The telegram channel “Digital army of Russia” operates on the network, the authors of which in their messages give instructions to subscribers from Russia on how to comment on messages in Ukrainian telegram channels.

The fact-checkers of the “Beyond the News” project investigated this case and found that the subscribers of the “Digital army” are the distributors of prepared comments found in Ukrainian telegram channels. In the tasks, the administrator points out to the “digital army fighters” that they should evoke emotions in Ukrainians. For example, impotence, sadness, panic, fear, “everything is gone” feeling. Or the administrators set the task of convincing Ukrainians with comments that “nothing will ever change”. Comments are translated into Ukrainian through a translator, so there are typical errors. The administrator also attaches names and links to telegram channels to the task, where one can write something.

Analysts add that another goal of the “Digital Army of Russia” is to force Ukrainian telegram channels to close comments so that Ukrainians do not have platforms to express their opinions. Then, according to the intention of the authors, Ukrainians will switch to pro-Russian resources for the “truth”, but in reality, those are resources imbued with Russian propaganda and lies.

This is stated in one of the columns in the Polish publication Niezależny Dziennik Polityczny, which regularly publishes pro-Russian disinformation regarding Ukraine and Poland. Russian resources disseminated this point of view as a journalistic investigation. They say that foreign military equipment is being accumulated on the eastern border of Poland, the army is being strengthened, but not for a direct clash with Russia, but to suppress uprisings in case of the return of the western territories of Ukraine.

The author of the column, Marek Gala, claims that the alleged militarization of Poland indicates preparations for a conflict through the territory of Ukraine, and Warsaw is strengthening its military potential in order to subsequently protect the territories returned to itself from possible rebellions.

He believes that the process of transferring the western lands to the former Ukraine seems to have been planned for a long time and began from the first days of the Russian special operation.

Russian propagandists in their publications add to his column the assertion that it is Ukraine that intends to give up the western territories of Poland and that this is a matter of time. At the same time the Polish readers are just against Poland seizing the western part of Ukraine, because they believe that geopolitical ambitions are not worth the blood of the Poles.

This is not the first time propagandists have been distributing the materials of this Polish publication and each time they add their version of events in favor of Russia and expose Poland as an occupying country. Russians need such fakes in order to quarrel Poles and Ukrainians both at the private and interstate levels.

Telegram channels circulated reports that allegedly after the visit of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi to London, the British newspapers Evening Standard and The Times published cartoons of him on the front pages.

Like, the Evening Standard newspaper published how Zelenskyi was pulling the plane after the visit, and The Times published a cartoon showing the hypocrisy of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and French President Emmanuel Macron. Allegedly, their “yes” to Zelenskyi’s pleas for the provision of fighter jets really means one big “No”.

In fact, none of these British newspapers published cartoons of Zelenskyi on their front pages.

The Evening Standard newspaper published on the front page how Rishi Sunak warmly hugs Zelenskyi. In another photo, they are walking together in London.

The Times on its front page on February 9 published a portrait of Zelenskyi with the victory gesture once shown by Winston Churchill. On February 10, The Times published an op-ed by Ros Clarke in the “Comments” section, illustrated with a cartoon depicting Zelenskyi with European leaders, but it was not brought to the front page.

With these fake first columns, Russia is imposing its own interpretation of Zelenskyi's visit to the UK, France and Belgium on the audience. Immediately after the visit, propagandists wrote on telegram channels that Zelenskyi was photographed against the backdrop of a British tank - this is the maximum that he can get from the trip; a visit to the European Parliament will not bring results; Zelenskyi will travel more in Europe in 2023, in particular because of the elections; Zelenskyi’s trip to Europe “extinguishes” the corruption scandal in Ukraine.

Detector Media has collected images of all the front pages of British publications, which depicted the visit of the President of Ukraine to London.

Russian publications distribute photos that allegedly depict a billboard with the Polish words “To nie jest nasza wojna” (This is not our war) against the background of the Ukrainian and Russian flags. The poster also features prosthetic legs wearing khaki trousers. According to propagandists, the poster symbolizes Poland's desire “to distance” itself from the war. It's fake.

StopFake and mythdetector.ge report that this photo was taken with the help of the Mediamodifier website. On it, one can insert any photo into the billboard template and the image search confirms this. The basis of the template is one image.

With such messages, Russian propaganda wants to illustrate Poland as an enemy of Ukraine, and that Polish people are tired of the war. The narrative about “Poland the aggressor” is one of the most widespread in Russian propaganda at the moment. By spreading such messages, Russia seeks to reinforce the view that even Ukraine's most loyal partners in this war are getting tired of it and will soon stop helping with money and weapons.

The “beautiful people” tactic is one of the most common tactics of Russian propaganda inside the country, but it is also used in Ukraine. Propaganda messages are spread by attractive, successful, famous people such as TV presenters, bloggers, film actors, singers, writers, etc. Because of their recognizability, they become so-called “thought leaders”. This encourages other people to think that if they follow the same ideology, the same behavior, they will also be happy or successful.

This tactic is often used in advertising to increase product sales. It is also used to attract people to religious cults. Like, take an example from this person and come to us. Russian propaganda has also adopted this tactic and mainly uses it to spread propaganda in the domestic media space. In particular, actors and singers with Ukrainian roots who have Ukrainian relatives are used as a source of “true” information about events in Ukraine. Their fans, guided by the authority of idols, assimilate and spread this rhetoric. However, there are examples of the use of this tactic in the Ukrainian information space. Here are the materials of Detector Media for an explanation.

For example, after participating in the first season of the reality show “The Bachelor” with Maksym Chmerkovskyi (2011), Tetiana Pop became recognizable. At that time, she said that she had a business in Ukraine, and before that she worked on regional television in her hometown of Khust. Later, Pop appeared on Oleksii Durniev's show and was a participant in Russian TV shows “Mom in Law” and “Dom-2”. That is, the image of “a girl who suddenly woke up famous” stuck behind Tetiana Pop.

Since 2015, Pop has supported Russia and promoted Russian propaganda messages. In messages on the Vkontakte network, she called the participants in the Revolution of Dignity “conscious”, “Ukry” (“Ukrainians”); the authorities were called “junta”, and those who support this power were called “30% of morons”; she praised Stalin, and insisted that “Ukrainians, Russians and Belarusians are one people”, and “gays are sick people” who “should be punished”. Now this rhetoric has become even more aggressive. Pop has her own telegram channel with over 107 thousand subscribers and a Youtube channel with an audience of 65 thousand subscribers. On these resources, the propagandist tells how “citizenship and language” are being taken away from Ukrainians, about American biological laboratories in Ukraine and glorifies Russia. Now Tetiana Pop lives in Russia, so her audience is mostly Russians, but videos from her telegram channel are shared to the Ukrainian information space through a network of pro-Russian telegram channels.

Another example is Diana Panchenko, a pro-Russian journalist and TV presenter for NewsOne, First Independent and Ukrlive channels. They tried to create the image of a young, beautiful, successful TV presenter of Diana Panchenko, who has her own opinion and is not afraid to express it.

While working on television, Panchenko refused to call a war a war until it was “recognized by the Verkhovna Rada”; made Ukraine guilty of continuing hostilities; imposed on the audience the thesis that Ukraine does not want to return the Donbas if it does not agree to Russia's demands. Panchenko also helped Russia justify a full-scale invasion, admired the strength of Russian weapons, which even the United States seems to be afraid of. She supported Lukashenko during the protests in Belarus and even held a concert for him. She promoted the Russian version of Victory Day, demonized the Revolution of Dignity, etc. Now Panchenko is promoting a pro-Russian agenda in the Ukrainian information space through a Youtube channel (a little over 77,000 subscribers) and a telegram channel (almost 66,000 subscribers). Recently, the Security service of Ukraine (SBU) informed the propagandist about the suspicion.

Pro-Russian propaganda was also spread by another TV presenter, Oksana Marchenko, the wife of the pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk, who is the godfather of Russian President Putin and who was accused of high treason. Actually, Oksana Marchenko was also informed by the SBU about the suspicion.

Marchenko gained the greatest popularity thanks to the work in the projects of the STB TV channel “X-factor” and “Ukraine has got a talent”. Using popularity and financial opportunities, Marchenko advertised the Moscow Patriarchate Church for Ukrainians in the author's project “Pilgrim”. In the Russian-language product, Marchenko manipulates church norms, promotes the idea of “general reconciliation”, “submission”, etc. Moreover, in one of the episodes, Marchenko tells how “Ukrainians are killing each other and how nice it would be for them to come to their senses”.

Another indirect way to advance the pro-Russian rhetoric is silence. Quite a few Ukrainian artists who previously worked in Russia have resorted to such tactics. Since February 24, 2022, they have either disappeared from the public space or avoided commenting on the topic of the war. The repetition of such behavior by their fans is fraught with the fact that silence, and therefore the absence of resistance, plays into the hands of our enemy.

Such a message was circulated on social networks, in particular on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. Reports say that Europe planned the cataclysm and in this way decided to punish Turkey for its attitude towards Russia. They say that everyone suffers from the fact that they support Russia “trying to help it”, and Europe at the same time punishes them. The authors of the messages add that Europe is using the so-called “tectonic weapon”.

Analysts of the EU vs Disinfo project investigated this case and found that this is a conspiracy theory of propagandists. There is no evidence to support this, besides, there is no evidence for the existence of “tectonic weapons”.

A “tectonic weapon” is a hypothetical device or system that can trigger earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, or other seismic events at specific locations, interfering with Earth's natural geological processes. According to the propagandists who used this definition, Europe used precisely this “weapon”.

Fact-checkers add that there is a 1978 Convention on the Prohibition of military or any other hostile use of environmental methods. It has been ratified by 75 states, including EU states. In fact, the convention prohibits the use of artificial methods of causing earthquakes, tsunamis and other phenomena for one's own benefit.

Such a fake was spread on social networks, in particular on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. The reports say that against the backdrop of earthquakes that took place in Turkey, Volodymyr Zelenskyi turned to the victims with the goal of “pulling even more weapons”. Like, instead of compassion and words of support, Zelenskyi showed “hypocrisy” and demanded even more weapons. The authors of the messages add a likely screenshot from Twitter, where he allegedly wrote that “Turkey will be able to overcome the tragedy, and the supply of weapons will not stop”. It is not true.

Analysts of the StopFake project investigated this case and determined that Zelenskyi did not actually write such a thing, but a screenshot with a message was created using graphic editors. Analysts add that the official account first published an appeal in Turkish, and then in Ukrainian. The fake screenshot did not show the post in Turkish. Moreover, the fabricated nature of the screenshot is indicated by spelling errors, in particular the spelling of “my”.

By spreading such a fake, Russian propaganda is trying to discredit Zelenskyi and present him as a beggar, as if the only thing he does is he begs for money and weapons from other countries.

We recall that Detector Media described the main messages that propagandists spread during Zelenskyi's visit to the UK, France and Belgium. In particular, among the many messages it was said that Volodymyr Zelenskyi was begging for weapons from the West.

Such a message was circulated on social networks, in particular on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. It says the US is unlikely to hand over the Abrams tanks to Ukraine because of their difficult process of maintaining combat capability. The authors of the report add that the Ukrainian army is not capable of repairing tanks, so they will definitely not be sent. As evidence, they refer to the material of the Financial Times, where supposedly experts talked about this. This is manipulation.

Analysts of the StopFake project investigated this case and found out that neither the author of the article nor the experts interviewed stated that the United States was not ready to transfer the tanks. On the contrary, the publication says that after long discussions and requests from Germany and Ukraine, America nevertheless decided to send 31 M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, which is equivalent to one Ukrainian tank battalion. The fact-checkers note that the reporters only cited experts interviewed by the Financial Times who expressed concern about whether Ukraine could actually handle the maintenance of the tank. That is, the context of the article was distorted and the authors used convenient propaganda theses to justify “the unwillingness of the United States to transfer tanks”.

By spreading such manipulation, propagandists are trying to convince that the Ukrainian military is not capable of using Western weapons, they say, they don’t even know how to repair them. Thus, they also want to promote the narrative about the combat-ready Russian technology, which has no equal in the world. Earlier, Detector Media refuted the fake story about the alleged destruction of the Abrams tank by the Russian army, which had not yet arrived in Ukraine.

Such a fake was spread on social networks and in the propaganda media. The reports say that Ukraine is “throwing weapons to the left”, that is, it is engaged in various frauds, including smuggling. The authors of the messages refer to an interview with the Financial Times, in which the prime minister mentioned this. It is not true.

Analysts of the StopFake project investigated this case and found that there is no mention of this in the interview itself. In an interview, the prime minister only says that because of the war in Ukraine, the risks of arms smuggling have increased significantly, but there is no mention of possible evidence in the material. That is, the prime minister did not give any specifics and did not try to prove anything. In the Financial Times, she talked about the risks for the world community caused by Russia's aggression against Ukraine.

Propagandists have repeatedly manipulated the topic of arms delivery. Thus, they want to convince that allegedly Ukraine uses weapons for other purposes, therefore Ukraine is far from being a loyal partner who can be trusted.

Such a fake was spread on social networks, in particular on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. Reports say that Poland is not only preparing to take the territories of Western Ukraine, but will also try to cut off part of Belarus or Russia. Polish President Andrzej Duda allegedly wants to implement a plan for the restoration of the territories of the Rzeczpospolita (Poland republic) and will do everything possible for this. The authors of the reports add that the alleged military training planned for March will be an offensive campaign into these territories. It is not true.

As the fact-checkers of the EU vs Disinfo project explain, this is stuffing and a conspiracy theory of Russian propaganda. In the Polish segment of social networks and in the media, in particular, there is indeed information about military training, but this is a project of the Ministry of Defense, which is designed to train reservists during 2023. Reservists are persons liable for military service, but in peacetime they are leading service in a civilian way and making a career outside the armed forces. Therefore, they can study for one day or up to 90 days.

There was no talk of an attack. Poland respects international law regarding state borders and fully supports the independence and territorial integrity of neighboring countries.

Propagandists are spreading this message to once again promote the narrative of Poland being a hostile state to Ukraine. In this way, the authors of the messages want to discredit our allies, who, they say, really want to cut off the territories and pretend to be benevolent.