With such a hidden meaning, the first autumn lessons "Talks about important things" by Volodymyr Putin and "Historical memory as the road to the future" by Oleksandr Lukashenko were held. Allegedly, these measures should concern Russia and Belarus, respectively, but they also talked about Ukraine there.

Volodymyr Putin said that allegedly schoolchildren in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions consider the Crimean bridge a fabrication. Also, children do not know that "Ukraine and Russia were once one country - the Soviet Union." Like, they weren't taught this at school. Thus, Putin once again demonstrated Russian chauvinism based on manipulation and distortion of reality.

In fact, the automobile part of the bridge across the Kerch Strait was opened on May 15, 2018, its railway part - on December 25, 2019 for passenger transport and on June 30, 2020 for cargo. Russia occupied Crimea and part of the territory of Donetsk and Luhansk in 2014. Therefore, the question of the “quality” of education in the occupied territories should be asked precisely to the occupying “authorities”, and not to the Ukrainian one.

Putin also once spoke about Russia's modern mission - "to stop this war", "to protect both the people and Russia itself", because on the territory of today's Ukraine "they began to create an anti-Russian enclave." In fact, Putin may well end the war he himself started. To do this, he should give an order and withdraw troops from the territory of Ukraine. He transfers responsibility for the start of the war and the crimes committed to Ukraine and to the West.

Oleksandr Lukashenko told Belarusian schoolchildren that the alleged events in Bucha were an artificially created picture. They say that in Belarus they “calculated” the numbers of cars and established the identities of those who brought “corpses in plastic bags” for “provocations”. Lukashenka also recalled an old fake that supposedly now “grain and black soil” are being exported from Ukraine to “rich Europe”. As the fact-checkers of The Insider write, the last time this fake appeared in the information space was in April, on a site of parody news.

In the temporarily Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine, the Russian authorities are distributing Russian educational materials in schools. In particular, according to the Institute for the Study of War, pro-Russian authorities from Sevastopol arrived in Starobelsk, Luhansk region, to hand over backpacks and official state symbols of the Russian Federation to local schools. The Russian-appointed head of Crimea, Serhii Aksionov, also urged teachers in Crimea to strengthen the patriotic program in Crimean schools, in particular, to inform children about the decision of Russian President Volodymyr Putin to conduct a “special military operation” in Ukraine. In addition, the first lesson, which will be held in schools in the occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions, is focused on the lesson outline, which is taken from Putin's article "The Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians", his speeches on the recognition of the independence of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, as well as the start of a "special military operation". According to the Institute's analysts, in these speeches, Putin rejected the legitimacy of Ukrainian identity, saying that it "is a product of the Soviet era ... and historical Russia was developed on this land." Institute experts call such actions of the Russian authorities an attempt to erase Ukrainian identity in the territories occupied by Russia. Remember that in the temporarily occupied Melitopol, the occupation authorities are trying to resume the work of schools and, according to the mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov, they want to open 4 schools, for which teachers will be brought from distant regions of Russia. As for pupils, due to the frantic "deficit" of schoolchildren, the occupiers are frightening parents that they will deprive them of parental rights.

Russian propaganda convinces of this. But this is not the case at all, the Center for Strategic Communications notes.

In fact, Ukrainians are:

going to rallies en masse,

cooperating with the Armed Forces,

fighting the invaders on their own,

This is stated in a letter allegedly signed by the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland, Marcin Przydacz. It is not true.

The letter from the Polish Foreign Ministry is a fake response to a fake letter from the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry. The "letter of response" speaks of a positive decision to rename a street in Warsaw in honor of Stepan Bandera, which houses the Russian embassy. In addition, the "letter" refers to the ways of future promotion of Bandera among the Polish population. According to the Center for Countering Disinformation, a bot account on the social network Facebook, which contains almost no messages of other messages, was likely the primary source.

The information that Serhiy Shnurov visited the city of Irmino in the Luhansk Region was spread by the Russian propaganda media with reference to the Russian actor Georgy Bolonyev. Later, a photo in which Shnurov is allegedly in Luhansk Oblast also appeared on the pages of Ukrainian online media. However, this is not true.

The photo turned out to be a fake. Shnurov accused Russian propagandists of having photoshopped his old photo into a picture with Prigozhin and Bolognev. Pro-government Russian media also denied the fake, referring to the words of Shnurov's press secretary Serhii Guguchkin. Like, the singer is currently in Turkey and taking part in a corporate event. Later, Bolonev published other attempts of the same photo on the Russian social network Vkontakte and wrote that Shnurov is being confused with the Russian actor Sergei Garusov. And this is done not only by readers of social networks, but also by residents of occupied Stakhanov who saw Harusov in person.

"Media Detector'' checked the photo. It is impossible to establish the author and the location of the shooting, as metadata about who created the image is erased in social networks. Reverse search of the original image on the Internet through search engines and the TinEye extension is not convincing due to the clutter of image reposts. However, analyzing the image in the InVid application shows traces of editing. Especially, the right part of the image, where Shnurov is supposed to be. This shows that Shnurov is not really in the photo from Irmina. Harusov is only three centimeters shorter than Shnurov, this difference can be muffled by a hat, higher shoes or lifting on the toes. So, they could really be "confused".

The use of photos of celebrities who were not actually in the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories is a novelty for Russian propagandists. Previously, they published news about stars who really visited the occupied territories for, apparently, ideological reasons.

This information is spread by pro-Kremlin sites, and for illustration, they used photos of the Iversky Convent destroyed during the fighting for the Donetsk airport in 2014.

The Iversky Convent belonged to the so-called Moscow Patriarchate and suffered as a result of the battles for the Donetsk airport in 2014-2015. Videos of Convent’s damage, which the Russian propaganda is using today to illustrate new lies, appeared as early as 2015.

Instead, the Russian occupiers are purposefully destroying Ukrainian cultural heritage, including churches and temples. According to the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy, the Russians damaged 101 objects of valuable historical buildings and destroyed or damaged 145 religious buildings. More details.

This information was spread by the Russian media and social networks. It is not true.

The VoxCheck team verified this information and reports that according to the band's concert program in Tallinn, any Russian song was played at the concert in Estonia on July 20, 2022. This is also confirmed by videos from the concert posted by fans on YouTube. The band has openly expressed its support for Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Concerts planned for 2022 in Russia have been canceled.

On social networks were spread the video of a concert in Mariupol, at which the residents allegedly celebrated en masse and sang along to "a white swan on the pond..." of the soloist of the Russian group "Lisopoval." Russian media and pro-Russian telegram channels distributed photos and videos of the "very massive" participation of citizens in the concert from the "press service" of the so-called DNR. Then these videos were shared on Facebook. It is manipulation.

Indeed, July 17 is celebrated in Ukraine as the Day of Metallurgical and Mining Workers. A similar holiday is also celebrated in Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. As NotaYenota writes, the occupiers decided to hold several events for Metallurgist's Day, including a concert with the participation of a special guest, Serhiy Kuprik. In the comments to the video of the show, Ukrainian users write, "who are our guys fighting for," "look, we felt sorry for them," etc. It is precisely the effect the occupiers sought — to convince the Ukrainians of the "treason" of the Mariupol's residents.

More than 400,000 people used to live in Mariupol. Probably, among them, some have pro-Russian views. However, at least 22,000 Mariupol residents died due to the hostilities. The occupiers forcibly removed thousands of people through the so-called "filtration camps" to Russia. Many citizens left for safer places earlier. According to the adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, Petro Andryushchenko, 50-100 people still leave the city every day. Therefore, the information of the occupiers that the city's population is now 220,000 is invalid. There are no more than a thousand people in the "holiday" video, but there is no evidence that these are Mariupol residents, not specially brought actors. From another perspective, the picture of the crowd of the event is significantly different. The event is sparsely populated compared to videos from previous years. Probably some of the people were collected by distributing food packages because there are problems with food in the city. The propagandists also attracted Russian bloggers, who, in their comments, talk about the support of the residents of Mariupol by the residents of Russian cities and talk about the "peaceful" life in Mariupol.

The Russian media report it concerning the reports of politicians. They said that the Russian army has nothing to do with the destruction of cultural objects - historical buildings are deliberately destroyed by Ukrainians themselves with "Western weapons." It is not true.

Ukraine's UNESCO experts and international partners recorded Russian attacks on 160 cultural objects: 72 religious objects, 12 museums, 32 historical buildings, 24 buildings for cultural events, 17 monuments, and 7 libraries. The occupiers also destroyed 2,100 buildings of educational institutions in Ukraine. Three-quarters of destroyed cultural objects are located in Donetsk, Kharkiv, and Kyiv regions. However, there is destruction all over the country. The Russians are looting museum exhibits and other cultural values in the temporarily occupied territories. According to the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy, the number of destroyed objects has increased to three hundred. The fact of the destruction of Ukrainian cultural values ​​by the Russians was confirmed by the UN Security Council during a special meeting, "Destruction of cultural heritage as a result of Russian aggression against Ukraine," the holding of which was supported by 38 UN member states. Other international organizations recognized the destruction and promised Ukraine to help overcome the war's consequences. StopFake writes about this in more detail.

Russia, on the other hand, continues its tactics of denying deliberate missile strikes on civilian targets in Ukraine. Moreover, Russian politicians accuse the West of hypocrisy, as they allegedly first provide weapons to destroy cultural heritage and then funds for its restoration. In this way, Russia is trying to avoid punishment for crimes committed in Ukraine.

US scientists support Putin's ideas. It is reported by the Russian media and anonymous Telegram channels regarding the words of the US Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul. It is not true.

In fact, propagandists have distorted McFaul's words. In an interview for the project "UKRAINE NOW. The vision of the future" McFaul talked about the fact that the clichés of Russian propaganda about the "historical unity of the Ukrainian and Russian peoples" are widespread among US citizens. According to McFaul, these theses are also supported by some scientists and professors. However, the opinion of individual scientists cannot be interpreted as universal beliefs. As StopFake writes, Michael McFaul talked about the fact that Russia uses significant resources to spread disinformation in the West. The civilized world often cannot find an adequate answer to this. However, the fight against Russian propaganda continues.

It is not the first time Russian mass media have spread McFaul's quotes out of context. In particular, his words regarding lobbying for the interests of Ukraine in the USA and the fact that Volodymyr Zelenskyi's entourage allegedly participates in "schemes" for purchasing weapons were distorted earlier.

Russian propaganda spread information that a national collection of microorganisms was taken out of Ukraine - and once again linked it to the work of the "military biological laboratories of the Pentagon," which supposedly exist in Ukraine. In fact, the collection has not been taken anywhere - it is stored in Kyiv. It has nothing to do with the laboratories that were actually reconstructed with the help of US funds as part of the biological threat reduction program.

StopFake received confirmation of the location of the collection in Ukraine by talking to the curator of the National Collection of Microorganisms of Ukraine, a senior researcher at the Institute of Microbiology and Virology named after D.K. Zabolotnyy NASU, candidate of biological sciences Taisiya Nohina.

"The collection is located in Ukraine. Moreover, she continues her work," Nohina said. Now the collection includes more than 5,600 cultures of microorganisms, represented by more than 1,000 species and 300 genera. It stores microbes found in the soil, water, certain plants, human intestines, and the organisms of various animals. The depository provides samples free of charge to educational institutions for training and, on a commercial basis, to pharmaceutical companies that use them for drug testing. The collection is neither secret nor dangerous - it is needed for scientific activity, and such collections exist in any developed country. It is also in Russia.

It was said by the head of the Russian Constitutional Court, Valery Zorkin. They said that 12 million Russians who lived on the territory of Crimea and several regions that became part of Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union were left "without any legal guarantees."

According to Zorkin, due to the "Kyiv Nazi regime" actions, these people were allegedly deprived of their rights to "national identity and native language." It is not true.

The rights to the national identity and native language of the residents of Crimea were enshrined in Article 10 of the Constitution of Crimea. As for Ukrainian legislation, the Law of Ukraine "On the Rights of National Minorities" guarantees "equal political, social, economic and cultural rights and freedoms regardless of national origin, supports the development of national self-awareness and self-expression." Russians are the most significant national minority in Ukraine, but not only do they but other minorities have the right to self-identity. The same Law states that "citizens of Ukraine must respect the languages, cultures, traditions, customs, and religious identity of the Ukrainian people and all national minorities." National minorities are also guaranteed the right to receive education in their native language, but in parallel with compulsory education in the state language. That is, Ukraine strives for its citizens to know the state language and in no case forbids the use of any other language. The Russians constantly repeat the manipulative message about "protecting the Russian-speaking population from nationalists." Moreover, it became one of the far-fetched reasons for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.    

In Saint Petersburg, a vacancy for an actor for mass shooting in the previously occupied territory of Donetsk and Luhansk regions was advertised. As StratCom of the ZSU writes in a telegram, this is how they recruit "local witnesses to the atrocities of the damned Ukrainian fascists." Payment for filming - 1,300 rubles (almost $24), travel to the so-called "DPR" and "LPR," "we will shoot there."

Some Russian mass media spread this information. The reports refer to a complete ban on distributing Russian-language literature in Ukraine.

Russian mass media claim that the prohibition is allegedly provided for by the law adopted on June 19, 2022. However, the amendments made to the Law "On Publishing" do not provide for the prohibition of Russian-language books. In fact, as StopFake writes, books in Russian were not banned in Ukraine. The country's authorities have banned importing literature published by publishers from Russia and Belarus. Texts in Russian (with some restrictions) can be imported from other countries and printed in Ukraine. 

Russian mass media and pro-Kremlin Telegram channels spread a fake about the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which allegedly canonized the head of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, Stepan Bandera. Along with this information, a "document" is also being distributed. It is said that the decision on the "canonization of Bandera" was supposedly made at the Bishops' Council of the OCU on June 20. With this fake, Russian propaganda again tries to discredit the OCU and fuel the narrative about "Nazism in Ukraine."

Russian propaganda promotes the manipulative thesis through social networks that some universities and colleges in Mariupol are resuming work and preparing for the admissions campaign. In particular, various reports refer to three educational institutions - Mariupol State University, Pryazovskyi State Technical University, and the College of Pryazovskyi Technical University. These messages are mainly distributed through telegram channels created in the occupied territories. Read more about the work of "occupation telegram channels" here.

Russian propagandists write that the Mariupol Drama Theater is allegedly resuming its work. Reports say that an attempt to revive a new theater season in Mariupol, which was destroyed by Russian troops, will take place on the premises of the Mariupol Chamber Philharmonic (which is in the story of the propagandist RT is called "the city's House of Music").

Her building survived the shelling of the city. According to reports from the Russian occupiers, the theater season in the city is planned to resume on September 10, and rehearsals are already underway. In the same plot of the propagandists, it is said that before the occupation of Russia, in the theater, Ukrainian plays gradually supplanted the rest of the repertoire, and allegedly it was not possible to stage works in Russian. However, it is not true. As StopFake writes, the theater's repertoire, until its destruction during the Russian air raid on March 16, 2022, consisted of Russian, Ukrainian and foreign works. You can see the complete list of the repertoire of the big stage, which includes 25 productions, on the theater's website. Only 10 were shown in Ukrainian, and the remaining 15 were Russian. That is, parity was not in favor of the Ukrainian repertoire.

"There was no way to ban performances in the Russian language at the Mariupol Drama Theater - it is fake Russian propaganda, which continues to demonstrate to its audience the alleged restriction of the rights of the Russian-speaking population in the territories temporarily occupied by Russia," the fact-checkers write. By the way, a significant part of the troupe of the Mariupol Theater was evacuated to Uzhgorod. Moreover, it is there that the theater plans to resume its work gradually and is already rehearsing the first play, which will tell about the life of Vasyl Stus.

After the adoption of the law banning Russian music in the Ukrainian media and the public space, many manipulations on this matter appeared in social networks, pro-Russian Telegram channels, and publications. In particular, it is said that the VRU allegedly banned Ukrainians from listening to Russian music. However, it is not so. The Council approved a draft law on the partial ban of Russian music on public transport and public places. This ban does not apply to artists included in the list of musical performers who condemn the war against Ukraine. This list is still in the process of creation and will become public later.

Moreover, no one generally forbids listening to Russian artists at home or even on the street with headphones. According to the Center for Combating Disinformation at the National Security Council, the law also applies to songs and the demonstration of clips by artists who are citizens of the Russian Federation or who became citizens after 1991 and who publicly support the war in Ukraine. However, the exception is former citizens of Russia who, alive or at the time of their death, did not support the war in Ukraine.

Information was spread on social networks that Kyiv was allegedly calling for the abandonment of the metro because it was a legacy of the Soviet Union. To such posts are added photos with stickers that contain this appeal and are allegedly pasted in the subway.

Photos of KFC and Booking posters allegedly installed at Munich train station in Germany are being spread on social networks. The posters show the founder of KFC lying in bed, and the caption states, "Chickens from Ukraine are very much awaited in Germany." According to StopFake fact-checkers, photos with this "poster" were also distributed by diplomats from the Russian Federation - on Twitter, First Deputy Ambassador of Russia to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy published one of these photos, commenting that this poster allegedly shows an objective attitude towards Ukrainians in Europe. "Russia's order Vasyl Nebenzya even referred to this" advertisement " in his speech at a meeting of the UN Security Council on combating sexual violence related to the war in Ukraine. However, the Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN, Serhiy Kyslytsya, noted that Russian diplomats are spreading another fake. In fact, the companies whose logos are on the images have nothing to do with this provocation. At least one of these advertising posters, allegedly placed in the central hall of the train station in Munich, does not exist - the photo, which is distributed online, was processed in a photo editor. Locals also confirmed the absence of this poster in the StopFake comment.

Russian media, in particular Ria Novosti, distributed fake documents of the alleged Azov Regiment found in Mariupol. These documents seem to be about preparations for hostilities in Mariupol and the suburbs. The fake document also states that "the local population is pro-Russian in 70% of cases." However, Russian propaganda made mistakes with the translation: although the "document" was written in Ukrainian, it was classified in Russian. "The documents have been given a strange stamp - "sekretnno " - instead of Ukrainian -" tayemno, " "the Center for Counteracting Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council said.

At the same time, the thesis about "70% of the pro-Russian population" is also untrue, according to various surveys. Despite the high level of distrust in the government, Mariupol in 2021 had a positive or neutral attitude towards Ukraine. It should be noted that there were no solid pro-Russian sentiments before; according to a 2015 poll, most residents of the south-eastern regions do not see Donbas outside Ukraine; The 2016 poll shows that 72% of residents of the free territories of Donbas would like the region to be part of Ukraine. As of May 2022, in all regions of Ukraine, the vast majority of residents have a terrible attitude towards Russia; in particular, in the South, 90% have a bad mood, and in the East - 85%. 82% of citizens who continue to live in the territory occupied after February 24, 2022, have a negative attitude towards Russia, and only 6% have a positive attitude towards it.

On May 21, the Ambassador of the United Kingdom to Ukraine, Melinda Simmons, shared a photo on her Twitter page with a demonstration burning of textbooks on the history of Ukraine and compared it to Nazism. In comments, pro-Russian accounts accused her of spreading fake. The photo was first published in July 2019 and depicted the burning of books in Kaliningrad. It had nothing to do with textbooks on Ukrainian history.

The ambassador distributed an original photo of the burning of books on Ukrainian history in Crimea in March 2010. Using the image search program, StopFake experts could find the earliest publications of this image on the Internet. They were taken in 2014.

An article from January 7, 2014, on the Censor.net website, is devoted to the torchlight procession of Russian nationalists in Crimea, who called for "expelling, sweeping away once and for all" Euromaidan.

"However, it was later established that the action to burn textbooks on Ukrainian history and other literature took place in March 2010. "Russian communities in Crimea, the «Russkyy blok,» and Natalia Vitrenko's party called on the newly appointed Minister of Education of Ukraine Dmytro Tabachnyk to remove history books from the school curriculum put into circulation by former Minister Ivan Vakarchuk," Censor.net reported.

The participants of the action burned books "Modern History of Ukraine," "History of Ukraine," and Yaroslav Hasek's novel "The Adventures of the Good Soldier Schweik," translated into Ukrainian and physics textbooks. The article emphasizes that representatives of Russian communities regularly held similar anti-Ukrainian actions. Read more.

Dozens of Russian media outlets wrote about the fact that Russians cannot listen to the song that won this year's Eurovision Song Contest on Facebook and Instagram. Their messages say that "access for Russians to the song of Eurovision 2022 winners - Ukrainian hip-hop group Kalush Orchestra is blocked in social networks Facebook and Instagram (banned in Russia, owned by Meta Corporation, which is recognized as extremist in Russia)." Such messages also add that this track cannot be added to both social networks and cannot be listened to if you are in Russia. However, as it turned out, access to the song in social networks is blocked to Russians not by Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, but by the company that owns the recording. Since Sony Music suspended all operations in Russia on March 10, 2022 and does not release new content in the country, the winning track and is not available for Russians to listen to in social networks. This is not the first time Russia has spread fakes on social networks. In particular, a video of Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg with Russian voiceover was recently circulated on social networks, in which he allegedly says, Facebook is closing down and leaving Russia. However, this is also untrue

The cover of the German magazine Stern with an image of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky allegedly titled "König der Lügen", translated as "King of Lies", circulated in social networks. According to Logically.ai, Zelensky was indeed on the front page of the magazine, but it was published under the title "Held der Freiheit", which translates as "Hero of Freedom".

The news that the contestant from Great Britain won the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday, May 14, was spread by some Russian media. In particular, the publication "Uralinformbureau. The news on the site appeared an hour after the announcement of the final results of the song contest. The text said that the bearded Briton won, while Ukraine took only fourth place. However, the news did not specify that these were only interim results, which are established by the jury voting, but filed this fact as the final result of the contest. According to the results of the judges' vote, Ukraine, however, took only fourth place, but in the end, after the announcement of the results of the spectator vote, Ukraine was in first place in the standings. Later, the publication deleted the news, but in other texts it continued to manipulate the topic of Ukraine's victory at Eurovision. In particular, it said that the Eurovision organizers had rigged the scores in favor of Ukraine and Great Britain.