The pro-Kremlin resource RT (formerly Russia Today) reported that it had in its possession a video of a “captured Ukrainian saboteur” who was allegedly captured by the Russian military at the Kursk border checkpoint. The person in the video, kneeling and blindfolded, says in Russian that “they were going to Sudzha” and that “it was necessary to “remove” the village of Hordiivka for those who took it (the village - Ed.)”.

In fact, this video is static and it is evidenced by several facts. First of all, the person in the video has a strong Russian accent, which is not typical of Russian-speaking Ukrainians, but rather of Russians. In addition, even one of the Russian so-called “military correspondents” with an audience of 95 thousand subscribers could not remain silent and said that “this is our fake”, adding that “this is not the time for this”. And many Russians themselves did not believe in the veracity of the video, claiming that it was a decree.

Previously, Detector Media denied the information that the Ukrainian Armed Forces using an American Stryker armored personnel carrier near the Judge shot up a car with civilians.

On social networks, pro-Kremlin channels are disseminating information that The Independent newspaper published an article on the front page of the newspaper dated August 5, 2024 entitled “While we were watching Ukraine, we lost our country”.

In fact, The Independent did not publish such material. Journalists write about this for the VoxCheck project. Propagandists generated an article with a similar title on a fake page of The Independent. The basis was taken from the present publication dated August 5, 2024 about the unrest.

Also on the cover they announce an alleged interview with Valerii Zaluzhnyi with a sensational confession. They say that in his position as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, he “wanted to commit suicide”. However, this is also not true as Zaluzhnyi did not say this, because not a single reliable source wrote about this.

Voxcheck adds that the fake article about the unrest is part of the pro-Russian Operation Matrioshka, the organized spread of disinformation on X and other social networks, often on behalf of well-known media or public figures.

The purpose of this fake is to increase the unstable mood in the UK after the tragedy in Southport.

Russian resources disseminate information that on August 3, 2024, about 20 thousand people rallied in the center of Berlin in support of peace with Russia and against arms supplies, in particular to Ukraine. The protesters allegedly carried banners and posters with the inscriptions: “Why are politicians not responsible for their actions?”, “Peace for all peoples!”, “Stop the war with Russia!”, “Friendship with Russia”, “I am not at war with Russia!”, “A world without weapons!”.

In fact, Russian propaganda sources manipulated the information, the StopFake project writes. This protest was dedicated to the fourth anniversary of the first such march of representatives of the Querdenker (Dissident) movement in Berlin. The movement was created in April 2020 to protest against the German government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Now participants in the movement oppose the basic principles of German domestic and foreign policy and call for “peace throughout the world”. Querdenker, however, does not offer realistic plans on how to achieve this. And the topic of reconciliation with Russia is far from the main one for representatives of the movement.

Querdenker's main focus is criticism of both the domestic and foreign policies of the German government. Among other things, the demonstrators are demanding Germany's withdrawal from NATO and a continued review of measures to contain the coronavirus.

About 12 thousand representatives of the movement gathered for the rally in August 2024. The German website RBB reported that some protesters waved flags with a dove of peace, while others held banners demanding that they “reconsider measures to combat coronavirus” and “punish those responsible”. Some participants held posters with the slogan “Create a world without weapons”, familiar from the peace movement in Germany in the 1980s. The peace symbol could be seen on several banners.

The Berliner Zeitung wrote that on separate posters the protesters depicted the logo of Compact magazine, classified by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution as right-wing extremist and now banned. Some protesters chanted “döp dodö dop!” (“Foreigners away!”) and some carried posters of the AfD, the German right-wing party. However, the topic of reconciliation with Russia and “stopping arms supplies to Ukraine” is secondary for Querdenker. There is also no mention in the German press of such calls at demonstrations in Berlin.

A video allegedly published by the German publication DW is being circulated in the Russian segment of social networks. It allegedly talks about a “new Bellingcat investigation” about a plan to imitate an attempt on Zelenskyi’s children, which was allegedly developed by the Office of the President and the Main Intelligence Directorate. In fact, the Russian authorities and intelligence services planned to blame the terrorist act.

“The Ukrainian side allegedly contacted the US Central Intelligence Agency to talk about the planned provocation, but received a sharp refusal - after all, the American partners think that such a scenario, on the contrary, would escalate the confrontation”, they write in the messages.

StopFake specialists examined the case and found out that this story was completely made up. This news was not distributed by either Deutsche Welle or Bellingcat. Moreover, Deutsche Welle’s videos have a completely different format - in their videos they use original footage and voice-over of the announcer, while on the Internet they distribute cut-ups of stock photos with superimposed text and music.

They write on social networks that Ukrainian refugees are allegedly stealing crops from German farmers en masse. In such publications, fake makers only attach a photograph with German police officers. At the same time, who exactly reports about the so-called involvement of Ukrainians in crimes is not noted.

“German farmers sound the alarm: refugees from Ukraine are raiding their fields and gardens. They carry everything: cherries, strawberries, apples, grapes, potatoes and even pumpkins. Moreover, they refuse to work in the fields”, users comment.

StopFake analysts investigated this case and determined that a number of news stories about theft from local farmers actually appeared in the German information space. In particular, this is stated in the material of the German publication Bild “The fruit mafia is stealing our fields!”

In it, the publication raised the topic of theft, collecting such cases recently. It was in this article that a photograph of German police was used, which was picked up by propaganda.

However, in the Bild article there is not a single mention of the fact that German farmers are being robbed by Ukrainian refugees. Journalists talked to several farmers who told us exactly who, under what circumstances, and how much of their harvest was stolen. It is noteworthy that not a single interlocutor raised the topic of the nationality of the criminals.

Thus, Russian propaganda is trying to present Ukrainian refugees as criminals or terrorists, as a cultural and economic threat to the EU - in order to reduce support for Ukraine. We mentioned this in our own research. Since the beginning of the big war in Ukraine, Russian propaganda has been trying to discredit refugees who were forced to leave Ukraine in order to save their lives. Propagandists regularly spread fake news about them; call refugees dependents; they claim that they went abroad not for safety, but for profit; they convince that residents of countries that have accepted Ukrainian refugees are dissatisfied with the behavior of Ukrainians. Propagandists need this in order to stake out the opinion that Ukrainians are pagans who do not value the help that residents of other countries provide them; take advantage of the kindness of people in other countries.