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“A second Bucha is being made out of Vovchansk”. How Russian propagandists use photos of Ukrainian documentarians to cover up civilian killings in Volchansk

6.6.2024
2
min read

Photography in the Russian-Ukrainian war is not only a valuable and truthful document of events, but also a weapon that is actively used for its own purposes for disinformation and distortion of facts. The Ukrainian Association of Professional Photographers is starting to work on the rubric “Is it really?”, where it will check the authenticity of certain manipulations of information, referring to the original source.

Volchansk, Kharkiv region. May 20, 2024. Photo by Konstantin and Vlada Liberov

“Installation photo from a drone”

The spouses of Ukrainian documentary photographers Konstantin and Vlada for several days in a row recorded the consequences of the breakthrough of Russian troops on the Volchansky direction in the Kharkiv region.

Recall that around 5 a.m. on May 10, the enemy tried to break through the Ukrainian defense in Kharkiv region in two places. The Ukrainian Defense Forces met the Russians with fire. The Armed Forces continue to defend themselves. However, civilians living in Volchansk and the surrounding settlements came under intense shelling. The Russians attacked the Ukrainians without sparing various types of shells and bombs.

While in Volchansk, Kostya and Vlad saw how “the city is filled with death, and the bodies of civilians under the rubble and just on the street.” Photographers documented the bodies of two civilian women lying dead on the ground.

“The second and third photos show the bodies of two civilian women. Next to them are two small specific burrows, who understand, immediately realize that this is not an accidental mine or artillery. With a probability of 90% — these are targeted discharges from a drone. Women in bright clothes. It is impossible to confuse them with the military even from a height. I have already heard about this in Krinki: the military told how the Russians persecuted with discards an old grandfather, who somehow miraculously ended up among these ruins,” Liberov wrote on his page in instagram.

Kremlin propagandist, native of Odessa Yulia Vityazeva, reacted to these photos. She published in Telegrama photo of the two killed Ukrainians, saying it was “a staged photo from a drone, which was taken solely to once again blame Russia and beg for weapons from the owners.”

“In fact, the women in the photo do not look at all like the murdered ones. The clothes are intact, there are no traces of blood. After a mine or artillery, the picture would be different. Unfortunately, we already know well what the killed look like. Too often we have had to see terrible footage of the consequences of Ukrainian arrivals on our civilians. And here is a set photo from a drone. Made solely in order to once again blame Russia and beg for weapons from the owners. In general, the years go by and the methods and techniques do not change. Just because they work. “Sorry,” she commented. Yuliia Vityazeva, a Kremlin propagandist from the channel “Solovyev Live”.

Liberov, in turn, replied to Vityazev. “Indeed, the years go by, and we will never get used to the level of their cynicism. The only thing that can not be disagreed with is that Volchansk is making a second Bucha, and the Russians themselves, as you can see, already publicly admit this,” commented Kostya and Vlada in Telegram.

Recall that the propagandist Vityazev from the Soloviev channel, who fled from Ukraine, was sentenced in absentia to 11 years in prison. This was reported by Security Service of UkraineNovember 30, 2023. According to the investigation, after moving to Moscow in 2015, she began to publicly spread fakes about the socio-political situation in Ukraine. Under the pseudonym Yulia Vityazev, she repeatedly supported the occupiers on the propaganda TV channel “Solovyev Live”. She also became a “columnist” of the News Front news agency, which was created in the temporarily occupied Crimea. In addition, the collaborator was one of the first to begin to justify the Russians after the explosion of the Kakhov NPP. The court found her guilty under two articles of the Criminal Code of Ukraine: Part 6 of Article 111-1 (collaborative activity); Part 2 and Part 3 of Article 436-2 (justification, recognition of legality, denial of armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, glorification of its participants). She was sentenced to 11 years in prison with confiscation of property.

The material was worked on:
Researcher of the topic, author of the text: Vira Labich and Vlada Liberova
Literary Editor: Julia Futei
Site Manager: Vladislav Kuhar

Shelling, Evacuation and Threat of Re-Occupation of Volchansk in Documentary Pictures by Georgy Ivanchenko and Yakov Lyashenko

Photography in the Russian-Ukrainian war is not only a valuable and truthful document of events, but also a weapon that is actively used for its own purposes for disinformation and distortion of facts. The Ukrainian Association of Professional Photographers is starting to work on the rubric “Is it really?”, where it will check the authenticity of certain manipulations of information, referring to the original source.

Volchansk, Kharkiv region. May 20, 2024. Photo by Konstantin and Vlada Liberov

“Installation photo from a drone”

The spouses of Ukrainian documentary photographers Konstantin and Vlada for several days in a row recorded the consequences of the breakthrough of Russian troops on the Volchansky direction in the Kharkiv region.

Recall that around 5 a.m. on May 10, the enemy tried to break through the Ukrainian defense in Kharkiv region in two places. The Ukrainian Defense Forces met the Russians with fire. The Armed Forces continue to defend themselves. However, civilians living in Volchansk and the surrounding settlements came under intense shelling. The Russians attacked the Ukrainians without sparing various types of shells and bombs.

While in Volchansk, Kostya and Vlad saw how “the city is filled with death, and the bodies of civilians under the rubble and just on the street.” Photographers documented the bodies of two civilian women lying dead on the ground.

“The second and third photos show the bodies of two civilian women. Next to them are two small specific burrows, who understand, immediately realize that this is not an accidental mine or artillery. With a probability of 90% — these are targeted discharges from a drone. Women in bright clothes. It is impossible to confuse them with the military even from a height. I have already heard about this in Krinki: the military told how the Russians persecuted with discards an old grandfather, who somehow miraculously ended up among these ruins,” Liberov wrote on his page in instagram.

Kremlin propagandist, native of Odessa Yulia Vityazeva, reacted to these photos. She published in Telegrama photo of the two killed Ukrainians, saying it was “a staged photo from a drone, which was taken solely to once again blame Russia and beg for weapons from the owners.”

“In fact, the women in the photo do not look at all like the murdered ones. The clothes are intact, there are no traces of blood. After a mine or artillery, the picture would be different. Unfortunately, we already know well what the killed look like. Too often we have had to see terrible footage of the consequences of Ukrainian arrivals on our civilians. And here is a set photo from a drone. Made solely in order to once again blame Russia and beg for weapons from the owners. In general, the years go by and the methods and techniques do not change. Just because they work. “Sorry,” she commented. Yuliia Vityazeva, a Kremlin propagandist from the channel “Solovyev Live”.

Liberov, in turn, replied to Vityazev. “Indeed, the years go by, and we will never get used to the level of their cynicism. The only thing that can not be disagreed with is that Volchansk is making a second Bucha, and the Russians themselves, as you can see, already publicly admit this,” commented Kostya and Vlada in Telegram.

Recall that the propagandist Vityazev from the Soloviev channel, who fled from Ukraine, was sentenced in absentia to 11 years in prison. This was reported by Security Service of UkraineNovember 30, 2023. According to the investigation, after moving to Moscow in 2015, she began to publicly spread fakes about the socio-political situation in Ukraine. Under the pseudonym Yulia Vityazev, she repeatedly supported the occupiers on the propaganda TV channel “Solovyev Live”. She also became a “columnist” of the News Front news agency, which was created in the temporarily occupied Crimea. In addition, the collaborator was one of the first to begin to justify the Russians after the explosion of the Kakhov NPP. The court found her guilty under two articles of the Criminal Code of Ukraine: Part 6 of Article 111-1 (collaborative activity); Part 2 and Part 3 of Article 436-2 (justification, recognition of legality, denial of armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, glorification of its participants). She was sentenced to 11 years in prison with confiscation of property.

The material was worked on:
Researcher of the topic, author of the text: Vira Labich and Vlada Liberova
Literary Editor: Julia Futei
Site Manager: Vladislav Kuhar

Shelling, Evacuation and Threat of Re-Occupation of Volchansk in Documentary Pictures by Georgy Ivanchenko and Yakov Lyashenko

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