“They are killing us. Our own guys are shelling us.” Despite suffering months of strikes by the Russian military, some Ukrainian residents repeat Kremlin propaganda, accusing the West of causing the war and their own army of shelling their homes.
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“They are doing it on purpose,” Natasha said. “They said people need to be evacuated. They need the land.” A native of the Donetsk region, Kirdiapkin, 35, has seen firsthand the effects of the Russian information war while serving in the police force in the front-line Ukrainian cities of Mariupol, Druzhkivka and, now, Kostyantynivka.
One pro-Russian channel, the Kostyantynivka Telegram channel, has 4,500 subscribers and posts a strange mix of pro-Russian images and videos, warnings of artillery and rocket strikes, Orthodox prayers and threats against local officials for not providing adequate utilities. Kirdiapkin said he spent much of his time rescuing victims from missile and rocket attacks and tracking down the informants who work as Russia’s eyes and ears on the ground.
The former taxi driver, a 50-year-old woman, was detained by the police after they noticed her visiting bomb sites in different parts of the town, he said. The woman admitted supplying information to Russian intelligence, he said, and a voice message on her cellphone from her Russian handler asking for confirmation of the number of victims gave her away.
“I thought maybe something would change for the better in my country this way, and peace would come,” she says in the video recording. “I didn’t want my children to live in war.”
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