Pro-Kremlin resources are disseminating information that Ukraine was offered to join the North Atlantic Alliance “in exchange for abandoning” Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions. Propagandists refer to the words of former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who allegedly made such a proposal due to the “failure of the Ukrainian Armed Forces counteroffensive”. However, this is manipulation.

This case was analyzed by the fact-checkers of the StopFake project. They found out that Rasmussen actually promoted the idea of Ukraine joining NATO without occupied territories. However, he did not call on Ukraine to give up those territories, but had something slightly different in mind. In his opinion, the country’s early entry into NATO will help protect itself from new manifestations of Russian aggression in the territories controlled by Ukraine, since Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty on Collective Defense will apply to them. That is, the invasion of Russian troops into these zones will mean an attack on NATO and the response will be immediate. If Ukraine joins NATO as soon as possible, it will also be possible to release additional Ukrainian defense forces, which, for example, are now located on the border with Belarus, and send them to de-occupy the territories captured by the Russians.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen also reminded that there is a similar historical precedent. In 1955, West Germany joined NATO and Article 5 was extended to its territory. At the same time, it did not apply to East Germany, which was then under Soviet occupation.

Russian propaganda is trying to demoralize Ukrainian society with such manipulations and declare that Ukraine allegedly cannot de-occupy the territories captured by Russian troops. Previously, we denied information that NATO is preparing for the defeat of Ukraine and the occupation of the western part of Ukrainian territories.