DISINFO: Ukraine is the world's main hot bed of neo-Nazism
SUMMARY
The Third Committee of the UN General Assembly adopted a draft Russian resolution on “combating the glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance."
The United States and Ukraine, the world's main hotbed of neo-Nazism, as has been the case for years, voted against. So did 51 other countries (including Italy and Washington's other European vassals), 15 abstained, and 106 states supported the Russian draft resolution expected to reach the General Assembly plenary in December.
The political significance of the opposition is clear: the US and NATO countries are boycotting the resolution that, albeit not openly, calls out Ukraine, where neo-Nazi battalions like Azov are an integral part of the proxy war waged by NATO and the US against Russia.
RESPONSE
Recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative claiming that Ukraine is a Nazi state, supported by the US, in the context of Russia's ongoing war of aggression against Ukraine.
The disinformation claim of "Nazi Ukraine" has been used as a pretext for Russia's illegal war of aggression against Ukraine.
This resolution mentioned in the disinformation claim has been used by the Russian Federation to accuse various European states of Nazism , and Ukraine more specifically.
The representative of the Czech Republic, speaking on behalf of the European Union as well as EU candidate country Ukraine, emphasized that the Russian Federation has used the false narrative of denazification to justify its breach of the United Nations Charter and its violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of an independent State.
Similar positions, including concerns about the context in which the resolution is being presented, have been expressed by several EU member states, as well as other UN members.
The myth of Nazi-ruled Ukraine has been the cornerstone of Russian disinformation about the country since the very beginning of the 2013-14 Euromaidan protests, when it was used to discredit the pro-European popular uprising in Kyiv and, subsequently, the broader pro-Western shift in Ukraine's foreign policy. This myth has been already widely addressed on EUvsDisinfo. See also our analysis titled "Why does Putin portray himself as the tamer of neo-Nazism".