De meest onpartijdige en complete evaluatie over wat er wel en niet klopt van claims door Rusland, Oekraïne en het Westen die ik tot op heden ben tegengekomen.
Enkele quotes:
Russian invasion of Ukraine is illegal under international law. Contrary to the Russian government claim, this war cannot be classified as a preventive war under the international law because there were no imminent security threats. While the Ukrainian government proclaimed plans to join NATO and NATO publicly stated during the Bucharest summit and before the war that Ukraine would become NATO member in the future, there was no immediate likelihood of NATO membership of Ukraine or deployment of long-range missiles or nuclear weapons by NATO there.
While Zelenskyy reversed his election promises of peaceful resolution of the Donbas conflict, did not fulfill the Minsk agreements, and proclaimed intention to return separatist- controlled Donbas under the control of the central government, there was no confirmed evidence of imminent attack of Ukrainian forces to take back separatist-controlled Donbas. While Zelenskyy suggested during the Munich conference shortly before the Russian invasion that Ukraine might seek to become a nuclear power, there was no immediate prospect of Ukraine building nuclear or biological weapons. Russia inflated the imminent nature of such security threats to justify the illegal invasion of Ukraine.
Ukrainian officials close to Zelenskyy revealed that the British prime minister visited Kyiv in April 2022 to block a peace deal with Russia after the Ukrainian government delegation in peace talks with Russia in its written peace plan proposal reportedly agreed to neutrality of Ukraine, no bases and troops from foreign countries, and no nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass de️struction. (Ukrainska, 2022). Fiona Hill and Ange️la Ste️nt confirme️d citing “multiple️ former senior U.S. officials" that Russia & Ukraine agreed in April on a peace deal outline. (Hill and Stent, 2022).
Zelenskyy abandoned the negotiations right after this visit by the British prime-minister and not after the revelations of the Russian war crimes in Bucha. He stated after visiting Bucha his willingne️ss to continue️ the️ ne️gotiations (Strana, 2022). But afte️r the️ Johnson’s visit, Zelenskyy and other senior government officials of Ukraine rejected peace talks. Zelenskyy and the Defense Minister of Ukraine stated that the war would only end with taking back all lost territory of Ukraine, i.e., not only territories occupied during the Russian invasion but also separatist-controlled Donbas and Russian annexed Crimea, and that such outcome would constitute the Ukrainian victory. Such radical policy shift happened even though the odds of such outcome remained extremely small because of the Russian military advantage over Ukraine.
There is no corroborated evidence of systematic false-flag shelling/bombing of civilians by the Russian, separatist, and Ukrainian forces. This concerns, for example, claims by the Russian and separatist governments that the bombing of the maternity hospital and a theater in Mariupol were false flag attacks and claims by the Ukrainian government that the shelling of Donetsk and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant were false flags. But there is clear evidence of Russian missile strikes of power plants in Ukrainian government-controlled regions in September 2022.
Contrary to the Russian government claims of staged killings in Bucha, analysis of UN and Amnesty International reports, forensic expert reports, videos, satellite images, eyewitness reports, media investigative reports, and other sources confirms that the total of about several dozen civilians and territorial defense members were shot or summarily executed by individual Russian soldiers or Russian units during the Russian occupation of Bucha. Such summary executions are classified as war crimes.
Contrary to the claims by the Ukrainian and Western governments and the media, there is no documented evidence of Srebrenica-like mass execution (massacre) of a large proportion of the Bucha town residents by the Russian forces.
There is no evidence of the Ukrainian genocide of ethnic Russians in separatist-controlled Donbas and the Russian genocide of Ukrainians in Ukraine. But there is various evidence of war crimes by individual soldiers or units, primarily from the Russian forces. Similarly, various evidence suggests that the absolute majority of civilian casualties resulted from indiscriminate shelling or bombing, overwhelmingly by the Russian forces, typically, in populated areas that were often used for military purposes, primarily by the Ukrainian forces.