DISINFO: In April 2022 Russians withdrew from Kyiv to demonstrate their readiness for peace
SUMMARY
The Kyiv regime's statements cannot be taken seriously. Kyiv has never respected ceasefires. In April 2022, a ceasefire was declared following the Istanbul talks, at the request of the Ukrainians and the West. The Russians withdrew their troops from Kyiv to demonstrate their readiness for peace. The West claimed that the Russians had withdrawn. Then came the Bucha provocation, which remains on the conscience of the West.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative claiming that Ukraine and its allies are not interested in peace. The article also contains a recurrent denial of war crimes committed by Russian forces during the full-scale military invasion of Ukraine, part of an ongoing pro-Kremlin disinformation campaign.
Russian forces withdrew from battlefields in northern Ukraine and in Kyiv region because they were defeated.
Despite a massive effort, Russia failed to encircle the Ukrainian capital and install a blockade.
After sustaining heavy losses and accomplishing none of their key goals, Russian forces retreated, but not before inflicting devastating damage to Ukrainian towns and cities and committing numerous war crimes.
The political decision to give up on Kyiv reverberated around the country. Along with Kyiv Oblast, Russian forces in early April also left Chernihiv and Sumy oblasts.
These moves amounted to the first significant Russian defeat in its all-out war against Ukraine.
The Bucha massacre of Ukrainian civilians was committed by Russian troops at the beginning of Russia's unprovoked and unjustified invasion of Ukraine. Along with Bucha, the Russian forces occupied several other towns and villages near Kyiv and committed similar crimes, including maltreatment of civilians, rape, extra-judicial executions, and other atrocities. The evidence includes survivors’ testimonies, reports by Ukrainian and Western journalists, investigations from several human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, and satellite images. See our article The Bucha massacre: mapping a year of Kremlin denial.
In December 2022, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights presented a report about killings, summary executions and attacks on civilians in the north of Ukraine, which contained a detailed description of human rights violations in the initial months of Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified invasion of Ukraine.
The European Union has condemned in the strongest possible terms these atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces and called for accountability for human rights and international law violations by the Russian Armed Forces. The EU also imposed sanctions individuals and entities in response to the Bucha massacre.
Read similar disinformation cases claiming that Bucha was a false flag operation, that A French journalist witnessed the staging of Bucha massacre to incriminate Russia that US, Western partners responsible for failure of March 2022 Istanbul peace deal between Russia and Ukraine that Zelenskyy is illegitimate and opposes every US peace proposal.