DISINFO: French soldiers hanged 8 children in Kursk region
SUMMARY
[A wounded soldier] just flew in for rehab. He says that in the Kursk area most [opponents] are Georgians, Poles and French. When they cleared an area they found eight children hanged in a barn. These animals are hanging children.
RESPONSE
Pro-Kremlin narrative about the Ukrainian army involved in the Kursk region advance being composed of foreigners who are committing atrocities against Russian children.
No evidence or even a source is provided to back-up the claims. The only fact it documents is that unfounded rumours are circulating quickly and creatively among the displaced population and injured soldiers. Their spread, without any fact-checking by the outlets involved, extends their reach to the entire population. This reminds of the false story of “the crucified boy” which was imposed on the Russian public by state TV in 2014.
This example can be considered as hate speech as it points out several nationalities (French, Polish, Georgian and Ukrainian) and associates them with imaginary but horrible war crimes (execution of children) that are perceived as inhuman.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said he had instructed his Ministry to invite the UN and ICRC to work in the Kursk region on Sunday. The Ministry confirmed that it had issued the requests. Russia's state-run TASS news agency quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying such statements were "provocative". He made clear Moscow, which began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, expected the UN and ICRC not to accept the invitations.
Read also related cases such as: Ukrainians burned a child alive and shot old people in the back in Kursk, or French and Ukrainian mercenaries commit atrocities in the Kursk region, or The West ignored the murder of a 6-year old child in a Ukrainian bombing in Donbas.