One of the factors that supposedly symbolizes the unity of Russian society and the state is the “great Russian culture”. In them, domestic literature is an important component of culture, the spiritual habitat of the people. This is about Pushkin, Dostoievskyi, Chekhov, Chaikovskyi, Gogol or Tolstoi in particular.

Russians use the term “great Russian culture” in fact with the goal of overcoming their inferiority complex and artificially exalting it in the international arena. They say that the cultures of different countries and peoples have the right to exist, but the “great” one, that is, with an exceptionally rich heritage, is Russian.

For centuries, Russia destroyed Ukrainian culture: language, history, customs and traditions, cultural elite, and this is not an exhaustive list. The Russians distorted facts and appropriated Ukrainian writers and cultural figures, for example, the writer Mykola Gogol or the artist Kazymyr Malevych. Ukraine is allegedly a territory that has always belonged first to the Soviet and now to the Russian heritage.

Russia's war against Ukraine showed the true face of the aggressor. It turned out that the “great Russian culture” can massively educate murderers, rapists and marauders who have thousands of war crimes to their credit. Russians also show the “greatness” of the culture they grew up with by physically destroying monuments of Ukrainian cultural heritage.

For example, in the town of Ivankiv in the Kyiv region, the occupiers fired at and set fire to the local history museum, which housed almost 20 works by the world-famous Ukrainian artist Mariia Prymachenko. In the Kharkiv region, Russian troops destroyed the National Museum of Hryhorii Skovoroda with a direct missile hit. In the Zaporizhzhia region, Russians robbed and destroyed the Vasylivskyi Historical and Architectural Museum “Popov’s Estate”, which is a national monument. The Ministry of Culture and Information Policy claims that in total, the Russians have damaged 664 cultural heritage sites in Ukraine as of July 2023.

The position of Russian culture as great has always had the goal of justifying violence and disregard for others, which is one of the manifestations of xenophobia. Of course, one can be proud of one’s own culture, but when it actually appropriates the achievements of others of its own kind and tries to rewrite history, then talking about the “greatness” of that culture, in our case Russian, makes no sense. It turns out that there is no “great Russian culture” - this is a fiction, rather aimed at emphasizing the supposed superiority of this culture over all others.

In the Ukrainian segment of the Facebook social network, an alleged poem by Taras Shevchenko is being spread, where he seems to predict the events of modern Ukraine: “The poor man cries, the rich man rejoices, and the government robs. Poor people bury sons killed in the war. A rich man who is full and proud makes a wedding”. However, there is no such poem in the works of the Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko.

The case was investigated by fact-checkers of the Center for Countering Disinformation. Taras Shevchenko does not have such a poem, and it is not written in his style. This was pointed out by the Ukrainian writer Oksana Zabuzhko: “Style, damn, style: no matter how the Chekist rabble disguises itself, no matter how it forges a voice for itself, as in the fairy tale about the wolf and the kid, the style will definitely betray them”. In her opinion, “Shevchenko's fakes” are “concocted in the style of an illiterate graphomaniac and thrown into the network as if they belonged to the pen of Taras Shevchenko, with a postscript, to encourage the spreaders, in the spirit of “oh how relevant, indeed a prophet! [...]”.

The original source of the fake poem is the Solomia Ukrainets Facebook page, which is not the first time that it promotes disinformation, anti-Semitism and pro-Russian narratives. In 2018, the publication Chitomo wrote about this with reference to the research Opora.

In this way, Russian propaganda tries to destabilize Ukrainian society, discredit the Ukrainian government and incite a rebellion against it. This “fake poem” appears in posts accusing the authorities of devaluing the lives of Ukrainians almost at the same time as Russian fakes that the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces is calling for a military coup.

Russian media, broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric, are disseminating information that Western countries are using the war in Ukraine to take away Ukrainian historical values. In the Kharkiv Historical Museum, allegedly under the guise of digitizing monuments, they are exporting them to the west of Ukraine, where “their traces are lost”. They seem to be taken “for temporary storage”, but in fact they are not going to return them. This is manipulation.

The case was investigated by the fact-checker of the StopFake project. The Kharkiv Historical Museum named after M. F. Sumtsov is a participant in the international project “Memory Savers”, the purpose of which is to digitize historical monuments, scientific research of museum collections and enter them into a European database. There is no talk about exporting valuable exhibits abroad.

However, it is Russia that plunders Ukrainian museums and galleries and removes cultural property from temporarily occupied territories.

Russian propaganda uses reflexive tactics: it accuses the West of stealing Ukrainian monuments and valuable exhibits. That is, it accuses it of what Russia is really doing in the temporarily occupied territories in order to divert attention from its crimes. Previously, we talked about the message that Russia does not destroy Ukrainian cultural and historical heritage and refuted the fake that Kyiv agreed with UNESCO to transfer holy relics to museums in Italy, France, Germany and the Vatican.

A number of anonymous telegram channels with pro-Russian rhetoric are disseminating information that the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi invited the “Satanist” Maryna Abramovych to become the Ambassador of Ukraine so that she would “be involved in Ukrainian schools”. It's fake.

The specialists from the VoxCheck project drew attention to it. They found out that the article on the British media The Telegraph, to which the propagandists refer, has already been deleted. Its author, in turn, refers to an interview with Maryna Abramovych, a shareholder of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Shanghai, but the fact-checkers were unable to find it. They also note that the English term ambassador, used in the article, can mean both a diplomatic rank and an unofficial representation of the interests of a specific group of people without a government appointment. Ukrainian-language media have no mention of this, and foreign media, such as The Jerusalem Post, refer to the Italian publication La Repubblica, which has no open access publications on this matter. There are no messages about the invitation on the website of the Office of the President of Ukraine, its official telegram channel or Facebook page. Abramovych’s official accounts make no mention of this either.

Propagandists also do not detail why they consider Abramovych a Satanist, not only in messages on this topic, but in all messages where the name of the shareholder appears. According to the VoxCheck analysts, they refer to the situation since 2016, when WikiLeaks published part of the emails from the broken account of John Podesta, who then headed Hillary Clinton's election campaign in the US presidential election. Among them was a message from Abramovych expressing her joy that Podesta's brother, an art collector named Tony, would be attending the spirit cooking. This can be translated as both “spiritual cooking” and “spirit cooking”, which is the more threatening version. In response to this, the shareholder noted in an interview that it was an ordinary dinner with a regular menu, which she calls “spiritual cuisine”. In addition, Maryna Abramovych has a poem called Spirit Cooking, which does not contain satanic motives. From the very beginning of her career, her performances involve testing the boundaries of her own body, which is why they are considered Satanic rites.

Maryna Abramovych has publicly supported Ukraine since February 25, 2022, but there is no evidence that she has received offers to be an embassy or ambassador for Ukraine.

By resorting to such fakes, propagandists aim to discredit the Ukrainian government and those who support Ukraine. They say that it can only be supported by Satanists who grab the opportunity to stay in the headlines on current topics. All this is in order to justify its aggression against Ukraine; it seems that Russia is fighting against the “Satanists” and those who support them.

Russian media and social media users spreading pro-Russian rhetoric claim that it is planned to hold a sale of icons from the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra at a separate auction in Paris. Like, proof of this is a photo of a billboard announcing an event with a scheduled date of October 1. It's fake.

Specialists in the StopFake project drew attention to it. They took a comment from the representative of the Auction House Osenat indicated on the billboard. He stated that this announcement is fake, like the “auction” itself. In addition, on the official website of the House, one can see that there are no auctions or other events scheduled for October 1st.

By spreading such fakes, propagandists want to show that Western countries allegedly deliberately take out works of art from the historical monuments of Ukraine, so as not to return them ever again. However, in fact, some exhibits are being evacuated to European museums precisely because of the relentless Russian shelling of civilian infrastructure. Detector Media wrote how Russian propaganda instrumentalizes the history of Ukraine for its own purposes.

In the Russian and Georgian segment of Facebook and in the media broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric, they disseminate information with reference to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service that Kyiv allegedly agreed with UNESCO to transfer the Orthodox relics of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra to museums in Italy, France and France as if the holy relics had to be taken out in order to preserve them. It's fake.

The fact-checkers of the Myth Detector project drew attention to the case. They established that the information about the removal of holy relics from the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra to European countries is false. The Minister of Culture of Ukraine Oleksandr Tkachenko wrote on his Facebook page that “not a single sacred value will leave the territory of Ukraine”.  Also, the acting director of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, Maksym Ostapenko, noted that “the reserve did not have such plans and will not have them”. Information about this agreement cannot be found on the official website of UNESCO. This fake was denied on the official Facebook pages of the Ministry of Culture and the National Commission of Ukraine for UNESCO.

By spreading information that Kyiv has agreed to transfer relics to European countries, propagandists are trying to discredit UNESCO and the Ukrainian authorities. Russian propaganda created a fake to sow religious discord, as well as divert attention from the crimes committed by Russia, in particular, from the looting of museums and galleries. Earlier, Detector Media talked about the message that allegedly Russia does not destroy Ukrainian cultural and historical heritage.

Such information was disseminated in social networks, in particular, on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. Reports say that an art object dedicated to Volodymyr Zelenskyi has been created at the Paris City Museum of Modern Art - a nose that “sniffs white powder”. It is not true.

The case was noticed by the specialists of the VoxCheck project, who investigated that it was an object of an exhibition in Italy in 2018, the author devoted it to dependencies. There was no mention of Volodymyr Zelenskyi at the exhibition.

The art object was created by artist Tom Palluh and first presented in September 2018. The exhibition was held in Parma (Italy), at The Mori Center. Palluh’s Instagram account has a selection of stories about this installation, one of which contains photos and videos that are now being circulated online.

Propagandists spread the information that the National Gallery in London intends to remove from the exhibition a portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini and his wife, painted by Jan van Eyck in 1434. Allegedly, visitors to the gallery are outraged that the person in the picture looks like Russian President Volodymyr Putin. It's fake.

Reuters fact-checkers drew attention to this trend. They received a comment from the gallery speaker, who said that there are no plans to remove the painting from the exhibition now, since there are no complaints about it either. It is impossible to find any press releases for the removal of the picture, nor public calls for such actions.

The propagandists want to show in this way that Europe is choking on absurd russophobia. Like, in their blind hatred for Russia and everything Russian, Europeans stick to everything in a row. Detector Media has already described a particular vision of “russophobia” propagated by propagandists.

Propagandists spread information, allegedly on Chinese television during the broadcast of the international festival on the occasion of the Chinese New Year, hopak was called a Russian dance. It's fake.

VoxCheck analysts drew attention to it. They found out that you can see in the screenshots of the broadcast that it took place back in 2021. The festival showed dances from different countries, in particular Egypt, Spain, Argentina and China. Among them was a Russian folk dance, but it was not a hopak.

VoxCheck notes that in this case we are talking about the Kamarynska dance. It differs from hopak in that girls play balalaikas during the performance. Hopak elements can be found in the Belarusian folk dance “liavonykha” and “trepak”, as well as in Crimean Tatar dances.

Thus, propagandists are trying to show that there is no independent Ukrainian culture, since it is allegedly a simulation of Russian. Allegedly, even abroad, everyone recognizes this.

The network quotes the representative of the Russian foreign ministry Mariia Zakharova. She believes that the world is “demonizing Russia”, carrying out “forced Ukrainization” and supporting the culture of abolishing everything Russian that exists. Zakharova calls the report on crimes against Ukrainian culture an attempt to “shield the Kyiv regime” and “infringe on the rights of Russian speakers”.

According to the fact-checkers of the project “Beyond the News”, in this way Zakharova reacted to the statement of UN experts regarding the destruction of Ukrainian identity by the Russians, published on the eve of the anniversary of a full-scale war. UN experts published a report in which they note that Russia continues to “denigrate the history and identity of the Ukrainian people to justify war and hatred”. It says that among the important cultural sites of Ukraine affected by the shelling are museums, libraries and churches.

From February 24, 2022 to March 1, 2023, UNESCO registered 245 cultural heritage sites of Ukraine that were damaged or destroyed due to the war unleashed by Russia. There are 106 religious sites, 20 museums, 88 historical and/or artistic buildings, 19 monuments, 12 libraries among them although they add: according to other sources, there may be about a thousand damaged objects.

According to the report, in Mariupol, Lysychansk, Sievierodonetsk and Rubizhne, historical buildings were destroyed for 90%. More than 10 thousand works of art were taken out of the Kherson Art Museum. In the Donetsk region, the invaders use burial mounds as field fortifications. The report also reminds that Russians have destroyed important cultural monuments in the temporarily occupied Crimea since 2014.

Thus, the Russians are trying to deprive Ukrainians of their historical and cultural heritage. Also, such messages feed the Russian narrative about the inferiority of Ukrainians. And the words of Zakharova are an example of the substitution of concepts: they say they destroy and devalue Russian culture, and not Ukrainian. Earlier, propagandists said that Ukraine was striking at its own cultural heritage, and the Kyiv totalitarian regime was waging a cultural war against Russia.

Reports are circulating on social media that a sculpture in the shape of a nose has been installed in Milan, around which white powder is scattered. Like, the Italians called the sculpture “Zelenskyi's nose” because it reminds them of the Ukrainian president. This is not true.

In Milan, indeed, they placed a sculpture in the shape of a nose, but it has nothing to do with Volodymyr Zelenskyi. A sculpture with a nose and cocaine is located in the Corso Como shopping mall in Milan. It was created by the Italian activist and artist Christina Donati Meyer. The activist sought to use the sculpture to protest the increase in drug trafficking in Milan, especially cocaine. MythDetector fact checkers note that this sculpture is actually called Bianco Natale, Milano-Medellin (White Christmas, Milano-Medellin).

Russian propaganda systematically creates fakes to discredit Volodymyr Zelenskyi both in Ukraine and abroad. To do this, propagandists use cartoon graffiti and fake covers of satirical magazines.

Russian propaganda is spreading messages that the actions of the Ukrainian authorities are comparable to the Taliban. They say that the demolition of the monument to Catherine II in Odesa, which was a “sacred symbol” for many Ukrainians, is reminiscent of the destruction of Buddha statues in the Bamiyan Valley by the Taliban in 2001. The fact-checkers of EU vs Disinfo drew attention to the spread of the message.

Russian propaganda systematically manipulates the theme of a “single Russian-Ukrainian cultural space” and universal history. Also, propagandists systematically use comparisons of Ukraine or Ukrainians with criminal regimes for manipulation and emotional pressure. The dismantling of the monument to Catherine II in Odesa was repeatedly used to spread messages about russophobia and create a destructive image of Ukrainians. In fact, the monument was dismantled after a long public discussion, that is, in a democratic, not totalitarian way.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC - MP) spread a fake that the Orthodox Church of Ukraine allegedly did not receive permission from the administration of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra reserve to hold a service on January 7. The UOC-MP calls Epifanii's intention to hold a service in Lavra an “attempt to seize by force”.

The UOC-MP also said that Oleksandr Rudnyk, the reserve's acting general director, told them on January 5 that he had not received any requests from the OCU regarding the use of the Uspenskyi (Assumption) Cathedral and the Refectory Church for worship.

In fact, the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine granted OCU permission, and the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra national reserve concluded a corresponding agreement. This, in particular, is confirmed by the acting general director of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra reserve Oleksandr Rudnyk, who said that he gave permission to the OCU and concluded an agreement to hold a service on January 7 from 8:00 am to 12 pm.

He explained that the conversation with the UOC-MP took place in the morning of January 5, and in the evening of the same day he received an appeal from the OCU and a corresponding permit from the Ministry of Culture. The representative of the press service of the OCU provided Ukrainska Pravda with a document confirming that the ministry had agreed to hold the OCU service in the Uspenskyi (Assumption) Cathedral.

Telegram channels from the Russian intelligence-controlled network began to spread the message that the Office of the President allegedly “made a list of monuments” that need to be dismantled in Ukraine. That is why in different cities, including Dnipro and Odesa, monuments to Oleksandr Matrosov and Empress Catherine II have recently been dismantled. At the same time, Russian propaganda channels, such as the “Kremlin washerwoman”, Volodymyr Soloviov’s channel and others, spread the thesis that russophobic orders to dismantle monuments to Russian and Soviet figures in Ukraine are given directly in London and Washington. And that is why, supposedly, the US-controlled and UK-protected UNESCO does not make statements about their dismantling.

Firstly, none of the dismantled monuments was protected by UNESCO. Moreover, the monument to Catherine II was generally restored only in 2007, since it was demolished in 1917. Restoring it was an initiative of Odesa officials, which immediately caused a lot of criticism from local activists. Secondly, the dismantling of monuments does not mean their destruction as they are gradually transferred to museums, where they will be stored if they really have artistic value. And thirdly, the list really exists: back in August, the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy compiled the top 10 most common toponyms associated with Russian or Soviet figures that really have nothing to do with Ukraine. The list includes Yurii Haharin, Oleksandr Pushkin, Ivan Michurin, Valerii Chkalov, Maksym Horkyi, Mykhailo Liermontov, Oleksandr Suvorov, Volodymyr Maiakovskyi, Oleksandr Matrosov, Volodymyr Komarov. The Ministry of culture and information policy of Ukraine expert council on overcoming the consequences of russification and totalitarianism recommended, first of all, to rename streets, squares, metro stations, squares and other names associated with these people. Monuments to these people from the cities of Ukraine are also gradually dismantled.

Before the start of a full-scale invasion, all these toponyms and monuments existed in hundreds of thousands in Ukraine. And the process of “de-russification” of Ukraine has a simple explanation: it is a military aggression against Ukraine, which was committed by Russia on February 24. Now no one, neither the authorities nor the inhabitants want to have anything to do with the aggressor. This is evidenced by the data of opinion polls: in May, 98% had a negative attitude towards Russia.

This was reported in the Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security. It recommends using Ukrainian swearing instead of Russian obscenities on TV channels.

To create a fake, they used the old emblem of the Ministry of Culture, which has not been in Ukraine since 2019 (the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy was created in 2021). The authors of the “memo” used the Russian word “mat” (swear word), which is not in the Ukrainian language (there is “cuss words”, “curse words” or “dirty words”).

The list of “recommended terms” includes both samples of Ukrainian swearing and literally translated Russian swear words. Such a selection appeared in Runet in the early 2010s, it can be found in the archives of Pikabu and other entertainment sites.

Russian propaganda systematically distributes fake documents on social networks and instant messengers on behalf of various authorities: the Cabinet of Ministers, the Security Service of Ukraine, the Verkhovna Rada, and regional administrations. Thus, they are trying to undermine the credibility of the authorities.

In Khabarovsk and Komsomolsk-na-Amuri, as well as in social networks, posters of Vierka Serdiuchka’s concerts performed by Ukrainian artist Andrii Danylko appeared. Like, performances will be called “For my own people”. According to the announcement, the concerts should take place on December 28 and 29.

Andrii Danylko ridiculed this Russian fake: “Are you really there?”.

Later, this information was refuted in Khabarovsk and Komsomolsk-na-Amuri, saying that the announcement was a fake, there would be no concert.

In the fake announcement of the performances, it was noted that Vierka Serdiuchka continued to sing in Russian and therefore had problems after the performance in Lviv. Vierka Serdiuchka is touring Europe now.

At the beginning of a large-scale war between Russia and Ukraine, Danylko changed the words in the song Dancing Lasha Tumbai, with which he took second place at Eurovision 2007. Since then, he only sings “Russia goodbye”.

The allegedly new cover of the Turkish humor magazine LeMan is being circulated online. The cartoon depicts a skeleton symbolizing the President, and the inscription: "It is important to take to your heels on time". However, this is not true.

According to VoxCheck specialists, the magazine did not publish an issue with this cover. Fact checkers compared the magazine number and publication date and found that the real cover looks different.

Pro-Russian telegram channels write about this in the context of the decision to demolish the monument to Catherine II in Odesa. Like, now in Ukraine there is a “cleansing” of the remnants of Russian culture. Further, there will allegedly be a “change in reality”: renaming cities, replacing monuments and names of heroes, the Russian language will be banned “everywhere”, moreover, people will be fined for its use.

In fact, Russia (USSR) has been rewriting history and continued Russification for many years. Now Ukraine is restoring historical truth and Ukrainian culture. Due to Russian aggression, Ukrainians voluntarily refuse to use the Russian language, associating it with the language of the occupier. Russian propaganda manipulates the language issue and uses the "inferiority complexes" of Ukrainian culture and Ukrainians imposed by the Soviet period.

This information was disseminated by Russian TV channels. Like, the students told reporters that it was hard for them to study when the teachers spoke to them in Ukrainian. Now teachers explain in class that Ukrainian language is inconvenient and how Ukrainians themselves get confused with it.

As an example, the TV report shows one of the schools in the temporarily occupied Melitopol, which has been under the control of Russian troops since February 25. Since then, the inhabitants of Melitopol, who stay in the city, have been persecuted by the Russians. For a blue and yellow ribbon or the Ukrainian language, Russian invaders can shoot them, and if, while checking the phone on the street, they find Ukrainian content in instant messengers or somewhere else, they punish people with a fine or imprisonment.

Schools in the Zaporizhzhia region continue to work online. In schools that began to work offline in the occupied territory of the region, children are taught according to Russian textbooks, where history is rewritten according to the KGB manuals, many teachers are brought from Russia, as the locals refused to cooperate with the occupiers. Therefore, it is incorrect to say that all schools in Zaporizhzhia have switched to Russian standards; rather, operating schools have been forced to switch to Russian standards.

On the other hand, to date, about 80% of the Zaporizhzhia region has been occupied by Russians. The city of Zaporizhzhia has never been under occupation, so no one has taught schoolchildren of Zaporizhzhia city and is not teaching now according to Russian standards.

Such information was disseminated by pro-Russian users of social networks and Kremlin propaganda media. Reports said that an accident occurred during the dismantling of a monument to Russian poet Oleksandr Pushkin in Zhytomyr, Ukraine.

Like, one of the activists who advocated the removal of the monument, the bust of the monument fell on his head and the man died. Propagandists added vivid quotations to their texts. For example, they claimed that the bust "smashed the head of the leader of Russophobes like an egg". However, this is fake. Analysts of the Myth Detector project drew attention to the case.

In fact, the information about the injury and death of a person during the dismantling of the bust of Pushkin is untrue. From the photo and video materials released by various media, it is clear that no one was injured during the dismantling of the monument. Although the monument itself in Zhytomyr was indeed dismantled on November 11. The video of the incident was published by the press service of the Zhytomyr City Council on Facebook.

The video shows how local utilities remove the bronze bust and erase the name of the Russian writer from the pedestal. The video shows that the bust, transferred to the truck, is not damaged. And the person who participated in the dismantling descends from the stairs and pushes the stepladder to the side. The footage shows that the man was not hurt.

The language issue is one of the key reasons for the manipulation of Russian propaganda. More often, messages in the Ukrainian language are promoted with a negative emotional connotation. Like, the Ukrainian language is “funny”, “village”, “artificially created”, etc.

The Center for Counteracting Disinformation has published a number of the most common fakes in the Ukrainian language. Particularly, Russian propaganda often writes that the language allegedly does not matter, that Russian and Ukrainian are the most related languages. Allegedly, speech does not affect national and cultural identity.

In fact, linguistic oppression has been one of the main instruments of Russia's struggle against Ukraine for centuries. The Ukrainian language is an original, natural Slavic language. It has never been artificial, moreover, when forming the literary Ukrainian language, they tried in every possible way to avoid artificial constructions. Dialects of the Ukrainian language have never been dialects of Russian.

According to a survey in February 2022, 56% of Ukrainians named the Ukrainian language of everyday communication, and almost 68% named Ukrainian as their mother tongue. Russian aggression against Ukraine has contributed to the fact that more and more Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine are abandoning Russian and switching to communication in Ukrainian.

This thesis was spread by Russian President Volodymyr Putin, after which it was replicated by Russian propaganda media. Putin is convinced that Mariupol is an ancient Russian city. He also claims that the city was founded by Peter I and created his first military flotilla there. However, it is not so. In fact, in Russian historiography, Mariupol as a city in the Russian Empire was founded in 1778, already under Catherine II. Then the city was called Pavlovsk. However, this was preceded by the existence on this territory of the Kalmius settlement - the territory of the Zaporizhzhia Cossacks - with the settlement of Domakha with the Kalmius fortress as the center. The fact-checkers of The Insider project write about this. In 1778-1779, the Russian authorities evicted the Christian population from there to the Crimea and settled Russians there.

Anonymous pro-Russian telegram channels write about this. The message is confirmed by the alleged decision to dismantle the monument to Catherine II. Reports claim that the decision was made on the basis of a "fictitious" vote. Like, the Office of the President gave a clear instruction to the mayor of Odesa, Trukhanov, to demolish the monument, so that the latter is allegedly doing everything possible for this.

In fact, the monument is called the monument to the "Founders of Odesa", and not Catherine herself. However, it is the figure of Catherine whose stone statue is the central figure of the monument that Russian propaganda manipulates the most. The Russian myth about Catherine II as the “founder of Odesa” is spread by Volodymyr Putin among other things.

There is no decision on dismantling yet. On the website of the President of Ukraine, several petitions have been registered regarding the future fate of this monument. Some of them got the required 25,000 votes. According to the current legislation, Volodymyr Zelenskyi submitted a petition to the Odesa City Council with a request to consider it in accordance with its competence.

According to the order of the Odesa Mayor No. 404 dated September 20, 2022, the townspeople had the opportunity to express their opinion on this issue for a month. There were seven options to choose from. About 8 thousand inhabitants of Odesa took part in the voting. About 1800 more votes were blocked, most likely due to problems with identification. The voting results were transferred to the Office for the Protection of Cultural Heritage Objects of the Odesa city council for further development and preparation of a draft decision of the city council.

Telegram channels are circulating reports that supposedly Twitter has begun to use special marks not only for Russian, but also for Ukrainian state media. Thus, it is hinted that the Ukrainian state media are just as propaganda-oriented as the Russian ones. This is manipulation. In August 2020, Twitter, indeed in order to counter Russian disinformation and propaganda, began tagging and downsizing accounts controlled by the Russian authorities. In 2021, the social network expanded the list of countries and accounts that it restricts and designates. It also included Belarusian state media.

Now, according to the company's rules, tags appear in accounts from China, France, Russia, Great Britain, USA, Belarus, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, Honduras, Indonesia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates. Thus, they designate accounts: government agencies and organizations; state media, the editorial policy and content of which is influenced by the state; persons (journalists, editors) associated with the specified media. At the same time, Twitter notes that such designations are not used in state-owned media that have an independent editorial policy, like the BBC in the UK or NPR in the US.

Russian media and pro-Russian social media accounts are circulating videos with the Euronews logo and a similar style of English subtitles. The story says that supposedly the auction house Bolland & Marotz is holding an auction where participants will be able to purchase Dostoievskyi's letters, Chaikovskyi's handwritten notes, a series of Vrubel's sketches and other exhibits. Moreover, after the sale, all these exhibits will allegedly be destroyed, because Russia has discredited itself in the war with Ukraine. So the destruction of the Russian cultural heritage is a logical consequence. It is not true.

According to the Georgian fact-checkers of the MythDetector project, the story spread on behalf of Euronews is fictitious. The video is modified with computer software, the media did not prepare such a story. Auction house Bolland & Marotz also denied the organization of such an auction. The company also said that the idea of ​​such an event is contrary to internal policy.