Fake news that can spark the war

Here and here.

The news was quick­ly picked up by many major Russ­ian news out­lets and spread all over the Inter­net. The fact is this piece of news is absolute bold-faced lies. Local media in Donet­sk has no men­tion of the shelling and sep­a­ratist lead­ers deny any esca­la­tion at the front­line.

This piece of news, or rather, dis­in­for­ma­tion, came imme­di­ate­ly after Russ­ian war­ships rammed and opened fire at Ukrain­ian Navy ves­sels in the Black Sea, wound­ing six Ukrain­ian ser­vice­men. Ukraine is set to intro­duce Mar­tial Law.

It’s clear that Rus­sians want to divert atten­tion, but such “news” com­ing from a state newswire can eas­i­ly spark a full-fledged war in East­ern Ukraine.