President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky on September 14 visited Izyum, liberated from Russian occupation, in the Kharkiv region. However, when covering the event, Russian propaganda agencies, including RIA Novosti and TASS, did not mention that the city had been de-occupied from the Russian army, but examined in detail the stripes on Zelensky’s sleeve and on the uniform of the Ukrainian military.
TASS decided to report that a patch “with the image of a skull and bones” is attached to the sleeve of Zelensky’s jacket, which is popular among “Ukrainian right-wing radicals, including those involved in the military operation in Donbass.”
However, in fact, Zelensky’s sleeve shows the emblem of the 72nd separate mechanized brigade named after the Black Cossacks. This is probably why TASS did not even show a photo of the patch close up, because the inscription “Ukraine or death” is visible on it, but there is no hint of bones, which the agency reports, implying a completely different emblem.
Similar news appeared in RIA Novosti and Radio Sputnik, but these publications drew attention to a different symbol. RIA correspondents claim that the “symbols of the SS division “Dead Head”” are noticeable on the uniform of a serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
When zooming in on a photo of a military man, the symbol does indeed resemble a skull, but it is impossible to establish that this is a “Nazi symbol” due to the quality of the image.
At the same time, in April, the head of the so-called DPR, Denis Pushilin, presented an award to a fighter with a similar symbol on his uniform. After that, frames with a serviceman and a patch were cut out of the video, which could be seen quite clearly.
It should be noted that TASS in its publication refers to Zelensky's publication in Telegram, where the president announced the de-occupation of territories, but the agency does not quote him. The pro-Kremlin resource also did not publish all the photos from the meeting with flags and military personnel. In one of the publications in the channel, the President of Ukraine writes:
“You can temporarily occupy the territory of our state. But it is definitely impossible to occupy the Ukrainian people. You can brainwash, but this cannot be done with the hearts of Ukrainians. Thanks to the Commander of the Ground Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Syrsky, and to all our soldiers for liberating the Ukrainian land from the enemy.”
In April, the website of the head of the DPR published a video of the awarding of “particularly distinguished” in the “operation to liberate Donbass.” Among the recipients was a militiaman whose uniform bears a patch in the form of a slightly modified Nazi Totenkopf emblem. This emblem was worn by soldiers of the 3rd SS Panzer Division "Dead Head". Also on the sleeve of the fighter is the Scandinavian symbol of Odin "Valknut", which is often used by neo-pagans and neo-Nazis. A soldier with Nazi stripes from the Somali battalion, who fought against Ukrainian "nationalists" in Mariupol, is called Roman Vorobyov, Mediazona wrote . He is the commander of an assault platoon with the rank of senior lieutenant. Pushilin presented Vorobyov with the St. George Cross of the II degree.
In addition to the fact that the Russian media do not write about the retreat of Russia against the backdrop of a successful counter-offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, recently the Russian Ministry of Defense has been trying more often to recall its “successes” in the war launched against Ukraine. However, the department periodically gives the Russians old facts as new ones or provides conflicting data. For example, the Defense Ministry for the second time in the last month reported on the destruction of 45,000 tons of ammunition in the Voznesensk region of the Nikolaev region. The department's summary was published on the Telegram channel on September 12, but it is similar to the report for August 7. The mayor of Voznesensk, Yevgeny Velichko, told The Insider that there were arrivals, but not at the ammunition depot, but at the grain warehouse, which never had military equipment.
On September 2, Sergei Shoigureported on the capture of the village of Peski in the Donbass. However, the Russian Ministry of Defense and the “DPR” forces report the capture of this village for the fourth time in a month. In addition, The Project found that, according to the Defense Ministry, Russia had destroyed more equipment by June than Ukraine had in total, taking into account Western supplies. For example, according to the agency, the Russian military shot down 84 of the 36 Bayraktar drones that Ukraine had.