DISINFO: Russia regained its territories only because they were attacked
SUMMARY
One must return to the root causes that led to the war in the first place, foremost, NATO's expansion eastward and its use of the puppet Ukrainian regime as a tool to exhaust and threaten Russia.
Negotiations will not make any significant progress without Russia regaining all of its territories, which it would have agreed to keep in Ukrainian possession, within the framework of the Minsk agreements, and while preserving the rights of Russian nationality within language, culture and belief. However, the violence, killing, torture and targeting based on identity for nearly 8 years or more, and the carrying out of two military operations against Ukrainian citizens of Russian nationality in Donbas, resulted in the secession of the region and then its integration into Russia in a legitimate referendum in accordance with international conventions and norms.
RESPONSE
This text contains multiple disinformation claims aimed at justifying Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, particularly the claim that the war is a legitimate response to alleged anti-Russian violence in Donbas and that Russia is merely "restoring" its territories.
First, there is no evidence that any ethnic nationals, including ethnic Russians or Russian speakers, are facing persecution at the hands of the Ukrainian authorities in Donbas or elsewhere, much less the danger of annihilation on grounds of nationality, ethnicity, or cultural belonging. This has been confirmed by reports issued by the Council of Europe, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the OSCE. Therefore, the claim that Russia had to invade the Donbas to protect it citizens against "Ukrainian Nazism and arrogance" is completely baseless.
Also, the related claim that Donbas is Russian territory that Russia just ceded to Ukraine is equally baseless. Donbas is historically part of Ukraine. Ethnologist and director of the National Museum of the Holodomor Lesya Hasidzhak explains that until the 15th century, Donbas was known as the "wild field" as it was sparsely populated where various groups moved and lived. From the 15th to the 18th century, Cossack settlements began to take root, followed by imperial colonization and the arrival of runaway peasants seeking land and freedom. This settlement process continued into the early 19th century. In the 19th century, Donbas began attracting workers from Russian provinces.
According to Donetsk Law University historian Dmytro Tytarenko, this Russian colonisation shaped the region’s demographic character well into the post-war 20th century.
Despite this complex history, Ukraine has never recognised the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DPR and LNR) as independent entities. These are Ukrainian regions currently under the control of Russian-backed forces. No country has recognised them as independent states. The European Union has condemned Russia’s military actions in Ukraine since 2014 as a clear violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
See similar cases that failure of peace conference will rid Russian lands of neo-Nazis and restore ancestral lands, that Russia is defending territories that have been part of it for centuries, that some territories of Donbas and Novorossiya are occupied by the Kyiv regime, that Russia has a right to five regions of Ukraine.