Original article (in Bosnian) was published on 24/03/2022
The Russian Ministry of Defense published incorrect information that most of the evacuated civilians from Mariupol expressed a desire to be transferred to territories under the control of pro-Russian forces, and that only a few fled to the territory under the control of the government. Details from this announcement were soon published in our speaking area.
On March 16, 2022, the Twitter profile @TheJomu (🅉Not a ‘bot you’re looking for 🇷🇸🇷🇺🇨🇳🇸🇾🅅) posted a tweet stating that almost all refugees from Mariupol, the most heavily bombed city during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, expressed a desire to go to Russia or the “liberated” territories:
Of the 31,367 people who left Mariupol, only 36 expressed a desire to go to cities under Ukrainian control. 99% want to go to Russia and the liberated territories.
This tweet gathered 47 retweets and 292 likes, with an additional 60 interactions achieved thanks to sharing a tweet link on Facebook. The claims that 99% of refugees from Mariupol want to go to Russia or territories controlled by pro-Russian forces have been posted on another Twitter profile (link) and Facebook (link, link).
What are the facts?
According to Ukrainian officials, the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, located in the southeast of the country, has been surrounded by Russian troops since the beginning of March this year (1, 2). The city was heavily bombed, and the city council estimates that 80 percent of the city’s housing units were destroyed. By March 15, Ukrainian officials estimated that up to 2,500 people had died in the city, leaving 350,000 without water, food and heating. Although the exact number of dead is not known, according to the estimate of the assistant mayor of Mariupol, by March 20, there could have been up to 3,000 dead civilians in the city.
When it comes to the evacuation from the besieged city, according to Al Jazeera, which refers to official Ukrainian sources, the first convoy of civilians successfully left Mariupol by car on March 14.
Civilians in convoys of vehicles continued to leave the city on March 15. However, the source for claims that most Mariupol residents have expressed a desire to be evacuated to Russia or territories controlled by pro-Russian forces was the Russian Ministry of Defense, which issued a statement on March 16 revealing this “information”:
The humanitarian operation continues in Mariupol. During the day, 31,367 civilians, including 89 foreigners, were evacuated safely through humanitarian corridors from the unblocked city. They include 71 representatives of the OSCE, nine citizens of Greece and nine citizens of Pakistan.
Of the more than 31,000 evacuated Ukrainian civilians, only 36 went to settlements in Kyiv-controlled areas in the Dnipropetrovsk region, while 99% of those rescued wanted to go to Russia, as well as settlements in Russian-controlled territory to liberated areas in Zaporizhia. and Kherson region. They categorically refused to move to the territories under the control of Kyiv.
However, according to the Ukrainian fact-checking website StopFake, the allegations of the Russian ministry are not true. In the analysis published on March 17, this website refers to the information of the city council, published on March 14, when the first convoy of 160 cars left the city on the route Portovske village – the city of Mangush – Berdyansk – Tokmak. The convoy’s destination was the city of Zaporizhzhia, which is under the control of the Ukrainian government, according to StopFake.
According to the Ministry of reintegration of the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, about 20,000 civilians were evacuated on March 15 through an organized humanitarian corridor, whose destination was also in Zaporizhia.
On the day of the announcement of the Russian Ministry of Defense, on March 16, the city council of Zaporizhzhia announced the arrival of 1,565 cars and 4,329 people from Mariupol. StopFake also states that many evacuated civilians were forced to spend the night in Berdyansk and then continue moving towards Zaporizhzhia.
So, the claims that almost all evacuees from Mariupol have expressed a desire to go to Russia and “liberated territories”, originated from the Russian Ministry of Defense and translated and published on social networks in our speaking area, are not true.
The first searchable publication of these claims receives the fake news rating, and later appearances are rated as the distribution of fake news.
