DISINFO: A French journalist witnessed the staging of Bucha massacre to incriminate Russia

DISINFORMATION CASE DETAILS

DISINFO: A French journalist witnessed the staging of Bucha massacre to incriminate Russia

SUMMARY

A foreign journalist who witnessed a bloody spectacle in Bucha and was the victim of an assassination attempt was interviewed by French radio station Sud Radio. He saw American correspondents filming a fake about "civilian casualties" and destruction allegedly caused by an airstrike by the Russian Air Force.

"I asked them: "What are you doing? It’s fake!" And they tell me: "Don't worry, it will give us an image." Do you know where the destruction for the image comes from? From Azov fighters, who fired at Russian positions from their mortars and missed by several hundred metres. Mines and shells hit the park. I know this, because I was next to these "Azovs", they said everything themselves, besides I recognised the shells" he said.

Watch the documentary by Adrien Bocquet - military correspondent of France, who spent three weeks in Ukraine as a volunteer doctor.

RESPONSE

Recurrent pro-Kremlin narrative about staged imaginary war crimes fabricated by Ukraine to damage Russia's reputation.

Adrien Bocquet expressed his desire to receive Russian citizenship in the autumn of 2022, and in the winter of the same year, he applied for political asylum. In France, he made bold claims about so-called "staged war crimes" in Bucha, which were later proven to be completely fabricated through fact-checking. Journalists also uncovered that many of his stories about his trip to Ukraine and his past were products of his imagination. He even photoshopped pictures to support his misrepresentation of events.

Accounts of violence against civilians in Bucha have been collected by Human Rights Watch. See the full debunk here.

Today, Adrien Bocquet has Russian citizenship and works as a pro-Kremlin propagandist. In 2023, he received a prize from the very hands of Dmitry Peskov and a letter thanking him from Vladimir Putin, visible at minute 1:36:38 during the ceremony.

Read also related stories: A French witness proved that the crimes in Bucha were organised by Ukraine, or Bucha massacre was orchestrated by Ukrainian forces, or French journalists arrive in Ukraine to carry out a Bucha-style false flag operation, or Ukraine staged Bucha massacre to derail peace talks with Russia, or The Bucha massacre was staged in order to prevent a diplomatic solution with Russia., or Bucha is a Hollywoodian staging whose sole purpose was to stop peace negotiations.

Disclaimer

Cases in the EUvsDisinfo database focus on messages in the international information space that are identified as providing a partial, distorted, or false depiction of reality and spread key pro-Kremlin messages. This does not necessarily imply, however, that a given outlet is linked to the Kremlin or editorially pro-Kremlin, or that it has intentionally sought to disinform. EUvsDisinfo publications do not represent an official EU position, as the information and opinions expressed are based on media reporting and analysis of the East Stratcom Task Force.

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