Such information is disseminated by pro-Kremlin media and anonymous telegrams. They say that 46% of Ukrainians living in the front-line regions are in favor of ending the war without returning the territories. In asserting this, propagandists refer to the all-Ukrainian public opinion poll Omnibus of the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS), which was conducted from November 29 to December 9, 2023. However, Russian propaganda manipulates its results.

In the “BezBrekhni” (No Lies) project, experts worked on this case. It turned out that the majority of respondents - 58% - are inclined to believe that even in the event of a significant reduction in assistance from Western countries, military operations should still be continued to put pressure on the occupiers. Moreover, this should be done even taking into account the risks for the territories controlled by Ukraine now.

Still, in the south and east of Ukraine, opinions were divided approximately in half, with a slight predominance of sentiment in favor of continuing hostilities. Yes, in the south 46%, and in the east 47% of Ukrainians believe that even with limited Western assistance, fighting should continue. At the same time, 40% and 42%, respectively, are ready to agree to a cessation of hostilities.

None of the options says that any part of society is willing to cede territory. In the survey, there is the following wording: “The fighting stops with serious security guarantees from the West, but the liberation of the territories is postponed for an indefinite future”. That is, we are not talking about the surrender of territories, as propaganda claims, but about the fact that their de-occupation will occur in the future.

KIIS also notes that “in this case, the factor of proximity to the front line plays an important role. The south and east are significantly closer to the active combat zone, which largely leads to a higher willingness to cease hostilities in the face of limited assistance (although, remember, the vast majority in these regions believe that with proper assistance Ukraine can succeed)”.

By manipulating the results of this survey, propagandists are trying to influence the morale of Ukrainians - to sow panic, fear and uncertainty in the future of the country. Moreover, in this case, Russian propaganda also encourages Ukrainian citizens to rethink the course of the war, saying that “the long-awaited victory may not happen”.  Detector Media has previously denied information that the majority of Ukrainians allegedly want to capitulate.

Pro-Russian telegram channels write that in the near future Ukrainian troops will supposedly begin to retreat from the left bank of the Kherson region, from the village of Krynky, since the losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces there can be calculated in the dozens. They say that since the end of autumn 2023, the Ukrainian military has been “pushed” there not to expand the bridgehead, but to inevitable death. In the Russian army, supposedly in Krynky there are only a few wounded. In asserting this, propagandists refer to Putin’s statement made during the “direct line” on December 14, 2023. However, this is not true.

The experts from the Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security analyzed this case. They found out that in fact the situation in the village of Krynky, which is described in propaganda publications, referring to Putin, is significantly exaggerated, as are the “tactical successes” of the Russian occupiers in this direction. In addition, a cemetery of broken Russian equipment has already accumulated near Krynky, which is confirmed by video recordings of precise strikes by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the occupiers. By the way, presumably, in the area of the village of Krynky in the fall of 2023, the deputy of the 14th Army Corps of the Russian Armed Forces, Major General Zavadskyi, died.

It should be noted that on December 14, 2023, the day of Putin’s “direct line”, the British Ministry of Defense reports specifically on the problems of the Russian military on the left bank of Kherson, and not the Ukrainian army. They write there that the newly formed 104th Guards Airborne Division of Russia with a high probability suffered extremely heavy losses when trying to dislodge Ukrainian forces from Krynky.

Speaking about the successes of Russians on the left bank of the Kherson region, Russian propaganda is trying to create the idea that the Russian army has a great advantage there. In addition, in this way, propagandists once again exceed the achievements of the Russian military in the war in Ukraine. Previously, we analyzed the propaganda message that Ukraine is allegedly preparing for the surrender of Kherson.

Russian telegram channels are distributing a video recording of an unknown woman who, on condition of anonymity, says that the Ukrainian military seems to be robbing residential buildings and apartments in Kherson because they will “surrender the city”. They justify their actions by the fact that they do not want to leave Russia.

The very fact of the appearance of information with reference to an anonymous authority already indicates its dubiousness. The Russians are conducting IPSO as if they are actively advancing on all sectors of the front and are preparing to occupy Kherson. In fact, the reality is different - the Ukrainian Armed Forces are conducting an operation on the left bank of the Kherson region, and this gives grounds to assert that the information about the surrender of Kherson is an invention of Russian propaganda.

With disinformation about the alleged capture of Kherson, the Russians are trying to cover up their failures on the battlefield and discredit the Ukrainian army. Moreover, the Russians launched similar messages before the Kharkiv region was liberated in September 2022.

• Read also: The Ukrainian Armed Forces allegedly deliberately shelled the center of Kherson

The Russians are promoting a message about the alleged appearance of “two armies” in Ukraine: one under the command of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the other under the Commander of the Ground Forces Oleksandr Syrskyi. Arguments allegedly confirming this thesis boil down to the fact that President Volodymyr Zelenskyi had personal communication with Syrskyi.

The Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council explains that the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief is working, so personal meetings between Zelenskyi and Zaluzhnyi, and Zaluzhnyi himself with Syrskyi are regular. In Ukraine there is a clear vertical: Supreme Commander-in-Chief (President) - Ministry of Defense - Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - Ground Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

The message itself about “two Ukrainian armies” is beneficial primarily to Russia. In this way, Russian propaganda is trying to sow discord among the military-political leadership of Ukraine, Ukrainians and weaken us. Previously, Detector Media denied information that the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was allegedly calling for a military coup.

Propagandists began re-distributing the old fake news using bot farms. According to it, deputies of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine should allegedly resign due to martial law. As it is written in the Constitution of Ukraine. However, this is fake.

Specialists of the NotaYenota project drew attention to it. They found errors in these messages (in particular, according to Ukrainian legislation in Ukraine it is not “military”, as indicated in the message, but martial law), and also found out that the Constitution clearly defines that during a martial law or state of emergency the powers of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine continue until the day of the first meeting of the new convocation of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, elected after the end of the martial law or state of emergency (Article 83, paragraph 3). During the period of martial law, the powers of the President of Ukraine, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, the National Bank of Ukraine and other higher bodies cannot be terminated (Article 10 of the Law “On the Legal Regime of Martial Law”).

The post indicated in the publication is distributed using a botnet with the aim of sowing discord in Ukrainian society. They say that the war is not worth it, because the deputies continue to sit in the Rada, so the war must be stopped on Russia’s terms. However, legal inaccuracies indicate that the messages are fake.

This information is disseminated by pro-Russian resources. Russian propaganda refers to an interview with the head of the Servant of the People faction, Davyd Arakhamiia, who allegedly said that Ukraine could have stopped the war by agreeing to the neutral, non-bloc status proposed by Russia. However, representatives of Ukraine “rejected peace” and “doomed hundreds of thousands of their citizens to death”. This is manipulation.

This case was processed by fact-checkers from the StopFake project. They found out that Arakhamiia stated that Ukraine really did not agree to the non-bloc status proposed by Russia, but there were objective reasons for this. Firstly, there is no trust in Russia’s promises to withdraw troops and not engage in hostilities with Ukraine anymore, and secondly, the Constitution of Ukraine should be changed, since the path to NATO is written there.

Throughout the war, the Russians have been promoting the thesis that Ukraine itself does not agree to peace. Thus, the Kremlin wants to show that the root cause of the armed aggression was allegedly the actions of Ukraine, which “provoked” Russia to war, and that in fact it was the Russian government that was the “peacemaker”. The purpose of such a narrative is to refute that it was Russia that started the war and that it was Russia that is to blame for all the crimes committed against the Ukrainian people.

Read on Censor.NET: 90% of Ukrainians are against territorial concessions to the aggressor, even for the sake of ending the war.

Russian telegram channels are distributing a video by a TikTok user under the nickname shket057, in which soldiers of the 167th brigade of the Ukrainian Defense Forces disorganizedly retreat from their positions near Bilohorivka. They say that such actions are related to the lack of supplies of resources necessary for fighting on the battlefield. However, this is fake.

Experts at the Center for Countering Disinformation analyzed this video. They found out that the profile from which the video was distributed duplicates the real page of the user shket057, but this video is not on it. In addition, in this case, the fact that there are no 167 brigades in the Armed Forces of Ukraine is also important.

To make things more credible, propagandists create fake accounts on TikTok, where they spread their lies on behalf of the Ukrainian military. The purpose of such actions is to demoralize the population of Ukraine, sow panic among them and assure everyone of the successes of the Russian army on the battlefield. The Russians also spread information that Ukraine allegedly went on the defensive along the entire front line, however, this turned out to be a manipulation of the words of Hanna Maliar, the former Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine.

Various photographs are actively being circulated in the Ukrainian segment of social networks, in which it is believed that Ukrainian soldiers are on their knees, praying for salvation. Like, Avdiivka asks for prayer. However, these photos are fake.

Over the past few weeks, StopFake analysts have observed the spread of various pictures on social networks depicting Ukrainian military personnel, with calls to pray for their fate. Similar publications are distributed mainly by bot accounts.

In fact, these images are not authentic - they were all created using artificial intelligence technology. Neural networks such as Midjourney, Bing Image Creator, DALL-E or DeepAI are capable of independently creating completely new content or transforming existing ones. Using services like AI or Not, one can check whether an image was created using AI or not. However, now it is possible to distinguish real photographs from artificially created ones without special tools - by carefully studying all the details in the picture. StopFake analysts checked the images circulating online using the AI or Not tool and found that they were likely all generated by a neural network.

The fact that this is an artificially created image is also indicated by many errors. For example, analyzing the image of a girl in military uniform in one of the photographs, you can notice: an incorrect image of the limbs (one leg, unnatural position of the fingers); the absence of a body and an example of a machine gun (in addition, the weapon in the photo does not resemble any of the models in service with the Armed Forces of Ukraine); incorrect image of the sleeve chevron (its size and color of the flag of Ukraine). In addition, the camouflage pattern of the uniform that the people in the photo are wearing is not used in the Ukrainian army, and is generally not similar to any real-life camouflage option.

Propagandists are likely spreading such images with the aim of demoralizing Ukrainians amid the fierce fighting for Avdiivka. Allegedly, the only thing left to do is pray, everything is so bad.  Detector Media has repeatedly refuted other fakes regarding the Ukrainian military.

Pro-Kremlin resources are spreading information that the West has finally realized that Russia is not going to lose the war to Ukraine. Propagandists also claim that Western countries allegedly realize that they cannot compete with Russia in the production of weapons. In its publications, Russian propaganda refers to an article entitled “It’s time to end magical thinking about Russia’s defeat” by the online newspaper The Wall Street Journal (WSJ). This is manipulation.

The fact-checkers from the StopFake project processed this information. They managed to find out that propagandists disseminate only those theses that confirm the narrative that is favorable to them about Russia’s military and economic achievements. In addition, the Russians are distorting the true content of the mentioned WSJ article. For example, the conclusion that the West is unable to compete with Russia in either the volume or quality of weapons production is based on a single phrase in the WSJ article that Russia produces more artillery shells than the West. That is, we are talking about only one type of ammunition, and the quality of the product is not mentioned at all.

The most important thing, as the authors of the article emphasize, is that “contrary to all forecasts, Ukraine withstood the Russian attack, and in less than two years, wiped out an entire decade of Russian military modernization”.

The authors of the material on the WSJ also believe that the West responded quite effectively to the immediate challenges caused by a full-scale invasion, and provided Ukraine with modern weapons and intelligence data in real time, as well as the development of sanctions packages against Russia. It should be noted that the article also says that the war is dragging on, and therefore Ukraine’s allies do not have the right to rely on “magical thinking” that Ukraine will soon win and peace will come. Rather, the authors write, we should move to long-term strategies to combat Russia. Detector Media also previously denied information that the West allegedly revealed the map of its plans, where there is almost no Ukraine.

Propagandists spreading pro-Russian rhetoric in the media began to disseminate information based on an interview with the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi to the British publication The Sun. Like, he admitted that Russian aggression is “supported” by most of the world, and the interests of Ukraine are defended by “at best 14 countries”. In addition, according to them, Zelenskyi allegedly admitted “Ukraine’s inability to resist the military actions waged by Russia”. This is manipulation.

Analysts from the StopFake project drew attention to it. They found that in fact, the President of Ukraine, in an interview with The Sun, accused Putin of “fuelling a fire” around the world that risks spiraling out of control, and added that a Hamas attack on Israel was Russia’s “great desire”. According to Zelenskyi, Russia plans to continue destabilizing the situation in the world, and the Balkans may be next to come under attack. According to him, this will continue until the Russian regime is stopped and punished.

Zelenskyi did note that Russia does not yet “feel that the whole world is against it”, but he did not claim that Russian aggression is “supported” by most of the world. The UN General Assembly condemned the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine by an absolute majority: the resolution “Aggression against Ukraine” was supported by 141 countries, and only five delegations - totalitarian Russia, Belarus, North Korea, Syria and Eritrea - voted against. In addition, on November 23, 2022, the European Parliament voted in favor of a resolution declaring Russia a state sponsor of terrorism for its large-scale invasion of the territory of Ukraine. A month earlier – on October 13, 2022 – PACE adopted a resolution in which it also declared the Russian regime terrorist. In addition, on October 13, 2023, PACE recommended that member states of the Council of Europe recognize Putin as illegitimate at the end of his current presidential term and cease all contacts with him. All these decisions of international institutions are the consequences of Russian aggression, which clearly demonstrate the unprecedented support for Ukraine by leading democratic countries.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyi also did not make any statements in this interview about Ukraine’s inability to resist Russia.

Propagandists spread such manipulations in order to personally discredit Zelenskyi and accuse him of betraying the interests of Ukrainian citizens. They say that the war must be stopped on Russia’s terms, and even the President of Ukraine admits this. Detector Media has repeatedly refuted the fabrications of propagandists aimed at personal attacks against Zelenskyi.

Propagandists spreading pro-Russian rhetoric on social networks claim that Ukraine stated that it was the military personnel who came to the reburial, and not civilians, who died in the village of Hroza during Russian shelling. However, this is manipulation.

Analysts from the VoxCheck project drew attention to it. They found out that civilians were killed in the attack in the village. Among the 59 victims was even a young child, 8-year-old Ivan Kozyr. Claims that about 100 military personnel attended the commemoration are also untrue.

Minister of Internal Affairs Ihor Klymenko stressed that the Russians killed 59 civilians with a direct hit from an Iskander missile, including pensioners, doctors, farmers, teachers, and entrepreneurs. Entire generations of families were victims of the tragedy. It was established that two traitors were behind the crime, who corrected the attack on the cafe. These are the brothers Volodymyr and Dmytro Mamon, who went over to the enemy side.

Targeting civilians is a war crime under international humanitarian law. The UN believes there is sufficient evidence of Russia's involvement in the strike, although Russia has not admitted direct responsibility for the crime.

By spreading such manipulations, propagandists want to shift responsibility for the crimes of the aggressor onto the victim of aggression and justify the Russian military.

Pro-Russian resources are spreading information that the Ukrainian army has stopped attacking and gone on the defensive, and the Russian military is stretching the Ukrainian Armed Forces along the entire front line. In asserting this, propagandists refer to an interview with former Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine Hanna Maliar, which she gave to the online publication Liga.net.

Experts from the Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security developed this case. It turned out that the Russians manipulated Maliar’s words. In the interview, she made an assumption about the task of the Russians: to prevent the Ukrainian army from concentrating forces in a specific place. Also, the former Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine noted that it is the Russian army that is stretching its troops along the front line in order to exhaust the Ukrainian defenders and prepare itself for offensive actions. In the end, there were no statements from Maliar that Ukraine was no longer advancing.

Thus, Russian propaganda is trying to discredit the Ukrainian counteroffensive and assure everyone around that the advantage on the front line lies in Russia. Previously, we refuted the information that Valerii Zaluzhnyi allegedly ordered preparations for defense between Mykolaiv and Odesa.

Social networks began to spread messages in Ukrainian with the information that “our army liberated 270-300 km², losing 71 thousand soldiers killed”. The publications also say: in order to de-occupy all territories, it will be necessary to “kill” almost 29 million Ukrainians.

Specialists from the Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security analyzed such messages. They found out that such publications are Russian IPSO. As for the deoccupied territories, this is the case – as of September 10, 2023, the Armed Forces of Ukraine actually liberated about 270 km². However, the data on the number of Ukrainian military deaths during hostilities is invented, since this information is a state secret and will be made public by Ukraine only after the end of the war. It turns out that the “calculation” of future losses was made on the basis of imaginary data, so it cannot be considered reliable.

Propagandists manipulate information and create facts because they see this as effective and potentially influential on Ukrainian society. Such disinformation is spread with the aim of demoralizing Ukrainians and making them think about giving up. When reading similar cases that can evoke strong emotions, we encourage you to think critically. We also worked on the Russian information campaign, when on behalf of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, recipes for dishes from pigeons and dogs were sent to Ukrainians in connection with the alleged crisis in the agricultural sector in Ukraine.

Self-proclaimed colonel, collaborator and war criminal Eduard Basurin claims that “denazification and demilitarization of Ukraine continues”. In general, the Russian leadership and propagandists are promoting the message that the so-called “special operation” is constantly ongoing, and all its goals will certainly be achieved.

Experts from the Center for Countering Disinformation drew attention to this repeated mantra. For example, Volodymyr Putin announced the two above-mentioned goals of the SVO on February 24, 2023. Moreover, another reason for the full-scale invasion, according to him, was “the protection of the residents of Donbas”. Over time, the Kremlin has already changed entire war goals against Ukraine many times, which indicates its confusion and misunderstanding between the military-political leadership of Russia.

Read also: The main goal of the so-called “SVO” is supposedly not to seize Ukraine, but to ensure the security of Russia

This thesis was spread by pro-Kremlin media. Reports say that Ukraine seems to be using prohibited methods of warfare, in particular using prohibited weapons. They say this is stated in the Landmine Monitor 2023 report, compiled by independent experts from different countries, which was presented to the UN on November 14, 2023.

The case was studied by StopFake project specialists and explained: the analysts who worked on the report reported that Ukraine began an investigation into the case of how the Ukrainian Armed Forces “used anti-personnel mines in the city of Izium and its environs in 2022, when the city was under Russian control”. The report emphasized that Ukraine then used mines against Russian military targets, but as a result, “civilians suffered”. This case in relation to Ukraine is isolated, and international experts have recorded hundreds of facts of widespread use of prohibited weapons in Ukraine by Russian occupiers.

Among other things, the document wrote that Russia, probably with the help of neighboring Belarus, is actively using anti-personnel mines in Ukraine. According to the data presented in the report, in Ukraine in 2022 there was a tenfold increase in the number of victims of anti-personnel mines compared to the year before the full-scale Russian invasion.

Russia tries to ignore cases of the use of prohibited weapons and pays attention only to Ukrainian actions - although the case of the use of an anti-personnel mine is isolated, and it was primarily used to replace a Russian military facility.

The online media of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, ArmyInform, explains that the Ottawa Convention of 1997 provides for a complete cessation of the use of non-directional anti-personnel mines, a cessation of their production and accumulation. Ukraine signed the mine ban agreement on February 24, 1999 in New York and ratified it on December 27, 2005, becoming a state party on June 1, 2006. Russia is not a party to the Convention, so it has been using them since the beginning of the war back in 2014.

This information is promoted by Spiridon Kilinkarov, a former Ukrainian politician, a traitor to Ukraine. He is hiding in Russia and speaking on Kremlin propaganda channels. In his opinion, Russia’s aggression is justified because it guarantees the country’s security. Kilinkarov argues that we are not talking exclusively about new territories for Russia, but about the exhaustive implementation of the assigned tasks for the Russian army.

The experts from the Center for Countering Disinformation examined this case. It turns out that by spreading such a message, the traitor makes Russia a victim of circumstances. They say that Russia must defend itself from NATO and the collective West, and therefore is forced to resort to armed confrontation on neutral territory, in Ukraine, playing ahead. A similar version of the reason for the full-scale invasion was voiced by the self-proclaimed President of Belarus Oleksandr Lukashenko: Russia launched a “preventive strike” because Ukraine was allegedly planning an attack on Belarus.

Pro-Kremlin resources are disseminating the words of Russian Defense Minister Serhii  Shoihu, who stated that in October the Russian army allegedly managed to destroy 37 Ukrainian combat aircraft. This is almost 2 times more than the promised number of F-16s for Kyiv. Despite the supply of new types of “NATO” weapons, Ukraine seems to continue to lose. However, this is a fake.

The specialists from the Vox Ukraine team analyzed this case. They found that OSINT analysts did not record large losses of the Ukrainian Air Force in October 2023. The Dutch open-source reconnaissance site Oryx found only one destroyed Su-25 during this period. In addition, according to the agreements of the Ukrainian authorities and partner states, Ukraine should receive more than 18 F-16 aircraft - propagandists are manipulating information. On August 21, 2023, Volodymyr Zelenskyi announced that Ukraine would receive 42 aircraft from the Netherlands and 19 from Denmark. Later, a clarification appeared: the Netherlands will transfer some of the mentioned 42 aircraft to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, and some will be left for pilot training. On August 24, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stør also announced the transfer of F-16 aircraft to Ukraine. In the end, Belgium will also join the supply of equipment of this type from 2025. It should be noted that Norway and Belgium still did not specify the number of aircraft that they are ready to transfer.

Russian propaganda exaggerates the achievements of the Russian army, trying to spread another “victorious” story from the front line among ordinary Russians. That is, propagandists engage in eye-catching activities and publish fake information from the combat zone. After all, we previously published information that Shoihu “knocked down”  a bunch of planes and ATACMS in five days.

Media spreading pro-Russian rhetoric are spreading a fake news story about the Ukrainian parliament passing a law that allegedly aims to “hide up torture in prisons”. According to it, since other countries refuse to extradite detained Ukrainians to Ukraine due to “non-compliance with human rights” there, the Verkhovna Rada decided to pass a law that will protect such prisoners. This, it would seem, is being carried out with the goal of “convincing partners to hand over persons unpleasant” to the regime to the neo-Nazis. However, this is manipulation.

Specialists from the StopFake project drew attention to it. They point out that propagandists not only misspelled the name of the Verkhovna Rada deputy who co-authored the bill — not Vadym Bozhyk, but Valerii Bozhyk — but also distorted the content of the legislative initiative for propaganda purposes. We are talking about bill No. 9451, the purpose of which is to ensure respect for the rights and freedoms of convicted Ukrainians extradited to Ukraine for prosecution or execution of a sentence. The explanatory note notes that the law was proposed due to the refusal of many countries to fulfill requests for extradition to Ukraine due to violations in Ukrainian penal institutions of Article 3 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms on the prohibition of torture, as well as due to the inability to ensure security during the stay of persons in penal institutions under martial law.

Bozhyk explained that because of this law, the Ministry of Justice receives the authority to approve a list of correctional labor or educational colonies to which Ukrainians from extradition will be transferred. It is also indicated that such institutions will fully comply with both the requirements of national legislation and Ukraine’s international obligations in the field of human rights.

Propagandists spread such manipulations to discredit Ukraine and portray it as a country that systematically violates international law. Detector Media has already repeatedly refuted other Russian video fakes.

Media and social media users spreading pro-Russian rhetoric claim that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi ordered the Ukrainian military to “immediately leave” the city of Avdiivka in the Donetsk region, supported by a corresponding video. However, this video is fake.

Analysts from the StopFake project drew attention to it. They found out that the video used old footage and a voice similar to the voice of the Ukrainian president. In addition, it is distributed only by users of social networks, pro-Russian sites and Telegram channels. Not a single authoritative Ukrainian or English-language media reported such a “loud” order from the Ukrainian president. In addition, this video distributed by Russian propaganda is not on Zelensky’s official pages on social networks, where he usually publishes his addresses.

Secondly, with a detailed review of the fake “video message”, it is noticeable that Zelenskyi’s facial expressions do not correspond to his language. StopFake specialists discovered an identical video with Zelenskyi dated October 31, 2023. However, in the original video, the president does not issue any “orders” regarding Avdiivka, but talks about the situation in the Black Sea, the work of the “grain corridor”, international support, and so on. To create a fake, audio with an artificially created voice of Zelenskyi about the order to leave Avdiivka was simply superimposed on this video, using the corporate style of the 1+1 TV channel for greater credibility.

By spreading such fakes, propagandists want to cause panic among Ukrainians and personal distrust of Zelenskyi. Like, Ukraine is losing. However, Detector Media also refuted other fakes and manipulations on a similar topic, where propagandists manipulated the President of Ukraine.

Russian media are disseminating information that supposedly the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, said that the European Union recognized Ukraine’s loss in the war. However, this is manipulation.

Analysts from the StopFake project drew attention to it. They found that propagandists used Borrell's statement, taking it out of context. In fact, the diplomat had no doubt about the prospect of ending the war in Ukraine’s favor. The quote was taken from the speech of the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security during the Congress of the Party of European Socialists in Malaga, Spain on November 11. Borrell said that EU countries must be prepared to continue to support Ukraine in countering Russian aggression.

Although Borrell did say that Ukraine's victory over Russia “does not happen overnight”,  Russian media deliberately skipped a significant part of the European diplomat's speech that followed this phrase. Borrell emphasized that the greatest security guarantee that the EU can provide to Ukraine is its membership in the “European family”. However, for this to happen, the Union must remain united and prepare for a longer conflict than Russia had planned, which hoped to take over the country in two weeks and establish its own puppet regime, similar to the Belarusian one. Borrell emphasized that, despite the expectations of dictator Putin, Ukraine not only did not fall, but is also recapturing its territories. This became possible thanks to Ukraine's fierce resistance against the Kremlin regime and the support of its allies. Thus, according to the EU representative, Ukraine is the EU's top priority, and work to support the country must continue until it wins the war.

Propagandists spread such fake news because they want to convince Ukrainians that even their closest allies have allegedly turned their backs on them. Like, if the EU has already recognized Ukraine’s loss, the situation is definitely catastrophic. However, this is not the case, and Detector Media has repeatedly refuted such fakes and manipulations of Russian propaganda.

Propaganda resources are trying to disorient the Ukrainian Defense Forces with messages about the alleged withdrawal of the Russian army from some temporarily occupied territories of the Kherson region. Thus, on the morning of November 12, pro-Russian media published news about the regrouping of Russian troops near Dnipro, and on November 13 they deleted their publications and reported that the preliminary information was canceled.

The Center for National Resistance investigated this case and stated that the regrouping of Russian troops in the Kherson region has not been recorded. This was reported to the Center by local residents of the temporarily occupied territories (TOT) of the Kherson region, which are discussed in the “news”. It looks like this case is an information operation against Ukraine. The Center for National Resistance also added that the withdrawal of Russian troops from the Kherson region is a matter of time.

This thesis was spread on social networks in the Russian segment. Reports say that in fact, all current wars are the result of the US aggressive policy in the world. And they explain that the reason for the Russian-Ukrainian war, as well as the Israeli war against Hamas, is the White House, which seeks to create “zones of instability” and sow discord.

Analysts from the EU vs Disinfo project took up the case and explained that this is a typical conspiracy theory of Russian propagandists. So they are trying to absolve themselves of responsibility for military aggression, explaining it by external influences. The authors convince us that most often, peaceful people who suffer from “external control” pay taxes “God knows where”, are zombied by “Western values” and have literally lost the right to be heard. That is, they show that such an “impact” is not good and leads to stagnation in all spheres of people’s lives. To strengthen their argument, they add information about Israel's war with the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas. Accordingly, the war in Israel was caused by the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023.

Consequently, the Kremlin benefits from aggravation in the Middle East, because it distracts attention from what the Russian army is doing in Ukraine.

Let us recall that the Institute for the Study of War's statement as of October 7 said that the Kremlin is using the Hamas attack on Israel for information operations aimed at weakening support for Ukraine by the United States and other Western partners.

In the pro-Kremlin media and in the Russian segment of the Facebook social network, information is spread that in 25 days almost as many civilians have been killed in the Gaza Strip as allegedly killed in Ukraine in 563 days, that is, since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. Russian propaganda presents an infographic comparing the number of victims. This is manipulation.

The case was investigated by the fact-checkers of the StopFake project. In the graphs published by Russian propaganda, it is stated that 8 thousand 796 people died in Gaza during the 25 days of the conflict, of which 3648 are children. There were 24,000 wounded, of which 9,600 were children. These data are provided by the UN.

During the 563 days of the full-scale war in Ukraine, 9,614 people died, including 554 children. 17,535 people were injured, of which 1,180 were children. However, the Office of the United Nations and High Commissioner for Human Rights believe that “the actual figures are much higher”, because the organization's calculations do not take into account data from occupied cities where fierce fighting took place, such as Mariupol, Lysychansk, Popasna and Sievierodonetsk, where there are reports of numerous victims among the civilian population.

This was also stated by the spokesman of the UN Office for Human Rights in Ukraine, Kryshtof Yanovskyi. He noted that it is impossible to provide exact figures from Mariupol. Ukrainian human rights activists believe that in Mariupol alone, the Russian invaders killed about 100,000 people.

By manipulating numbers and using a sensitive topic for this, Russian propagandists are trying to put psychological pressure on Ukrainians. Russians also want to whiten themselves: as if against the background of Israel, which, regardless of morality, kills people, Russia looks like a humanistic country, because it supposedly protects Ukrainians. Earlier, we refuted the fake that Economy Minister Svyrydenko said that Ukraine would restore the Gaza Strip.

Russian media broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric are spreading the statement of Ukraine's Economy Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko that Kyiv is bound to restore the Gaza Strip after the end of the conflict. It is not true.

The case was investigated by the fact-checkers of the StopFake project. They established that Yuliia Svyrydenko did not make such statements, and the quote used by Russian propagandists is completely fabricated. There were also no statements by the minister or anyone from the department in the official communication channels of the Ministry of Ukraine.

Russian propaganda spread a fictional quote in the context of the fact that Ukraine will once again “beg for money” from the West for its supposedly new project.

In this way, Russian propagandists try to discredit Ukraine, undermine the narrative about its lack of independence and show it as a “beggar country”, and as a result reduce the support of Western partners. Earlier, we refuted the fake that Israel is calling Ukrainians to join the IDF.

Russian high-ranking officials claim that it is absurd to talk about the prospects of Ukraine's victory. They said that all the goals that were set for the special military operation will be fulfilled.

Specialists of the Center of Countering Disinformation of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine drew attention to this message. They found such statements to be manipulative and contrasted with Russia's front-line failures, sanctions pressure, and heavy casualties during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

By spreading such messages, propagandists are trying to establish among Russians the myth of the power of the Russian army. Moreover, such reports also aim to show that everything is supposedly under control in Russia. They seek to create the impression that Russia is in a winning position and will fight against Ukraine until it achieves its own goals. There were more such messages against the background of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, which Russian propagandists repeatedly tried to discredit. Detector Media wrote about this, refuting a number of fakes and messages on this topic.