Russia is preparing to launch a disinformation campaign aimed at discrediting Ukraine during the final stage of prisoner exchanges, with the dissemination of fake lists of deceased individuals.
That is according to the Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Service, Ukrinform reports.
The campaign is set to culminate next week, and the decision to initiate it was made personally by Russian leader Vladimir Putin. The campaign is being coordinated by a senior deputy chief of the Russian presidential administration, who is responsible for orchestrating the actions of officials and ensuring an immediate media response across Russian state and aligned outlets.
“The goal of the campaign is clear – to provoke outrage within Ukrainian society (among service members and their families) with the actions of the Ukrainian authorities, demoralize the public, and simultaneously undermine Ukraine’s credibility on the international stage as a party that fails to honor its commitments,” the intelligence service said.
The entire Kremlin-controlled media ecosystem is engaged in the Russian-language information space. This includes well-known propagandists such as Margarita Simonyan and Vladimir Solovyov, along with various military bloggers and so-called “war correspondents.” They are actively generating emotionally charged content, manipulating statistics, and portraying any delays in the exchange process as deliberate actions by the Ukrainian government, aimed at avoiding the return of Ukrainian citizens, the Foreign Intelligence Service said.
The campaign is also being supported by pro-Russian proxy media outlets in Europe, including marginal platforms such as Hungary’s Magyar Nemzet and Magyar Hirlap, the Czech site CZ24.news, Slovakia’s Jednotne Slovensko, and the French-language outlet Reseau International. These platforms are being used to push Russian narratives and spread a distorted version of ongoing prisoner exchanges.
Common disinformation themes include: “Ukraine refuses to accept the bodies of its dead,” “the remains of nearly 6,000 soldiers have yet to be returned to Ukraine,” and “relatives of the deceased must continue to wait due to Ukrainian government inaction.”
The campaign’s climax is reportedly scheduled for the final days of the ongoing exchanges, tentatively around June 20. At that point, Russia is expected to release fabricated lists of supposedly identified deceased Ukrainian soldiers and civilians to the media. The intent, according to the Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Service, is to trigger a wave of panic and outrage in Ukraine, and to shift blame for Russia’s actions onto the Ukrainian authorities.
Ukraine and Russia conducted a fourth prisoner exchange in one week on June 14. Among those returned home were soldiers who had been in Russian captivity since 2022, including individuals previously listed as missing in action.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has confirmed that prisoner exchanges will continue in accordance with existing agreements and has instructed Defense Minister Rustem Umerov to carry out further exchanges.
Photo: Office of the President of Ukraine
Source: Russia plans to disseminate fake lists of dead during final stage of POW exchanges – intel
