Spilnota Detector Media
Detector Media collects and documents real-time chronicles of the Kremlin disinformation about the Russian invasion. Ukraine for decades has been suffering from Kremlin disinformation. Here we document all narratives, messages, and tactics, which Russia is using from February 17th, 2022. Reminder: the increasing of shelling and fighting by militants happened on the 17th of February 2022 on the territory of Ukraine. Russian propaganda blames Ukraine for these actions.

On 23 December, on the 1033th day of the full-scale war, our editorial office recorded:

2602
Fake
774
Manipulation
753
Message
541
Disclosure
Русскій фейк, іді на***!

Fake Russian disinformation that 40% of FBI employees are LGBTQ+

A Russian Telegram channel writes that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation has a section where they refute various fakes. And now the FBI allegedly accused Iranian channels of spreading the fake that 100% of FBI employees are representatives of the LGBTQ+ community. At the same time, the video refutation said: “not 100% of FBI employees are representatives of the LGBTQ+ community, but only 40%, according to the agency’s inclusivity rules”. The propagandists add that this is a case where “it would have been better to remain silent”.

In fact, neither the FBI website nor the agency's social media have a video refutation of the information that is being distributed in Russian Telegram channels. In all likelihood, it was created by the Russians themselves, who added an FBI watermark to increase the credibility of the video.

Russian fakers regularly produce video fakes on behalf of authoritative organizations or media outlets in order to maximize the effectiveness of their leaks. Yes, we have repeatedly recorded similar fabricated videos that Russians submitted on behalf of the BBC, Euronews or other well-known Western resources. And they all have a similar design style.

With this insinuation, Russian propagandists nourish their narrative that in the West “everyone has long since gone crazy”, because they go “against nature” when they start same-sex romantic relationships, undergo gender reassignment surgery (the list goes on). Russia, on the contrary, defends “traditional values”, and is therefore a refuge for “normal people”.

Earlier we refuted the information that KharkivPride created an advertising campaign “Better a gay SSU-er than a straight dodger”.

Manipulation Russians manipulate information and write that Ukraine is the worst country in the world for women

On social media, Russian propagandists are spreading a picture of the Women's Peace and Security Global Index (WPS Index) for 2023, according to which Ukraine is supposedly “the worst country in the world for women”. The propaganda also makes an ironic comment: “But soon they will be the only ones left there”.

In fact, the Russians manipulated the information, as reported by the StopFake project. The data on the chart reflects the situation in Europe, but not in the world as a whole. According to the WPS Index, in 2023, the lowest scores were given to Afghanistan, Yemen, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan and several other countries. Ukraine is not in the top ten worst countries for women, it ranks 117th out of 177 countries. At the same time, Ukraine has the lowest score among European countries.

It is worth noting that Ukraine received such low ratings precisely because of the war with Russia, and they reflect the difficult realities that women face in war conditions. Thus, the aforementioned rating evaluates various components of women's status from participation in the economy to health and risks of violence. In particular, it includes assessments of education, security, parliamentary representation, maternal mortality, legal protection and proximity to armed conflict.

By manipulating information, Russia is trying to discredit Ukraine, influence its image in the world and shift the focus. Earlier, we documented a fake, supposedly, that the Bellingcat investigation proved that Yermak paid Time for a place in the ranking of the most influential people of the year.

Fake In Copenhagen, Russian “partisans” allegedly set fire to a warehouse with aid for the Ukrainian Armed Forces

Propaganda resources are spreading information that members of the pro-Kremlin Resistance movement set fire to a warehouse of the volunteer organization Autukrania biler til Ukraine in Copenhagen. The fire allegedly destroyed bulletproof vests, thermal imagers, helmets and transport that the volunteers planned to hand over to the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

According to the propagandists, the size of the “Resistance” is rapidly growing, which allows its participants to effectively resist the process of providing aid to Ukraine. This allegedly concerns dozens of cases of destruction of military and humanitarian aid, as well as logistical, infrastructural and other objects in Germany, Bulgaria, Poland and Moldova, in one way or another connected with the war in Ukraine.

However, this news is a fabrication, writes the StopFake project. Previously, the propagandists misspelled the name of the organization whose staff was allegedly destroyed in the fire. Auta Ukrainaa (not Autukrania) and Biler til Ukraine are two different organizations. In addition, only the second of them is actually based in Denmark. Both organizations provide assistance to Ukraine - the Finnish Auta Ukrainaa mainly transfers humanitarian supplies for the military and IDPs, and the Danish Biler til Ukraine provides the Armed Forces of Ukraine with cars and trucks.

StopFake journalists also contacted representatives of Biler til Ukraine, and they denied the news about the arson. Information about the fire at the warehouse of this organization did not appear in any Danish media. After all, the organization really does not operate in Copenhagen, but in another city in Denmark.

Also, it is likely that the information about the activities of the so-called resistance movement in Europe is made up. In some cases, it is more likely to be sabotaged by the Russian special services, rather than some mythical underground fighters.

Earlier we documented a Russian fake claim that Ukrainians in Romania destroyed a fuel composition that NATO troops used to conduct proxy operations in Ukraine.

Fake Russians are lying that in Lviv first-graders are forced to kneel to honor the memory of the fallen defenders

Information is being spread online that in one of Lviv's lyceums, first-graders are being forced to kneel and honor the memory of fallen Ukrainian soldiers. As evidence, the Russian propagandists add a photo of a complaint addressed to the lyceum's director, allegedly written by the mother of one of the 1-B class students. It states that the woman is against her daughter ‘honoring the memory of fallen Ukrainian soldiers by kneeling before the start of classes’.

The StopFake project checked this information and found out that the propagandists simply made up this news by fabricating a complaint.

In the photograph distributed by pro-Russian sources, it is noticeable that the complaint was allegedly written by “Halyna Ivanytska”, the mother of the student “Olena Ivanytska”, to the director of Lviv Lyceum No. 17, Iryna Luniova. And such a lyceum with such a director really does exist.

Therefore, StopFake journalists asked the director to confirm or deny the complaint and to tell whether the said practice really exists in this educational institution. But she replied that this information is completely fictitious. “No such complaints have been received by the director of Lyceum No. 17 of the Lviv City Council! And we do not do such things (getting on our knees – Ed.). There is no 1-C class in the Lyceum, we only have two of them. In addition, student Olena Ivanytska does not study and has never studied in our educational institution”, said Iryna Luniova.

StopFake also verified the information from the parents of first-graders. The head of the parents' committee of first-graders, Anastasiia Lysenko, confirmed that there is no practice of ‘getting on one's knees’ in the school, and there is no 1-C class with a student named “Olena Ivanytska”.

Previously, we recorded disinformation that children in Ukraine were forced to donate blood for the needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Fake The lie that the OCU priest refused to perform the funeral service for Ukrainian defenders baptized in the UOC (MP)

Russian sources are spreading information that in the city of Chernivtsi there was a quarrel between an OCU clergyman and a husband in a camouflage T-shirt. This allegedly happened due to the fault of the priest, who refused to perform the funeral service for two dead Ukrainian soldiers because they were baptized in the UOC (MP). As “proof”, Russian propagandists add a corresponding video in which the quarrel takes place, and people around shout “Shame! Disgrace!”

In fact, this information is not true. As Ukrinform journalists report, everything happened exactly the opposite. This quarrel occurred because of a priest of the UOC (MP), who refused to perform the funeral service for two Ukrainian soldiers because he did not want to conduct the service together with the chaplain of the OCU. The video was filmed on August 10, 2023 in the village of Irkliiv, Zolotoniskyi district, Cherkasy region. That is, Russian propaganda presented the inhumane actions of a priest of the Moscow Patriarchate Church, which led to a scandal in the community of the Cherkasy region, as the actions of a clergyman of the OCU.

Moreover, an identical situation occurred in the village of Vyzhenka in Bukovyna in March 2024. Then, a priest of the UOC-Moscow Patriarchate did not allow the coffin with the body of the deceased defender to be brought into the church. This was reported by MP Iryna Nykorak.

In this way, propagandists are reacting to the recently adopted bill #8371 on the ban in Ukraine of the activities of religious organizations with their headquarters in Russia. The Russians want to artificially split Ukrainian society on religious grounds.

Read on Censor.NET: How conspiracy theorists explain events in Ukraine and the world: the theory of ‘church persecution in Ukraine’

Fake Disinformation that the first secretary of the Ukrainian Embassy in Lebanon was injured as a result of the explosion in Beirut

Russian propagandists are speculating on the massive explosion of pagers in Lebanon on September 17, 2024. On their Telegram channels, they are spreading information that as a result of the explosion in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, the first secretary of the Ukrainian Embassy in Lebanon, Mykola Khomenko, was injured.

However, this is a fake. The Center for Countering Disinformation, after verifying the information in the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry and the Ukrainian Embassy in Lebanon, reported that there were no Ukrainian diplomats or Ukrainian citizens among the dead and wounded.

At the same time, according to the Iranian news agency Mehr, it was the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani, who was injured in one of the explosions.

Such fakes of Kremlin propaganda are aimed at accusing Ukraine of collaborating with terrorist groups and forcing international partners to refuse to provide any assistance in the war against Russia.

Orest Slyvenko, Artur Koldomasov, Vitalii Mykhailiv, Oleksandra Kotenko, Oleksandr Siedin, Kostiantyn Zadyraka, and Oleksiy Pivtorak are collaborating on this chronicle. Lesia Bidochko serves as the project coordinator, while Ksenia Ilyuk is the author of the project.