The war against Ukraine began in 2014, when Russia became directly involved in the creation of separatist formations in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. At that time, Russian propaganda, at the direction of the Kremlin, tried to present this as exclusively the people's will. This should have increased the informational noise around the “referenda on self-determination”, which are recognized as illegal, that is, their results are not recognized by other states of the world. Therefore, the new quasi-formations were named “Donetsk People's Republic” and “Luhansk People's Republic”. Such terminology is used by communist states to show in the name the importance of the people for power, although in reality these countries are far from “people's”, for example, the People's Republic of China or the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

Thus, Russia wants to shift the responsibility for its actions to Ukraine and justify them. They say that the people of Donbas suffered as part of Ukraine and wanted rapprochement with Russia, so Russia heard them and liberated them. The propagandists want to create a false impression of a split within the state and artificially deepen it.

This is a new text for the “Newspeak” section, which Detector Media launched as part of the “Disinformation Chronicles” project. In it, we will tell and explain new lexemes that Russian propaganda uses to distort reality.

Russian propaganda is again spreading the message that civilians in Bucha during the occupation were shot by Ukrainian artillery. Like, foreign experts came to such results, but they “keep silent” whose artillery killed local residents.

EU vs Disinfo analysts drew attention to a new wave of message dissemination. In the spring of 2022, Russian propaganda said that the Ukrainian military allegedly shelled people's houses in Bucha because they accepted help from the Russians. For this, a specially edited video of eyewitness accounts was used.

The New York Times journalists investigated and identified dozens of soldiers of the 234th airborne assault brigade of the Russian army, who in March 2022, during the temporary occupation of Bucha in the Kyiv region, deliberately killed civilians.

By spreading such messages, Russian propaganda is trying to shift the responsibility for the death of civilians to the Ukrainian army. Propagandists deny the numerous war crimes of the Russian army in Ukraine, despite the existing evidence.

Pro-Russian media disseminate such messages to foreign audiences. Like, reports of Russian crimes, including crimes against Ukrainian children, were deliberately invented by the US State Department. Allegedly, the State Department funded a Yale University study on the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia for the sole purpose of holding Russia accountable for “fictional crimes”. They say that the studies deliberately focus on the fact that children in Russia are placed in camps, appealing in association with concentration camps. “In fact” children are placed in comfortable conditions of children's camps.

EU vs Disinfo analysts drew attention to the spread of the message. Russian propaganda is spreading these messages against the backdrop of the publication of a report by American researchers on how Russia is deporting and “re-educating” Ukrainian children. It states that Russia is committing “serious violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention for the Protection of Civilian Persons”, that is, committing war crimes against Ukrainian children. There are at least six thousand children, the report says.

However, researchers from Yale University are not alone in drawing conclusions about crimes against Ukrainian children. This was confirmed by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi. He believes that Russia violates the fundamental principles of protecting children in time of war by providing children in the temporarily occupied territories with Russian passports and permission to be adopted by Russian families.

Russian propaganda thus tries to hide its crimes and shift the responsibility for them to others. They say that the United States deliberately “come up with” evidence of Russia's crimes.

Pro-Russian telegram channels write that Georgians bring Ukrainian flags to the protests, but this is inappropriate. Like, they are protesting against the law, which will allow the authorities to close the media and “crush” the opposition. And in Ukraine, all “opposition” media were allegedly closed and the opposition as such was “legally banned”. Allegedly, in Ukraine there is no freedom of speech, for which the Georgians are fighting.

Spreading such messages, Russian propaganda uses a substitution of concepts and calls opposition only pro-Russian political parties, which were really banned in Ukraine after the start of a full-scale war. The same applies to the media: those who spread messages supporting Russian propaganda were banned. That is, in Ukraine they are fighting not with the opposition, but with pro-Russian forces. Actually, in Georgia they are also protesting against changes in the legislation that imitate the Russian legislation on “foreign agents”.

Read more about the reaction of Russian propaganda to the protests in Georgia in the material selection of Detector Media.

Russian media are spreading reports about the “plans” of the Ukrainian army to “destroy the Crimeans”. Like, Ukraine allegedly “let slip about a new blockade” of the temporarily occupied Crimea, and the Ukrainian military “will spare no one”. This is manipulation.

The Ukrainian authorities have not made any statements about preparing “a blockade” of the temporarily Russian-occupied Crimea, and the Armed Forces of Ukraine are “not preparing to destroy the civilian” on the peninsula. According to StopFake fact-checkers, Russian prpaganda used the words of Ukrainian military analyst Petro Chernyk to report on the “preparation for a blockade” of Crimea. However, his opinion is not the official position of the political or military leadership of Ukraine.

On the air of the Ukrainian talk show, Petro Chernyk expressed his opinion that the military liberation of the temporarily occupied Crimea is a realistic plan for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He added that a military blockade of the peninsula could become an effective lever to start the liberation of Crimea. So, it was about the depletion of the Russian armed group in the temporarily occupied Crimea. Russian propaganda not only published the expert's own opinion as an official position, but also distorted the content of what was said.

Earlier, propagandists wrote that Ukraine’s disconnection of Crimea from electricity and water supply was a war crime, and Ukrainians rejoice that war has come to Crimea. Thus, the invaders are trying to turn the residents of the temporarily occupied peninsula against Ukraine and Ukrainians.

A video allegedly shooting down a helicopter that NATO provided to Ukraine is being circulated on social networks. Like, as soon as these helicopters cross the border of Ukraine, they deal with Russian missiles. Allegedly, the Russians shot down more than one such helicopter. Like, only China shows these videos, and the rest of the countries hide the information. It's fake.

The video of the helicopter shooting down is footage from the video game Arma 3. Reuters fact-checkers found the origin of this video. This footage is likely taken from a YouTube video uploaded in April 2022. It was labeled as a representation of the video game's origins, and was subsequently uploaded in lower resolution without such information. It is difficult to see the animation from the video of the worst quality, so the video may be perceived as real.

Russian propaganda has previously distributed video game cards to illustrate military events. In particular, in this way they were convincing people that Russia “had destroyed” the Ukrainian tank division. Video game footage was also passed off as an online broadcast of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The Kharkiv regional military administration reported that the invaders could broadcast under the fake name “Slobozhanske FM”. Ethers are on a wave of 100 MHz. They are not led by Ukrainian journalists. The enemy is misinforming the population of the Kharkiv region, using FM frequencies, on which it broadcasts fake news.

The Kharkiv regional military administration notes that all official information is broadcast on the following waves: Balakliia - 104.9 MHz; Zmiiv - 90.8 MHz; Blyzniuky, Lozova - 100.1 MHz; Barvinkove - 103.4 MHz.

We recall that earlier Russian hackers penetrated the air of several Ukrainian radio stations and spread a fake about “Zelenskyi in intensive care”. More details.

Russian propagandists are spreading the message that a Ukrainian court has ordered the demolition of the Church of the Tithes (Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary) in Kyiv. Like, the Ukrainians want to destroy the historical building restored in 2007, which is more than 1000 years old. This is manipulation.

EU vs Disinfo analysts drew attention to the spread of manipulation, in particular to a foreign audience. Tithe Church is considered the first stone church of Kyiv Rus. The church was destroyed during the Mongol assault on Kyiv in 1240. The renovated Tithe Church was destroyed again in 1928. Since that time, the church has not been restored. The remains of the foundation of the Church of the Tithes are a monument of national importance. Both the foundation and the area around it are protected by UNESCO.

Propaganda reports speak of the demolition of a chapel near the foundations of the Church of the Tithes, which representatives of the Moscow patriarchate church call the Tithe Monastery of the nativity of the holy theotokos. The Church of the Moscow patriarchate received permission to place a tent on this site for a one-time festive service. After that, they did not remove the tent, moreover, they turned it into a full-fledged chapel, despite the fact that any construction on this historical territory is prohibited. That is, the court decision refers to the demolition of an illegal structure in the historical part of the city, and not an ancient Orthodox church.

Russian propaganda systematically manipulates religious topics, in particular, claims that Ukraine is on the verge of a large-scale inter-confessional conflict, Ukrainians defame Orthodoxy, that the Orthodox Church of Ukraine calls on its own behalf to kill Russians. Thus, they are trying to destabilize the situation in Ukraine and quarrel Ukrainians with different religious beliefs.