Social media is a critical domain of ‘information warfare’, where states seek to advance their interests by shaping the views of their own citizens or those of other nations. A new study tracks activity in this domain at the start of Russia’s invasion.
Bridget Smart and colleagues obtained all tweets sent between February 23rd and March 8th containing the following hashtags: #(I)StandWithPutin, #(I)StandWithRussia, #(I)SupportRussia, #(I)StandWithUkraine, #(I)StandWithZelenskyy and #(I)SupportUkraine.
These hashtags were chosen as they were the most commonly trending hashtags that could be reliably identified with one or other side. If a particular tweet contained a pro-Russian hashtag and a pro-Ukrainian one, it was labelled ‘balanced’. Only English-language tweets were included.
The authors’ main finding is shown in the chart below. In short, the overwhelming majority of tweets (90%) were pro-Ukrainian, whereas only a small percentage were pro-Russian (6.8%).
Now, you might say this is not surprising, as most people in the West support Ukraine and very few support Russia. However, it provides evidence against the commonly heard claim that Russian troll farms exert large sway over public opinion.
An important caveat is that over 100 pro-Russian accounts were banned on March 4th, which partly explains the lack of pro-Russian tweets. However, it’s clear that even before these accounts were banned, the overwhelming majority of tweets were pro-Ukrainian.
Smart and colleagues used the Botometer tool to identify bots, and concluded that about 70% of tweets in their dataset were sent by bots (with the percentage being similar for pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian tweets).
However, as Mike Hearn noted in an article for Daily Sceptic last year, the Botometer tool has a massive false positive rate, making it almost useless. (In other words, it massively overestimates the number of bots.) So I wouldn’t trust the authors’ conclusions in this regard.
On the other hand, their finding that 90% of English-language tweets were pro-Ukrainian strikes me as highly plausible. Indeed, one notable feature of Twitter activity since the start of the war is the ubiquity of certain large, pro-Ukrainian accounts. One of these has attracted particular attention: The Kyiv Independent.
This is the account of a Kiev-based newspaper, founded in November of 2021. (Note: I use ‘Kiev’ because it is the English exonym for Ukraine’s capital.) The Kyiv Independent was the successor to the Kyiv Post, which became defunct last year after a dispute between staff and ownership.
What’s remarkable about The Kyiv Independent, as several observers have noted, is how quickly it rose to become one of the most influential accounts on the war in Ukraine.
Checking the internet archive, the account had just 731 followers on November 22nd. By February 13th, it was up to 11.4K. By February 24th, the date of Russia’s invasion, it was up to 37.2K. And by 28 March, it was up to 2 million. This is an extraordinary rate of growth, which must be partly explained by algorithmic amplification.
Indeed, The Kyiv Independent – which no one had even heard of before February – has more followers than the Daily Express, the Daily Mirror or The Times (which all joined Twitter more than a decade ago). Not only that, but it doesn’t produce any content in Ukrainian, so almost all its readers are in the West.
Another point worth noting is that calling itself ‘independent’ is a stretch, as the newspaper received a $200,000 grant from the Canadian government.
Evidence suggests that pro-Ukrainian accounts are much more influential on English-language Twitter than pro-Russian accounts. This is in part because the latter are frequently banned. Yet the unprecedented rise of The Kyiv Independent suggests that Twitter is also shaping the discourse via artificial boosting – not just banning.
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‘…their finding that 90% of English-language tweets were pro-Ukrainian strikes me as highly plausible.’
All of which makes the pro Russian bias in the comments section on this site a bit strange……or not really:
‘Informed by publicly available ‘open source’ data, the analysis delineates three key tactics that underpinned their disinformation campaign: account buying; ‘follower fishing’; and narrative switching. Both individually and collectively these were designed to build the reach, impact and influence of the ideologically loaded messages that social media account operators authored and amplified. The particular value of the analysis is that whilst a lot of recent public and political attention has focussed upon Kremlin backed disinformation in respect of the 2016 United States presidential election, far less work has addressed their European activities.’
‘Unlike classic propaganda, the design is not intended to seduce people to invest in a particular ‘truth’, but rather to render them in a state of profound and radical doubt about what to believe—a state of epistemic anarchy.’
‘How Russia’s Internet Research Agency Built its Disinformation Campaign’
I used to be in a ‘state of epistemic anarchy’, but I’m all better now.
I determined not to believe anything at all about the war in Ukraine. Seems to be a lot more disinformation and skewed analysis than facts and honesty.
Let me know when its over and the peace treaty is signed…
There are two possible reasons for the number of pro-Russian comments on this site, neither of them reputable.
The first, as previously detailed, is that many originate from the Internet Research Agency in St Petersburg. The ‘American speak’ and U.S. style spelling often gives the game away
The other is that many originate from dotty little organisations run by oddballs who are recipients of Putin’s largesse.
The 2021 European Parliament ‘Tip of the Iceberg’ report details numerous cases of Russian financial dealings with far-right parties and anti-gender civil society organisations across Europe. It found Russian actors accounted for $188m of funding flowing to European anti-gender actors between 2009 and 2018, far surpassing the US Christian Right’s spending in Europe over the same period.
Russian funding is not like other sources of funding – it is a reward for ideological alignment with Moscow and an incentive to advance Russian interests in the West.
Follow the money.
I’m not sure it’s accurate to sugggest there are a large number of pro Russian comments
The majority of people who comment BTL on Ukraine are sceptical about the wisdom and motives of our involvement and most of those people are Lockdown Sceptics who have been commenting for a while
I think it’s not at all surprising to find scepticism about state actions on this website
I simply state that there is a pro Russian (numerical) bias within the comments here, not, as you put it, ‘a large number of pro Russian comments’
As the article makes plain, opinion elsewhere is numerically biased in the alternative direction. That makes me sceptical……because I am a sceptic.
You are, of course, entitled to your view.
It is not one that I share.
I don’t at all get a sense that BTL here is pro-Russian. We’re just pro-Reality, which is not a binary thing.
Please point out which posts in this Ukraine related thread you think are from Russian bots or whatever, and what makes you think this.
Majority of posts on a sceptic website focusing on things we’re being lied to about wholesale and mass insanity are sceptical of mainstream view of Ukraine conflict- what a surprise!
PS I’m not a Russian bot – I’m sitting in the glorious English September sunshine waiting for a train at Stratford railway station (that’s Stratford London not the birthplace of The Bard). Do I pass the bot test?
I don’t know much about Ukraine or Russia but I don’t think it’s our fight.
I am talking about the entire site not this particular thread.
Have a look at the comments below all of the Ukraine articles……
Major made it our fight when he signed the Budapest Memorandum guaranteeing Ukraine’s territorial integrity….
Or should we join Putin in reneging on our international agreements which, by the way, include the Chemical Weapons Convention?
You are unconcerned that Putin’s Novichok underpants poisoners killed British citizens in Amesbury?
Though impossible to prove there are all the hallmarks of an organised pro-Russian propagandist campaign on this site as Monro states.
The vast majority of the relevant comments are explicitly or implicitly fully supportive of the imperialist military campaign and regime (rather than simply questioning aspects of the ‘western mainstream narrative’), there are frequent linguistic and cultural slips, the use of the rather unconvincing ‘I have friends in Moscow who tell me..’ meme, the near instant appearance of mass positive upticks for pro-Russian comments / mass downticks for anti- ones.
Indeed if you achieve the status of a consistent opponent of the invasion you are liable to receive automatic post disapproval – I once received something like 10 downticks for a single line post correcting a spelling error! 🙂
Re ‘I think it’s not at all surprising to find scepticism about state actions on this website’
It would in fact be extremely surprising to find widespread scepticism of the claims of governments (also media etc) in liberal democratic systems such as the UK coupled with blind acceptance and endorsement of the feeble excuses for expansionist military activities of ruthlessly tyrannical regimes such as the Putin one;
Other than through the sort of organised propagandist campaign (involving both directly Kremlin backed groups and their anti-democratic fellow travellers in the West) being speculated about.
I used to be Ossettian, particularly on the Telegraph and Spectator.
I changed to Nearhorburian because I got sick of ignorant people like you and Monro accusing me of being Russian because they’d never heard of Ossett, the West Riding market town where I grew up.
And if there are any paid propagandists commenting here, my money is on you two.
“I used to be Ossettian, particularly on the Telegraph and Spectator.
I changed to Nearhorburian because I got sick of ignorant people like you and Monro accusing me of being Russian because they’d never heard of Ossett, the West Riding market town where I grew up.”
I was not casting aspersions on any particular posters (including yourself), and don’t even recognise nationality (never mind use it as a basis for condemnation or suspicion).
I was merely arguing that there are signs of an organised pro Russian propaganda campaign on this site – and to be clear that does not mean that I think that every poster or comment that in any way supports any Kremlin positions / challenges any anti-Kremlin ones would be part of such a speculated arrangement.
“And if there are any paid propagandists commenting here, my money is on you two”
Well I wasn’t implying any payment aspect, but in any case sadly my own magnificent contributions have yet to be recognised financially (but I would say that, wouldn’t I….) 🙂
It’s pretty obvious to me that the ratio and numbers of up/downvotes on certain comments are statistically implausible. The ease with which it’s possible to cast a vote makes it open to abuse.
Totally agree.
On the plus side any objective reader will notice that there is block and knee-jerk / automatic voting going on (see my downticks for a spell fix!) so it will be counter-productive
I think that the folk who frequent this website are far less likely to subscribe to group think. And possibly also many of them were prolific contributers here before the “pay to comment” policy was introduced. They downtick because they can.
One doesn’t even have to be logged in to up/downvote. It’s a simple HTTP request with neither authentication nor authorization, which can easily be automated. I don’t think you’d even need a different IP address each time (but I haven’t checked).
IP is checked to prevent duplication and DoS attacks (although not DDoS attacks, obviously).
Anyway, the fact that something is possible does not mean it happens. Perhaps you could analyse this dataset, it will be recorded in the web servers’ logs. It will also be possible to analyse an IPs route to requesting any URL, hence it is possible to identify automated/programmatically controlled downtick behaviour.
No, I’ve just had a look at the JS and it doesn’t seem to check the IP address, although it does check the “nonce” value, but it’d still be trivial to write a script to produce any number of up/downvotes.
So you think people make the effort to come to this site, especially to down-tick you?
Over the last two+ years we have had several Pro-vaccine commentators, they seem to have all disappeared now ?
As they also garnered dozens of downticks are you suggesting it was another Russian Bot attack? Or maybe, reality check, people did just disagree with them…
What I’m saying is that one person with a computer could manipulate the numbers very easily, and it looks like the numbers on certain articles and comments are being fairly blatantly manipulated. One could do it with a simple shell script using cURL.
“I think that the folk who frequent this website are far less likely to subscribe to group think.”
If you want to take that approach (not mine) then this and similar threads discussing the Ukrainian situation show huge amounts of pro-Russian / anti-Western ‘group think’.
“And possibly also many of them were prolific contributors here before the “pay to comment” policy was introduced. They downtick because they can.”
A large number of the most vehement and prolific of the pro-Kremlin posters disappeared after the pay-to-comment policy was introduced.
It seems implausible to me that the relatively trivial sum of £5 for a month’s worth of contributions would have been enough to permanently put off such dedicated campaigners; perhaps the fact that online payments involve revealing addresses was relevant in at least some cases.
Just more educated guesswork, at the end of the day the organisational or locational background of posters is irrelevant (though deception is always a red flag), it is the content that matters.
And all the Kremlin-backing excuses for this act of naked imperial expansionism are easy to refute.
..there’s a difference, not one you like I know…but questioning the agenda and tactics of the West is not the same as being pro Russia…
…and again with the faux-shaming….America’s acts of naked Imperial expansion dwarf anyone else’s….as the excellent John Pilger has pointed out….
“In my lifetime, the United States has overthrown or attempted to overthrow more than 50 governments, mostly democracies. It has interfered in democratic elections in 30 countries. It has dropped bombs on the people of 30 countries, most of them poor and defenceless. It has attempted to murder the leaders of 50 countries. It has fought to suppress liberation movements in 20 countries.
The extent and scale of this carnage is largely unreported, unrecognised, and those responsible continue to dominate Anglo-American political life.”
What’s their excuse?
“.there’s a difference, not one you like I know…but questioning the agenda and tactics of the West is not the same as being pro Russia”
Condemning the agenda and tactics of the West whilst avoiding any criticism of Russia in the specific context of the Ukrainian invasion (and I am not suggesting you specifically are doing this) absolutely is acting in a pro-Russian propagandist manner.
In the same way as purely condemning the British Empire in the context of the Nazi invasion of Poland would be in effect supplying the Berlin regime with supportive / distracting propaganda.
With regards to Mr Pilger’s long list of allegations about the US, none of that is relevant to Russia’s unilateral invasion of Ukraine and general imperial-expansionist foreign policy.
Of course it’s utterly relevant…..America don’t give a fig about Ukraine other than what it can politically provide for them…..they have previous for going into countries rich in oil and gas don’t they? LOL?
I have never avoided criticism of Russia, nor has anyone else, but when the mega-pot calls the kettle??
I don’t think anyone has ever said what Russia is doing is good, but I think we try to talk about the reasons, something your scripts don’t allow…..my sympathies are very much with the Ukrainian people, as I have said on numerous occasions. I just don’t believe their Government, or ours, or America or NATO are acting in their best interest…and neither do millions of others, as much as you like to suggest otherwise…
This site has been taken over by Covid sceptics!
…and yet if you read the actual study, your comment fits the description of an active Ukrainian bot….’imperialist’ ‘government’ ‘democracy’..all
there…colour me surprised…LOL!
“…and yet if you read the actual study, your comment fits the description of an active Ukrainian bot….’imperialist’ ‘government’ ‘democracy’..all there”
Don’t compute, internal error, immediate shut down and reboot…. 🙂
Which posts here are from Russian bots?
I made no mention of bots, indeed highly doubt that there are algorithms sophisticated enough to convincingy contribute to complex forum discussions.
There does seem to be something dubious going on with the voting process where number and speed of broadly pro-Russian up and downticks often far exceed what would normally be expected on a UK based and anti- state oppression site.
At the end of the day none of this really matters, it is force of argument, evidence and morality which count rather than comment or voting patterns.
I only get involved in this sort of speculation because deception and manipulation are always unacceptable and should be called out when even the possibility of them exists.
In excess of $60 billion given to Ukraine from the USA alone….where shall I follow it to?
Yesterday a former Twitter IT security bod was presenting to Congress. The lack of security & data protection is dire. Over 4,000 Twitter employees have access to all the details for each Twitter account. How could such a system possibly maintain the integrity of the platform???
It’s not surprising that the Kyiv Independent has more Twitter followers than British-focused newspapers. Volodomir Zelenskyy’s Twitter account has 6.5M followers – several times that of the Daily Express – so what are we to conclude from that? The Kyiv Independent is a quality news outlet that’s of interest to many outside of Ukraine (me included), and I think the insinuations made in the article constitute a baseless and downrightly disreputable attack on another online publication and on Illia Ponomarenko, who founded the Kyiv Independent because the previous Kyiv Post didn’t let him have the editorial independence he wanted. It functions on donations, just like this site.
I don’t understand what you think you might achieve from this article, but I wouldn’t call it journalism. It seems more like sour grapes. And what about the fact that you’ve worked for a Russian state news outlet? Are you “independent”? How many of your Twitter followers are bots? People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
Also, FWIW, the English language does not have any “correct” or “incorrect” spellings: it’s not prescriptive or proscriptive; and unlike the French, we don’t have an “Academy of English”. This is also true of proper nouns, including place-names: there are many English place-names that have changed significantly over the years, and still have variations that are argued over. The name “Kiev” is based on the Russian spelling, whereas “Kyiv” is based on the Ukrainian. You can choose what to use, but don’t try to make out one or other is correct. It’s particularly ironic that the term you use to describe it – “exonym” – is itself a neologism (it doesn’t appear in the OED 2nd ed.).
I hadn’t seen a single use of the spelling Kyiv until February.
It’s a helpful indicator that the user is a globalist shill.
Nor here. All my life (and I’ve loved maps since before I left nappies), it’s been Kiev.
“I hadn’t seen a single use of the spelling Kyiv until February.”
It’s such a mystery, what on earth could explain why large numbers of people would prefer to use the Ukrainian rather than Russian pronunciation of the Ukrainian capital after 24 February 2022…
“It’s a helpful indicator that the user is a globalist shill.”
Whilst avoiding a reciprocal personalised attack, clearly anyone who is offended by this sympathetic minor change in pronunciation to the more accurate local one believes that Russia has an imperial right to impose its linguistic (and by implication military) will on its relatively small neighbour.
Nor had anyone else! But they’ll defend it on some Russian Imperialist nonsense….while ignoring the egregious act of the Ukrainian Government and the 2019 law effectively banning Russian speakers from a normal life…it basically regulates the Ukrainian language in the media, education, books and printing, Films, all cultural, artistic, recreational and entertainment events, All schools and universities are also required to teach in Ukrainian….….but you know, Kiev/Kyiv much more important!
It is important to examine rapid rises in popularity of anything, agreed, Mr Rons. The rapid rise of this website can be clearly explained by its catering for a large number of people who see practically zero journalism happening anywhere else at this most crucial period in the history of the human race.
But Noah is mainly refuting the idea that it is Moscow that is conducting Twitter-based propaganda; this study shows pretty clearly that it is not (whatever the reasons).
If you don’t mind my saying, between you and Noah, you’re the one who comes across more as emotion over reason.
I don’t think Noah makes any kind of a case for Russian or other activity on Twitter. He simply hasn’t got the data, and this is all just a distraction from the fact that Russia is losing the war. To coin the meme, “What Twitter defence doing?”
What would be Noah’s motivation to “distract” us from the “fact” that Russia is losing the war, Mr Rons?
I did not impute motive, I simply stated as a matter of fact that it is a distraction. Don’t try to put words in my mouth.
I am not saying you did. That’s why I asked you to elaborate.
Comparing to other newspapers makes more sense than comparing to world leaders. (Obama has 133M followers.) The Times is a “newspaper of record”, and has substantial name recognition not only in Britain but around the world. In 15 years of being on Twitter, it has accumulated 1.7M followers. It is not plausible that The Kyiv Independent, which lacks name recognition, could accumulate 2M followers in only four months without artificial boosting.
If the Daily Sceptic had received a $200K grant from a foreign government, it would be reasonable for people to question whether it was truly independent. The two articles I linked under “have noted” argue that The Kyiv Independent cannot be considered independent.
Other English speakers are free to use “Kyiv” if they want, but I will continue calling it “Kiev”. For the same reason, I will use “Moscow” rather than “Moskva” for Russia’s capital. The Wikipedia page for Ukraine’s capital, which is now titled “Kyiv”, notes that “Kiev is the traditional English name for the city”.
Here’s an example of artificial boosting by Twitter. This tweet appeared on my timeline, despite the fact that I do not follow The Kyiv Independent and none of the accounts I follow retweeted it. The tweet simply appeared under the heading “War in Ukraine”.
Another one 30 minutes later:
Thanks for your reply.
The comparison with Zelenskyy’s Twitter account is perfectly valid, as it shows the general level of international interest in Ukraine: his account had a “mere” 351K followers on 1st January. The number of followers of the Kyiv Independent thus needs no explanation, although as one of the main English-language Ukrainian publications, it obviously attracted a lot of attention from other news outlets. As for it being promoted by Twitter, I suppose that could be the case, or it could be that it’s being suggested to you in a normal manner because of your Twitter activity.
As to the $200,000 grant via the European Endowment for Democracy, again I really think you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel if you’re suggesting (as you seem to be doing) they wield any sort of editorial influence or control, or that the connection is somehow shady. I’d think an organisation that promotes independent journalism in a country where a lot of the media was oligarchically controlled would be a good thing, but that’s just me.
It all just comes across as a gratuitous smear against a reputable pro-Ukrainian website.
Zelenskyy had 322K followers on 22nd November versus 5.8M on 28th March – an increase of 18 times. The Kyiv Independent had 731 followers on 22nd November versus 2M on 28th March – an increase of 2,700 times. In any case, if you say it “may well be the case” that Twitter artificially boosts The Kyiv Independent, then we don’t disagree.
I didn’t say there was “any sort of editorial influence or control”. I merely said that “calling itself ‘independent’ is a stretch”. This seems like a fairly mild claim to me. Far stronger claims are made in these two articles. Perhaps you could write an article addressing them? I would be genuinely interested to read it.
For clarification, I edited my comment after you read it to effectively say that I think it’s possible the KI is being promoted to you personally because of your Twitter history/connections. But I don’t know. By the way, Twitter has suspended a bunch of pro-Ukrainian accounts, so it’s not one-sided, although the company does seem a lot more sympathetic to Ukraine – however the IT side of Twitter is a complete disaster, as we know, so it’s not clear what’s going on at all, and whether there’s a human somewhere tipping the scale. But sure, they may have decided to promote KI.
Re: statistics, c’mon Noah, you know it’s invalid to use multiples (18×/2,700×) instead of absolute numbers to compare Zelenskyy’s and KI’s accounts. KI started much lower, so a similar level of overall growth will obviously be exaggerated when using that metric. I could do something similar and say that, since both accounts started at zero, they’ve both shown an infinite rate of increase, thus they’re on par. I just don’t believe there’s anything suspicious going on.
As to the articles you refer to, I’m afraid I don’t have time to look into them too closely, but they don’t come across as much of a “gotcha”.
It’s entirely valid to use multiples when you’re talking about population growth.
Adding a given number of followers, in a given amount of time, is much harder for a small account than for a large account (up to a point). What’s more impressive? Going from 1 follower to 100K followers in 6 months, or going from 1M to 1.2M in 6 months?
Or suppose there are two towns: one with a population of 10 and one with a population of 10 million. After 6 years, the first has grown to 1 million, while the latter has grown to 12 million. Which would you say has experienced more growth?
I think your fundamental error is assuming (as you implicitly do) that there is a strong relationship between the number of Twitter followers on day 1 to the number of followers on day 2, as though followers reproduce and multiply in a way similar to sexual reproduction (you even give such an example). But Ukraine suddenly became the focus of massive international media attention, and KI suddenly got a lot of publicity. There are lots of examples of obscure people who suddenly became overnight internet sensations, and we even have a term for this kind of rapid spread – “viral”.
It’s simply incorrect, on a very fundamental level, to suppose that the number of Twitter followers today has to bear any kind of predictable relationship to the number of Twitter followers yesterday.
If the rise of KI tells us anything, it’s that Western media outlets suddenly had to look for someone in Ukraine who could tell them about the situation, because nobody in their organisation had any prior knowledge of, or relationships with people in, Ukraine.
‘Officially’, Twitter themselves estimate they have 16.5 million bots…so I assume the real number is much higher.
Of course there’s loads of Ukraine propaganda messaging, you’d have to be blind and dumb not to see it…my particular favourite…..every time Ukraine is mentioned they have to put the trademark ‘unprovoked’ in front of it…LOL!
Where, in the MSM, are the essays about the origins of the conflict? Why hasn’t anyone written about Ukraine still shelling civilians in Donbass?
Why have all discussions..that were numerous before this years great white-wash, about the far-right parties in Ukraine disappeared?
Why doesn’t anyone mention Zelenskyy’s dodgy financial dealings any more? Again they were being discussed in relation to the Pandora papers the MSM before?
Now we get glossy Vogue photo-shoots..and we are not supposed to be sceptical? At all? About anything?
…and why does asking these obvious questions invoke wrath from the trolls?
Are we not supposed to notice the suppression of everything that’s happening and just believe a one-sided version of events that borders on stupidity?
It’s utterly bizarre to think that if everyone is so unquestioning about what is happening, why do they need so much propaganda?…Who exactly are they trying to convince?…..and who is paying for it all?
Hear hear!!!!!
The USA has three-letter organisations that are the most ruthless disinformation agencies in the world: organisations that will happily walk into many countries and assassinate or arrest or honey-trap someone they don’t like, organisations that are now treating and speaking of American citizens in the same manner they talked about Al Qaeda 21 years ago.
Russia, China and the N Koreans are good at cyber-attacks and disinformation. Can anyone really believe the country that is home to Silicon Valley, whose oligarchs are on speed dial to presidents and prime ministers and such ruthless organisations, as well as the social media giants, isn’t heavily influencing everything we see, hear and read?
In case anyone is in any doubt as to why so much twitter activity is pro-Ukraine:
‘Ivan Litvynyenko, age 40, told Amnesty International about one such attack, which mortally wounded his wife Oksana on 15 April. Several cluster munitions exploded in a playground where he was walking with his wife and their four-year-old daughter, nearly killing his wife. He recalled: “When my daughter saw her mum on the ground in a pool of blood, she said to me, ‘let’s go home; mum is dead and the people are dead.’ She was in shock and so was I.” He said that his wife’s prognosis remains dire; it is still not clear whether she will be able to speak or walk again. “Our world has been turned upside down,” he concluded. The number of people in Kharkiv whose lives have been lost or irreparably harmed is substantial. The director of the medical department of the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration told Amnesty International that 606 civilians had been killed and 1,248 injured in the Kharkiv region between 24 Feb and 28 April.
Amnesty International researchers documented seven cluster munition strikes in different neighbourhoods all over the city, where they found fins and pellets/fragments of cluster submunitions, as well as fragments of Uragan rockets known to carry such munitions. Indiscriminate attacks were also carried out using scatterable land mines and other explosive weapons, notably Grad rockets. In all, the organization documented 28 indiscriminate strikes on Kharkiv launched by Russian forces between 28 February and 30 April. These continuing attacks have forcibly displaced hundreds of thousands of residents. A city with a pre-war population of 1.4 million people, Kharkiv emptied quickly under Russia’s brutal campaign of bombardment. On 8 March, Governor Syniehubov said that more than 600,000 civilians had been evacuated from the Kharkiv region.’
‘Anyone can die at any time’ Report June 22
That is also why so much commentary on here is in the worst possible taste.
At least Ukraine is going to win.
The staggering thing is how long it has taken for so many on here to get the hang of that.
Most of them still haven’t…….
Win what?