Ukraine’s billionaires hard. According to Forbes’ 36th annual World’s Billionaires List, there are only seven left in the country and Zelensky is not one of them. He’s currently worth roughly $20 million at most.
His main asset: an estimated 25% stake in Kvartal 95, a group of companies that produce humorous shows, which he transferred to his partners after being elected president, though he’ll likely regain his shares after leaving office. Kvartal 95 produced and owns the Servant of the People series. Netflix, which previously streamed the show between 2017 and 2021, snapped up the rights again in March. With estimated revenues of $30 million annually, Forbes Ukraine values Zelensky’s stake at $11 million.
While he does own a flat in one of Ukraine’s most expensive apartment buildings in the center of Kyiv, it’s relatively modest by Western standards. Forbes estimates Zelensky’s entire real estate portfolio is worth $4 million, including two more wholly owned apartments, two that he co-owns, a single commercial property and five parking spaces.
We estimate he and his wife Olena Zelenska share a bank account that holds roughly $2 million in cash and government bonds. Their other assets, consisting of two cars and some jewelry, are worth no more than $1 million.
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@truth959 So, Zelensky is not a multi billionaire, not even a billionaire! But Putin is, what do you say about him?? Where do you think his wealth come from, his salary is USD 180 000 a year? And before that, he was a spy.
Putin has ruled Russia like a mafia boss and robbed his country for over 20 years now. In 2017, financier Bill Browder claimed putin is worth $200 billion (200.000.000.000.) and USD 2 Billion+ annual income. He testified before the U.S. Senate and said Putin was the “richest man in the world” as a result of “terrible crimes” his government committed. Putin is often seen sporting luxury watches and own a 190,000 square-foot, $1.4 billion worth mansion atop a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, 19 houses, 700 cars, 58 aircraft and helicopters including a $716 million plane called “The Flying Kremlin” that has a toilet made of gold, $100 million mega yacht designed by a nuclear submarine maker from the Russian navy, according to several reports.
He has a "Western billionaire lifestyle", but officially hates all western. He and his relatives own big houses in UK, France etc. Wears western fashion and buy western arts, as well as other fancy designs. The video of the Black Sea mansion called “Putin’s Palace” had gone viral in January 2021.
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albinvega7008 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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herbertfuchs3599 You are lying your teeth off! This isn't even the official Russian reason.
1. LOL, "Carefully expected". Russia has NEVER presented any proof of explosives on the grain ships. The reason (at least the official one) Putin wouldn't expand the deal, is he demanded the economic sanctions to be lifted.
2. Over 33 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 64% of the wheat exported through the Black Sea Grain Initiative reached developing countries. Maize is exported almost equally to developed and developing countries.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP – the largest humanitarian organisation in the world) is also shipping wheat from Black Sea ports. Before the war, the programme bought half of its grain stock from Ukraine.
Since the start of the initiative in August 2022 over 725 000 tonnes of wheat have left Ukrainian ports to Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and Djibouti.
The reason for the neighboring countries import restrictions are the fact that it is hard to SHIP out grain from Ukraine. Therefore most of the grain to Europe is by road, and the neighboring countries were flooded with grain. Then the local farmers got problems. As you can see, Europe has no problem getting grain, but to get to farther away countries, they need to go by ships. Now Putin put an end to that. The result is that farther (and poorer) countries either don't get grain, or it's much more expensive. Don't forget to say "thank you, Putin"! What a filthy hypocrisy !
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December 2022: According to “Russia will pay” project experts, the largest increase in damages as of December is related to the destruction of the housing stock, educational institutions, and objects in the spheres of culture, religion, and sports. Damages from the destruction of the housing stock are estimated at $54 billion. In December, this amount increased by another $1.5 billion. For more than ten months of the war, a total of 149,300 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, including: 131,400 private houses, 17,500 apartment buildings and 280 dormitories.
Russia continues to destroy educational institutions of Ukraine. The amount of damage in this sphere has increased by $400 million and estimated at $8.6 billion. As a result of hostilities, more than 3 thousand educational institutions have already been damaged or destroyed, among them: 1.4 thousand — secondary education, 865 — preschool, 505 — higher education. Damage caused by cultural, sports, and religious objects due to the war increased by another $100 million and is estimated at $2.2 billion. According to December 2022, there were 1,327 such facilities: 907 cultural facilities, 168 sports facilities, 157 tourism facilities, and 95 religious facilities.
Since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, 84.3 thousand units of agricultural machinery, 44 social centers, almost 3 thousand shops, 593 pharmacies, almost 195 thousand private cars, 14.4 thousand public transport, 330 hospitals, 595 administrative buildings of state and local administration have been damaged, destroyed or seized.
These numbers are from the first 10 months of the Russian invasion. Does this look like "to easy and merciful"??
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@TheTeodorsoldierabvb Has someone said you should be scared of NATO??? Have you been dreaming or are you on heavy medication?
As for nazis - A statement signed by more than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism and World War II said Putin’s rhetoric about de-Nazifying fascists among Ukraine’s elected leadership is “propaganda.”
“We strongly reject the Russian government’s cynical abuse of the term genocide, the memory of World War II and the Holocaust, and the equation of the Ukrainian state with the Nazi regime to justify its unprovoked aggression,” the statement says. “This rhetoric is factually wrong, morally repugnant and deeply offensive to the memory of millions of victims of Nazism and those who courageously fought against it, including Russian and Ukrainian soldiers of the Red Army.
“Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia,” Finkel said. “They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent. That is not to say that Ukraine doesn’t have a far-right problem. It does. But I would consider neo-Nazi groups IN RUSSIA A MUCH BIGGER problem and threat than the Ukrainian far right.”
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@pcfree4994 "so far they are still trying to minimize civilian casualties"??????
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian targets and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. They have attacked schools, hospitals, theatres and many more civilian targets.
The war began on 24 February 2022, and the UN’s Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU) has confirmed that more than 9,000 civilians, including over 500 children, have been killed since then, though the real number could be much higher.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable"
“Today we mark another grim milestone in the war that continues to exact a horrific toll on Ukraine’s civilians,” said Noel Calhoun, deputy head of the Mission.
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Feb -14 “coup”: It already started in nov -13.
First there was an attempted coup by the russians. They put pressure on president Yanukovych to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade deal with EU. When people heard about this scam, they gathered in the streets. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russians and oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the government’s resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but in April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
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THERE WAS NO GENOCIDE IN DONBAS.
From Iranian press: Vladimir Putin regularly drone on about the alleged “genocide of the Donbas population”. Today, this myth sits at the core of the Kremlin’s propaganda. Putin has used this myth to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. " Its goal is to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years” Putin said in his address announcing the war.
Both Ukraine and the occupied Donbas territories have suffered casualties because of the HOSTILITIES THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION has been conducting there since 2014. But Russia has insisted for these eight years and tried to convince the world that the actions of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in Donbas “are aimed at destroying the population of Donbas” and are not a struggle for Ukraine’s territorial integrity. And despite the UNTRUTHFULNESS of the argument, Russia’s propaganda machine has nevertheless managed to convince the Russian audience of this, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “an act of retaliation for Donbas”.
As it happens, official United Nations data suggests that the 14,000 casualty figure that Putin has used does not only refer to civilians. During Russia’s 2014-2021 military operations against Ukraine, 14,500 people died in the Donbas war. Of that 14,000, 3,404 were civilians, 4,400 were Ukrainian servicemen and 6,500 were Russian militants. The figure Putin operates with, is the total number of casualties incurred in the Donbas war by both sides.
The Russian Federation both armed the separatists and sendt unmarked soldiers. Russia initially denied that there were Russian military forces in Donbas, but on 17 April 2014 Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 RUSSIAN citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
THESE SOLDIERS are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian propaganda will tell you.
Data obtained from the reports of the so-called “Commissioner for Human Rights in the Donetsk People’s Republic” show casualty figures even lower than those of the United Nations. In a 2020 report the total losses of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) since the start of the war in Donbas are estimated to be 4,959. This is the figure that is officially recorded by the DPR “legislature”.
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Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression.
On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution. There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense.
In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
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Russia’s Lie Machine.
48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.
This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building.
All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists. Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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Disinformation: Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas for eight years.
Verdict: FAKE NEWS
In order to pursue its expansionist goals in Ukraine, Russia also unleashed information warfare against Ukraine simultaneously with its military aggression. Moreover, it was the “pretext” based on disinformation and falsehoods which Putin used to launch his invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.
On 24 February 2022, Putin stated that the goals of the full-scale war, which he calls a “special operation,” are to “protect the population from genocide as well as denazify and demilitarise Ukraine together with the protection of those people who were abused and subjected to genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.” Putin made similar statements at the session of the Human Rights Council in December 2021, saying that “what is happening in Donbas now very much reminds us of genocide.” Russian MFA spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, also made a statement of similar content on 18 February 2022: “The situation [in Donbass] does not resemble a genocide. No, it does not resemble a genocide… It is a genocide…”
The claim that Ukraine was committing genocide in Donbas has become a main propaganda message not only for the Kremlin and Kremlin-run media but in other pro-Russian sources as well. The aim of this disinformation is to proclaim Russia’s actions in Ukraine as legitimate and completely disregard any Kremlin-directed blame. In fact, there is not a single international document or conclusion of any relevant international organisation whatsoever that would confirm Moscow’s allegations. That Putin and the Kremlin are unable to prove that genocide indeed took place in Donbas is confirmed by the fact that Russia has never officially appealed to the UN Genocide Prevention Office or any other international institutions over the issues of genocide and ethnic cleansing.
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Ian Garner, a historian and analyst of Russian culture: Russia and President Vladimir Putin are preparing the country's youth to "die for the motherland", believes the Canadian historian and author Ian Garner, who has written a book about what he calls "Russia's fascist youth".
- Russia indoctrinates young people with military games, TikTok videos and influencers. Children and young people who have grown up since 2012, when Putin became president again, are much more ideological and isolated from the world than generations before them When we think of young people, we like to think of the hope of the future and of people who want peace and democracy. But those who do not want war in Russia are fleeing or have fled. They will not die because of ideology, says Garner With Putin as president, everything has become much more ideological, right from childhood. Young people are almost forced to join the state's youth groups, which are becoming more and more militarized.
They are constantly told that everything outside Russia is dangerous and will destroy them. It makes me worried - and scared, says Garner. He points out that teachers and schools are receiving new teaching material where violence and ultra-nationalism become part of everyday school life - that young people who want to do something in their spare time must do so under the auspices of the state.
The scope for what you can do as a young person in Russia is narrowing. - That's very smart. Children and young people are getting more and more ideological and military input. Like a Wagner officer telling you that you have an obligation to join the military and make sacrifices so that Russia can be saved from the so-called scary and dangerous world out there, says Garner.
It is especially young people under the age of 19-20 that Garner calls the "Z generation", who are influenced by what he refers to as "fascist ideology". Recruitment is done on TikTok and other social media. According to Garner, the youth army - which has members aged six to 18 - is the most radical group. Now I meet children who are learning the language of hate and war. It makes me sad and scared. The young people are brainwashed into thinking that everyone outside Russia hates them and wants to crush them, he says The Russian state has, according to Garner, created a world where you are either with us, Russia, or against us. There is no room here for homosexuals, oppositionists, pacifists, Ukrainians - or non-Orthodox Christians, according to Garner.
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Priests arrested in Russia.
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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"There is evidence that Ukrainian troops have been indiscriminately shelling civilians in Donbas"
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities and armed forces have committed war crimes by carrying out deliberate attacks against civilian target] and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas. The Russian military exposed the civilian population to unnecessary and disproportionate harm by using cluster munitions and by firing other explosive weapons with wide-area effects such as bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells and multiple launch rockets. As of the beginning of July 2023, the attacks had resulted in the documented deaths of between 9,300 and 16,500 civilians. On 22 April 2022, the UN reported that 92.3% of civilian fatalities were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
On 5 July 2022, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Michelle Bachelet reported that most of the civilian casualties documented by her office had been caused by the Russian army's repeated use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Bachelet said that the heavy civilian toll from the use of such indiscriminate weapons and tactics had become "indisputable". From 24 February 2022 to 30 June 2023, OHCHR assessed that 90.5% of all civilian fatalities were killed by explosive weapons with wide area effects, and that 84.2% of them were recorded on the Ukrainian-controlled territory. El País estimated that by March 2023 the Russian forces were firing at a rate of between 600,000 and 1.8 million shells per month.
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The total number of Ukrainian and Russian casualties in military personnel is estimated to have reached almost 500,000 in the year and a half of the full-scale war, most of them Russians.
According to US estimates, the total number of Russian losses is 300,000, of which 120,000 are killed and 170,000-180,000 are wounded. According to the same calculations, Ukraine’s casualties amount to about 70,000 soldiers killed and 100,000-120,000 wounded
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@JamesBee-y1f 40.000? 180.000 russian troops were on the Ukrainian border when they invaded.
Deluded Putin ‘thought he would capture Kyiv in three days’
Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear.
According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
The report comes from a source known as Wind of Change and was initially sent to Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian human rights activist and founder of ‘Gulagu’, an organisation which highlights abuses in the country’s prisons.
The emails were initially thought to be the work of a lone FSB officer, but it is now believed several people contributed to the leak.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said.
‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’
Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour.
‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source.
‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’
Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital.
‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
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@fred4687 Businessinsider 2022: When Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an invasion on February 24, he expected a swift and decisive victory, seeming to believe his own propaganda about the strength of his armed forces and people's willigness to fight for a country, Ukraine, that he has defined as an integral part of his own.
Within minutes of his televised war declaration, explosions were reported across Ukraine — including in the capital city, Kyiv, home to nearly 3 million people.
CIA Director Bill Burns told lawmakers last week that Putin's strategy for the war was centered on "seizing Kyiv within the first two days of the campaign." US intelligence likewise assessed that the city could fall soon after the invasion.
It has now been roughly three weeks. Instead of quickly conquering Ukraine, the Russian military made strategic mistakes — failing to take out the country's air defenses; deploying tens of thousands of troops without adequate supply lines — and were met by a steadfast Ukrainian resistance that was underestimated by Washington and Moscow alike.
Frustrated, Russian forces have resorted to tactics seen in Syria and Chechnya before: all-out attacks on civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and apartment buildings, in an apparent effort to demoralize a population that has not greeted them as liberators or surrendered.
"It seems obvious Putin was sold a bill of goods by his intelligence services," Michael Weiss, news director at New Lines magazine and director of special investigations at the Free Russia Foundation, told Insider. Lending credence to that theory is that, according to independent Russian news outlet Meduza, leaders of Russia's foreign intelligence service have been placed under house arrest since the invasion.
But after more than two decades of consolidating power, it is also possible that Putin's intelligence officials knew well enough that the fight for Ukraine would not be easy "but they didn't want to tell him the truth," Weiss said, "that Ukraine in 2022 is not Ukraine 2014 — and he [Putin] mobilized the entire country over the last eight years to resist Russia."
When Russia seized Crimea in 2014 and deployed forces to wrestle eastern Ukraine from Kyiv's control, it was exploiting the weakness of a country in turmoil, its pro-Russian president having just fled the country after a deadly crackdown failed to disperse a mass protest movement — one sparked by the country's leadership backing out of a trade deal with the European Union and cozying up to Moscow instead. Since then, Ukraine's military has been rebuilt, professionalized by training from NATO members like the US and hardened by battles with Russian-backed forces in the east.
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No it is not!
Eupoliticalreport:
Russia is the World’s Breeding Ground for Neo-Nazi Culture.
Putin has said that “De-Nazification” of Ukraine is one of his key objectives, and that it is the main justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin media even brands all those who oppose Russian aggression as “Neo-Nazis.”
At the onset of the invasion, Russian propaganda clearly distinguished between the Ukrainian “fraternal people” and the “criminal regime” in Kyiv. In his address in the early hours of 24 February, Putin said, addressing the Armed Forces of Ukraine: “Take power into your own hands. It looks like it will be easier for us to come to terms with you than with this gang of drug addicts and Neo-Nazis, who settled in Kyiv and took the entire Ukrainian people hostage.”
Later, the Kremlin and the pro-government media began to substitute certain concepts: “nationalists” and “Neo-Nazis” became synonymous with the Ukrainian Army, volunteer battalions, and territorial defence forces, which have put up massive resistance against the Russian invaders. Pro-Kremlin media headlines and newscast rhetoric are full of phrases about “hours spent under targeted fire by nationalists” or Russian units and their proxies “who managed to drive nationalists out of the most residential areas in the city.”
But still after 8 weeks of war, the Kremlin propagandists refer to Ukrainians daring to oppose Russian occupation as “Nazis.” For example, for Margarita Simonyan, the head of one of the Kremlin’s main mouthpieces, RT, it came as an unpleasant surprise that “a significant part of Ukraine was engulfed in the madness of Nazism.” On one of her panel shows, she said: “Previously, I also thought that there were a few of them, but I definitely could not imagine that there were so many!”
Why does Russian propaganda massively and indiscriminately brand all Ukrainians as Nazis? First of all, it’s about dehumanising the nation in the eyes of the Russians. The Kremlin needs to give them something that will make Russians hate Ukrainians and justify in their eyes the atrocities committed against Ukrainians by the Russian military, the annihilation of Ukrainian cities. How could this be done? It turned out to be that simple: to an average Russian, who has been under the harsh influence of the Kremlin’s propaganda machine for years, it’s enough to say: “You know what? They are all Nazis there, we shouldn’t feel sorry for them, it’s okay to kill them all!” Which is what the Russian forces are doing.
Meanwhile, in Russia, people get detained and prosecuted for phrases such as “No to fascism” and “fascism shall not pass” – such slogans are now equated with “discrediting” the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Putin’s statements that the power in Ukraine is controlled by neo-Nazis is blatant falsehood. As any other country, Ukraine has some problems with far-right movements. In Russia itself, there are no fewer ultra-right, Neo-Nazi and nationalist, sharply xenophobic groups and organizations close to them in spirit. Moreover, there are people today in the Russian circles of power who used to openly back extremely nationalist views and participated in the infamous “Russian Marches.” Traditionally, Russian law enforcement are trying to find a “Ukrainian trace” in pretty much anything, presenting ultra-right groups as “branches of Ukrainian radical movements.”
The Russian ultra-right are frequently in the news focus, and there are still plenty of skinhead gangs that go out terrorising and murdering representatives of various Central Asian ethnic groups, while caveman nationalists keep chanting their favourite “Moscow is for Muscovites” song.
The uncomfortable truth is that Russia has long and regularly made accusations against former Soviet republics about supporting neo-Nazism, But the reality as borne out by the obscene behaviour of the Red Army in Ukraine is that Russia is itself the main breeding ground for today’s Nazis, and it is this evil that the world must address urgently and destroy the demon before it spreads.
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@AJAYSINGH-ns1vv - Wagner Group recruits people with Nazi tattoos for war in Ukraine
The Wagner Group recruits mercenaries through the Russian social media VKontakte; and due to the shortage of personnel, drug dealers, citizens hiding from the police, and people with Nazi tattoos are accepted for "work".
Source: video of the Sistemy investigative project
- Wagner Boss Cites Tattoo in Colleague’s Nazism Scandal.
Dmitry Utkin, one of the Wagner founders, have nazi tatooes. In 2016, he was hosted by Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.
“In order to defeat Nazism, you must try it on yourself,” Prigozhin said in response to a report that a Wagner Group official flaunts his admiration for the Third Reich.
Sources close to Wagner cited by Dossier say Utkin used the nickname “Wagner” precisely for its reference to Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner. He was also reportedly known to discuss the path of a “true Aryan” and openly don clothing accessories that featured a swastika.
- According to a German intelligence report, at least two neo-Nazi groups are fighting alongside Moscow in Ukraine, despite the Kremlin's claim to be 'denazifying' its southwestern neighbor.
- A video, published in December 2020, showed two nattily dressed Russian men. I’m a Nazi,” said one of the men, Aleksei Milchakov, who was the main focus of the video published on a Russian nationalist YouTube channel. “I'm not going to go deep and say, I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist, and so forth. I’ll say it outright: I’m a Nazi.”
Aside from being a notorious, avowed Nazi known for killing a puppy and posting bragging photographs about it on social media, Milchakov is the head of a Russian paramilitary group known as Rusich, which openly embraces Nazi symbolism and radical racist ideologies.
Along with members of the Russian Imperial Movement, a white supremacist group that was designated a "global terrorist" organization by the United States two years ago, Rusich is one of several right-wing groups that are actively fighting in Ukraine, in conjunction with Russia’s regular armed forces or allied separatist units.
- - A journalist covering the war for Russia’s state news agency has visible tattoos with fascist symbolism, the Moscow Times website reported on Thursday.
The website referred to photos published in the Kievskaya Pravda 2D Telegram channel.
They show Russian journalist Gleb Erve, with fascist and Nazi symbols tattooed on his body and head. These include the emblem of the Italian National Fascist Party, tattooed on the back of his head, and the algiz, or rune of life, commonly used in Nazi Germany on his hand.
The journalist reports on the war, which Kremlin propaganda claims was launched to “denazify Ukraine”, for state news agency RIA Novosti.
Before joining RIA Novosti, Gleb Erve worked in a Moscow tattoo parlour alongside people linked to Nazi movements, the Moscow Times wrote.
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What has received less coverage than the Ukrainian far right groups, is the Putin regime’s own record of collaboration with far-right extremists. Even as Russian diplomats condemned “fascists” in the Baltic states and Kremlin propagandists railed against imaginary “Ukronazis” in power in Kyiv, the Russian state was cultivating its own homegrown Nazis.
The roots of neo-Nazism in Putin’s Russia:
The origins of this relationship date to the late 1990s, when Russia was shaken by a wave of racist violence committed by neo-Nazi skinhead gangs. After Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000, his regime exploited this development in two ways.
First, it used the neo-Nazi threat to justify the adoption of anti-extremism legislation, a longstanding demand of some Russian liberals. Ultimately, this legislation would be used to prosecute Russian democrats.
Second, the Kremlin launched “managed nationalism”, an attempt to co-opt and mobilise radical nationalist militants, including neo-Nazis, as a counterweight to an emerging anti-Putin coalition of democrats and leftist radicals.
As part of its preparations to confront a potential democratic uprising in Russia, Nashi enlisted football gang members, whose subculture overlapped with the neo-Nazi underground.
During 2005, Nashi’s thugs staged a series of raids on anti-Putin youth groups. The most violent attack, which left four left-wing activists in hospital, led to the arrest of the assailants. They were released after a visit to the police station from Nikita Ivanov, the Kremlin functionary who supervised the regime’s loyalist youth organisations.
The resulting scandal provoked a reconfiguration of “managed nationalism”. While Nashi distanced itself from football gangs, its radical militants migrated to two rival Kremlin proxies, the nationalist “Young Russia” group and the anti-immigration “Locals” group. These organisations became bridges between the neo-Nazi subculture and the Kremlin.
In 2008-09, the Kremlin was threatened by Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s efforts to build an anti-Putin coalition of democrats and radical nationalists in Russia. In response, the Kremlin began to work with Russkii Obraz (“Russian Image”, or “RO” for short), a hardcore neo-Nazi group best known for its slick journal and its band, Hook from the Right.
With the assistance of Kremlin supervisors, RO attacked nationalists who were abandoning the skinhead subculture for Navalny’s anti-Putin coalition. In return, RO was granted privileged access to public space and the media.
Its leaders held televised public discussions with state functionaries and collaborated openly with Maksim Mishchenko, a member of parliament from the ruling party. Perhaps most shockingly, RO also hosted a concert by the infamous neo-Nazi band Kolovrat in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square, within earshot of the Kremlin.
The problem for the Kremlin was that RO’s leader, Ilya Goryachev, was a fervent supporter of the neo-Nazi underground, the skinheads who committed hundreds of racist murders in the second half of the 2000s. The authorities turned a blind eye to RO’s production of a two-hour internet “documentary” titled Russian Resistance, which celebrated these killers as patriotic heroes and called for armed struggle against the regime.
I think we can now state that RUSSIA HAS A MUCH BIGGER PROBLEM WITH NAZISM than ukraine. Also into the corridors of power.
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@Martin-nl1dl Russia arrests priests:
- "Brothers and sisters in Christ are now killing Christians. It is impossible to live with this fact." For this statement, made in a sermon in the church, the Russian priest Ioann Burdin was arrested.
Zona Media reports that Burdin is one of the first to suffer under a new law, which criminalised calls for the end of the war. The Russian priest says that he finds it irreconcilable that Russian Christians are killing Ukrainian Christians. "For me, this is about the same as if I would come to our Church and stab someone who is praying because I did not like what he was saying. We cannot break the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" so easily."
Burdin is a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian village of Karabanovo in the Kostroma region. During one of his sermons, he announced that he would pray for the war's end. According to him, however, that was not the point of his sermon. "It is a deeper call to people to retain humanity in their hearts; so that they do not feel hatred for either Ukrainians, Russians or the Americans."
Burdin's statements, however, led to his arrest. He was summoned to the police station, heard and charged with "discrediting" Russia's war in Ukraine, Dagen reports. The new law made it illegal to question the Russian invasion. Violating this legislation can lead to imprisonment or a fine.
- A Russian priest now faces up to 10 years behind bars for declaring that troops waging war on Ukraine are going to hell.
The charges against Ioann Kurmoyarov, a former priestmonk of the Russian Orthodox Church and doctor of theology, come as the Kremlin seeks to stifle dissent over the war, with numerous high-profile musicians and writers recently charged under a new law against spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
The charges against him stem from a video he posted on social media in March responding to Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov’s claim that even if the war in Ukraine leads to a nuclear strike, Russians will “go to heaven.”
“I would like to disappoint everyone who believes in this ‘fake,’” Kuromaryov said, adding that those who “unleash aggression” do not wind up in heaven. “Ukraine did not attack Russia,” he said. “You will not be in any heaven, you’ll be in hell.”
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@Alexey_Nikolaevich Ее хар ду, Иван:
Россия применила различные кассетные бомбы на поле боя в Украине, как против украинских войск, так и в городских районах, сообщил CBS News научный сотрудник аналитического центра по вопросам обороны и безопасности RUSI Сидхарт Каушал. По его словам, Украина также имеет ограниченное количество кассетных боеприпасов из Турции.
Применение кассетных боеприпасов во время российского вторжения зафиксировано рядом очевидцев и журналистов, а также представителями ООН, гуманитарных и общественных организаций.
В частности, глава Совета ООН по правам человека Мишель Бачелет сообщила 30 марта (2022 г.) о не менее 24 случаях с начала вторжения.
Российские вооруженные силы беспорядочно обстреливают и бомбят населенные пункты, убивая мирных жителей и разрушая больницы, школы и другую гражданскую инфраструктуру, действия, которые могут быть приравнены к военным преступлениям. «То, что мы видели в подконтрольном правительству Краматорске 8 апреля (2022 г.), когда кассетные суббоеприпасы попали в железнодорожную станцию, убив 60 гражданских лиц и ранив 111 человек, является символом несоблюдения принципа различия, запрета неизбирательного нападения и принцип предосторожности, закрепленный в международном гуманитарном праве», — сказала Бачелет.
По состоянию на 1 июля 2022 года уже зафиксированы сотни обстрелов российскими войсками кассетных боеприпасов в населенных пунктах Днепропетровской, Донецкой, Запорожской, Киевской, Луганской, Николаевской, Одесской, Сумской, Харьковской, Херсонской и Черниговской областей. Известно, что в результате этих обстрелов погибло 215 мирных жителей и 474 получили ранения, о многих из которых, возможно, не сообщается.
И Россия, и Украина применяли кассетные боеприпасы во время конфликта, однако Россия применяла их широко, а Украина — более ограниченно.
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@hermano4242 The US medling is no more than the Russian (actually, much less). That’s how those two operates. I do not agree with them. The main thing now, is that US is wanted/invited, while Russia is NOT!
BBC Feb 2014 on Nuland call: “Overall this is a damaging episode between Washington and Moscow. Nobody really emerges with any credit. The US is clearly much more involved in trying to broker a deal in Ukraine than it publicly lets on. There is some embarrassment too for the Americans given the ease with which their communications were hacked. But is the interception and leaking of communications really the way Russia wants to conduct its foreign policy? …. could the Russian government be joining the radical apostles of open government? I doubt it.
Though given some of the comments from Vladimir Putin's adviser on Ukraine Sergei Glazyev - for example his interview with the Kommersant-Ukraine newspaper the other day - you don't need your own listening station to be clear about Russia's intentions. RUSSIA he said "MUST INTERFERE in Ukraine" and the authorities there should use force against the demonstrators.”
(Besides, at that time Putin had already decided to invade)
I think you know very well that Yanukovich was Kremlins puppet. He’s sudden decision to not sign an already negotiated political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia, was the final straw.
Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. RUSSIA had put much PRESSURE on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. The end result was the goverments resignation. Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
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@upstairs1307 "Vladimir Putin initially thought Russia could defeat Ukraine and overthrow its government in just three days, according to leaked FSB intelligence.
Almost exactly a year since Putin launched his disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the leaks appears to confirm what has long been suspected: FSB spies had been feeding him false intelligence in the build-up to the war which told the Russian despot exactly what he wanted to hear. According to the leaks, first published by The Sun, Putin’s spies assured him there were over 2,000 armed and trained Ukranians in every city who were waiting to rise up and topple Zelensky before welcoming the Russians with open arms.
‘We issued reports that at minimum about 2,000 trained civilians in every major city in Ukraine were ready to overthrow Zelensky,’ the source said. ‘And that at least 5,000 civilians were prepared to come out with flags against Zelensky on the beck-and-call of Russia.’ Wind of Change then explains that the FSB thought that once Zelensky had been overthrown, the Ukrainians would then fight amongst themselves to win Putin’s favour. ‘Do you want a laugh?,’ says the source. ‘We were expected to be the arbitrators for crowning Ukrainian politicians who were supposed to start tearing each other apart competing for the right to be called aligned with Russia.’ Russian troops came within 19 miles of Kyiv but were defeated around April last year, forcing the Kremlin to refocus their efforts on the east of the country.
Experts have put the Russian failure to secure victory on a range of things including poor intelligence, equipment and tactics.
According to Winds of Change, nobody among the Russian leadership had a backup plan ready in case they failed to take the Ukrainian capital. ‘“What if it doesn’t work?” This question was left unanswered when they planned to take Kiev in three days,’ they said.
"
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"Norway were with Hitler". You're a first class liar!
The saving of Europe was a joint effort of the Allies. After Soviet/Russia was on Hitler side the first 2 years of the war. Not before Hitler broke the pact and attacked Soviet, the Soviets shifted side. Then Stalin begged UK and US for help. They sent million of tons with weapon and equipment to Soviet via the Arctic Convoys.
After the D-day in Normandy, (where USA, UK, Canada, France, Polen, Belgium, Greece, Norway, Holland and Czechoslovakia) fought their way into the German positions and started the march to Germany. That meant that the Germans had two fronts to fight against, Eastern (Soviet) and Western. Together they defeated the Nazis. But they probably don't teach that in Russian schools.
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@nikxohs3925 Russia is by far the largest country of the planet, with 11% of the total land mass. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Russia was worth 2240.42 billion US dollars in 2022, according to official data from the World Bank. The GDP value of Russia represents 0.96 percent of the world economy.
GDP (2022), bn USD:
1. USA: 25,462.70 billion USD
2. China: 17,963.20
3. Japan: 4,231.10
5. India: 3,385.10
6. UK: 3,070.70
7. France: 2,782.90
8. Russia: 2,240.40
9. Canada: 2,139.80
10. Italy: 2,010.40
GDP per capita, bn USD:
1. Norway: 106,149
5. USA: 76,399
9. Canada: 54,966
18. Germany: 48,432
19. UK: 45,850
20. France: 40,964
21. Italy: 34,158
22. Japan: 33.815
30. RUSSIA: 15,607
33. China: 12,724
48. India: 2,389
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