October 2022
As part of the program Regional Initiative to Combat Disinformation, we present you a new analyses of fake news and disinformation narratives.
„THE HORRORS OF WAR – THE TERRIBLE LIQUIDATION OF REGIME OPPONENTS IN UKRAINE! Zelensky organized a hunt on Russians: We are shooting them like pigs!“
https://informer.rs/planeta/vesti/740238/zelenski-lov-protivnici-ubistva
We can characterize this news as fake, since the information we read both in the title and in the text are not correct, i.e. they are made up.
The subtitle of the news reads: “The hunt for collaborationists has been announced. Their lives are not protected by the law. Our intelligence service eliminates them, kills them like pigs, says official adviser to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Anton Gerashchenko. So far, 29 people have been killed, and on another 13 of them assassinations were unsuccessful.” It is not possible to find either Gorashchenko’s disputed statement or data on the “hunt for collaborationists”, assassinations and victims on the Internet.
However, it is possible to find the original news from which the text was taken, and which was originally published in the Daily Mail in English language.
The author further states that “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky organized the hunt for Russians. The Western media, which openly support this, write that at least 29 people have been killed so far, and that another 13 escaped death in a liquidation attempt on them. These murders are organized by the Ukrainian services, and the authorities brag that they are “killing collaborators of the occupiers like pigs”!” As we have mentioned, it is not possible to find on the Internet search the news of the Western or any other media that talk about these murders, as well as the statements of the Ukrainian officials who talk about this or “brag” as the news says.
The news further conveys more unverifiable information: “According to the British “Daily Mail”, which received a list of killed “collaborationists” from a Ukrainian source, states that Kyiv has so far launched an investigation against 1,309 traitors, and that criminal proceedings have been launched against 450 collaborators of the occupiers for betraying their nation and neighbors. Other collaborationists are hunted down and killed by local Ukrainian fighters, with the help of special services. The regime of President Volodymyr Zelensky looks approvingly on all of this.”
On another occasion, the statement of the advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Anton Gerashchenko, is pointed out: “The hunt for collaborationists has been announced. Their lives are not protected by the law. Our intelligence service eliminates them, kills them like pigs.” As we mentioned, proof that Gerashchenko said this cannot be found on the Internet.
The news also mention the murders of people like Ivan Shusko and Volodymyr Struk and blames official Kiev, but the Ukrainian government did not take responsibility.