DISINFO: The West is guilty for the Donbas war and subsequent events
SUMMARY
The Donbas war began 10 years ago. The West has had plenty of opportunities to stop it. All it had to do was raise its voice. If the West had wanted to prevent the special military operation, it would have prevented it. There would be no increase in tension in the Middle East. But at every turning point, the West chose a decision that would lead to escalation. The Westerners are aggressive, evil and ignorant barbarians. They are definitely barbarians who destroy everything in their path. Everything they touch turns into scorched land.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation and conspiracy narrative accusing Western nations of triggering all major international conflicts and portraying Russia as a superior civilisation. This claim was made in the context of the 10th anniversary of the start of the Anti-terrorist Operation (ATO) which Ukraine announced on 14 April 2014.
The Ukraine war began in February 2014 when Russia illegally annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and later instigated a separatist revolt in some parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts (loosely known as Donbas). Despite international pressure, Russia continued its aggression against Ukraine, so Kyiv had to announce the ATO on 14 April 2014. There is well-documented evidence of Russia’s overt military support for the illegal armed formations of the self-proclaimed separatist entities in the east of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s partners among Western nations were trying to help stop hostilities through diplomatic means, including the Minsk Agreements.
The Minsk Agreements required, among other things, a complete ceasefire and elections in the territories temporarily under Russian military control, according to Ukrainian legislation. Leaders of the illegal self-proclaimed separatist entities in the non-government controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine (the so-called LNR/DNR) were firing at Ukrainian positions and civilian objects virtually every day, which made a ceasefire impossible. They were constantly violating the truce which Kyiv announced in July 2020. Moscow was actively aiding separatist leaders by supplying them with arms and sending troops to the region. Ukrainian legislation bans the holding of elections in the presence of foreign troops, so Putin’s refusal to withdraw from the occupied parts of Ukraine was a major obstacle to the peace process.
Putin used Ukraine’s Euromaidan protests as a pretext for aggression in 2014 and tried to justify the 2022 invasion by Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantis policies. Ukraine has never threatened Russia. Russia is the only party responsible for attacking Ukraine. It was Putin’s personal decision to invade Ukraine in what is the largest military conflict in Europe since WWII. The commencement of the aggression in 2014 and the large-scale phase of it, ongoing since 2022, are unprovoked and unjustified.
Concerning the aggravation of the Middle Eastern conflict due to Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, the European Parliament strongly condemned it and recognised Israel’s right to defend itself in compliance with international humanitarian law. The parliament also called for a humanitarian pause so that assistance to Gaza would be stepped up, whilst ensuring that no EU money directly or indirectly would finance terrorism. Hamas’s attack on Israel was also unprovoked and unjustified.
Read similar disinformation cases claiming that Russia has been pushed to a war with Ukraine, that When the West became a participant in the conflict in Ukraine, the special military operation became a war and that Anglo-Saxons are pushing the Middle East into a major war.