DISINFO: Ukraine uses American chemical weapons in the war
SUMMARY
Ukraine uses chemical weapons in the war against Russia. Ukrainian militants use chemicals of the same class that the Germans used in gas chambers during the Great Patriotic War [World War II]. [Russia] recorded the use of poisonous substances that could be synthesised only in the United States.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about biological laboratories in Ukraine. The claim also promotes a recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about biological weapons being secretly developed by the US in countries bordering Russia. Both claims were made in the context of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
There is no evidence to back the claim that Ukraine is preparing a chemical provocation or a use of the weapons of mass destruction.
After the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Secretariat of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) working under the auspices of the UN, has been closely monitoring any threat of using toxic chemicals as weapons.
In July 2024, at the invitation of Ukraine, a delegation of the experts of the organisation to prohibit chemical weapons arrived in the country. The OPCW has carried out a number of trainings on emergency response to incidents associated with toxic chemicals. Also, at the request of Ukraine, observers placed 70 LCD 3.3 detectors in the country - improved devices notifying about detected and identified threats associated with gases at levels that pose a direct danger to life and health or lower. Thus, Ukraine and international observation missions monitor the situations related to toxic chemicals.
In March 2024, the OPCW Executive Council rejected the charges made by Russia against Ukraine. Members of the Council called the Kremlin narratives “a campaign for misinformation aimed at creating confusion in the Council and discrediting the OPCW”. Read the full text in one of our cases: "Ukraine uses chemical weapons against Russia".
See other examples of similar disinformation narratives in our database, such as claims that Pentagon report on biological threats is an excuse for offensive biolabs, that Russia presented evidence of US biolabs in Ukraine at the convention on biological weapons, that new evidence of US military-biological activity emerged in Ukraine, that disease outbreaks in Ukraine are linked to the activity of US biolabs, that Zelenskyy ordered the destruction of evidence regarding the development of biological weapons, or that bio-experiments in US labs turned Ukrainian soldiers into ‘most cruel monsters’.