White House says US passed written warning of Moscow attack to Russia
The White House on Thursday described Russia’s allegation that Ukraine was involved in the attack on the Crocus city concert hall as “nonsense”, saying it was clear that Islamic State was “solely responsible”.
According to Reuters, in a briefing to reporters, the White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said that the US passed a written warning of an extremist attack to Russian security services, one of many provided in advance to Moscow.
Russian investigators claimed on Thursday they had uncovered evidence that the gunmen who killed more than 140 people in an attack on a concert hall near Moscow last week were linked to “Ukrainian nationalists”. While it described the nature of the alleged evidence, it did not publish it. In a statement, the state investigative committee claimed the attackers had received significant amounts of cash and cryptocurrency from Ukraine, and that another suspect involved in terrorist financing had been detained.
The White House on Thursday described Russia’s allegation that Ukraine was involved in the attack on the Crocus city concert hall as “nonsense”, saying it was clear that Islamic State was “solely responsible”. In a briefing to reporters, the White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said that the US passed a written warning of an extremist attack to Russian security services, one of many provided in advance to Moscow.
Russia vetoed on Thursday the annual renewal of a panel of experts monitoring enforcement of longstanding UN sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programme. The move comes amid US-led accusations that North Korea has transferred weapons to Russia, which Moscow has used in its war in Ukraine. Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied the accusations.
The White House called Russia’s veto of the renewal of North Korea sanctions monitors a “reckless action” that “further undermines” the UN security council’s actions on North Korea. South Korea’s UN ambassador Joonkook Hwang said the veto was “almost comparable to destroying a CCTV to avoid being caught red-handed”, while the deputy US ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told the council that Moscow had “undermined the prospect of the peaceful, diplomatic resolution of one of the world’s most dangerous nuclear proliferation issues”.
Russia has no designs on any Nato country and will not attack Poland, the Baltic states or the Czech Republic but if the west supplies F-16 fighters to Ukraine then they will be shot down by Russian forces, president Vladimir Putin said late on Wednesday. “The idea that we will attack some other country – Poland, the Baltic States, and the Czechs are also being scared – is complete nonsense. It’s just drivel,” Putin said, according to a Kremlin transcript released on Thursday.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, has warned that Vladimir Putin will push Russia’s war “very quickly” on to Nato soil unless he is stopped in Ukraine. In an interview with CBS, Zelenskiy acknowledged that his troops are not prepared to defend against another imminent major Russian offensive, and highlighted the urgency for American Patriot missile defense systems and more artillery.
Poland’s prime minister on Thursday hosted his Ukrainian counterpart for long-awaited talks designed to ease friction over Ukrainian farm imports and border blockades by disgruntled Polish farmers. On Thursday, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk welcomed his counterpart Denys Shmyhal to Warsaw.
Putin’s foreign intelligence chief paid a visit to North Korea this week to deepen bilateral cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang and discuss broader regional security, Russia’s spy service said on Thursday. Sergei Naryshkin, the head the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service, visited Pyongyang on 25-27 March, the SVR said. North Korea’s KCNA state media first reported the visit, said Reuters.
The Kremlin gave no indication on Thursday that Russian president Vladimir Putin plans to visit family members of those killed in last Friday’s attack on a Moscow concert hall, which killed 143 people. “If any contacts are necessary, we will inform you accordingly,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, when asked if Putin planned to meet family members of the dead.
Security measures in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv will be tightened after a spate of Russian ballistic missile attacks and threats of escalation, a city official said on Thursday. Russia staged concerted airstrikes on Ukraine’s energy system last week in what Moscow said was part of a series of “revenge” strikes in response to Kyiv’s bombardment of Russian regions.
Russia struck the north-eastern city of Kharkiv with aerial bombs on Wednesday for the first time since 2022, killing at least one civilian and wounding 16 others, local officials said. The airstrikes caused widespread damage, hitting several residential buildings and damaging the city’s institute for emergency surgery.
Authorities in the Mykolaiv region, near the Black Sea in southern Ukraine, said 12 people were injured and six residential buildings were damaged in a Russian strike on the city on Wednesday afternoon with a ballistic missile.
In an overnight attack on the southern Ukraine region of Zaporizhzhia, Shahed drones struck a residential area, injuring two women aged 72 and 74, according to regional governor Ivan Fedorov. Rescue services said seven buildings were damaged.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, has appointed Oleh Ivashchenko as the new head of Ukraine’s foreign intelligence service.
A Russian military aircraft crashed into the sea on Thursday off the Crimean port of Sevastopol, the Russian-installed governor of the region, Mikhail Razvozhayev, said. The pilot safely ejected and was picked up by rescuers, he added.
The Kremlin said on Thursday complete silence was needed when it came to discussions about possible prisoner exchanges involving Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter arrested in Russia a year ago on suspicion of espionage. Gershkovich, 32, became the first US journalist arrested on spying charges in Russia since the cold war when he was detained by the Federal Security Service (FSB) on 29 March. The reporter, the Wall Street Journal and the US government all deny he is a spy.
Ukraine asked western allies for additional air defences in an extraordinary meeting of the Nato-Ukraine Council that took place at ambassadors’ level on Thursday. Rustem Umerov, the Ukrainian defence minister, briefed the ambassadors and “called on Nato member states to provide additional air defence systems and missiles to protect Ukrainian cities and citizens”.
Ukraine’s foreign minister arrived in New Delhi on Thursday for a two-day visit to boost bilateral ties and cooperation with India, which considers Russia a time-tested ally from the cold war-era.
Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW) has carried out searches as part of an investigation with other European security services into alleged Russian espionage, the agency said on Thursday.
French authorities uncovered a website containing a fake recruitment drive for French volunteers to join the war in Ukraine, the defence ministry said on Thursday. The site has now been taken down by French services, a government source, who asked not to be named, told AFP without giving further details on the nature of the operation.
The Moscow attacks appear to have been the work of the group’s branch in Afghanistan, known as Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP).
ISKP, which was founded in 2015, has targeted propaganda and outreach to central Asia and previously has made multiple efforts to launch recruits into Europe and Russia. Turkey has also been a focus of activity. The four suspects presented in court by Russia were from Tajikistan.
One of the men suspected of taking part in the attack on the Crocus City Hall waiting for his pre-trial detention hearing at a court in Moscow. Photograph: Tatyana Makeyeva/AFP/Getty Images
Islamic State (IS) remains defeated in its core strongholds of the Middle East but has made significant progress in Africa and parts of south Asia, winning territory and resources that could serve as a launchpad for a new campaign of extremist violence, analysts and officials believe.
European governments have moved to their highest levels of alert for years after the attack on a concert hall in Moscow last week by militants from IS that killed 140 people.
The attack in Moscow, the most lethal Islamist extremist operation ever in Europe, was claimed by IS, which, officials believe, has been planning new operations against European targets for several years.
Between 2015 and 2019, when IS ran a so-called caliphate across a swath of land it controlled in eastern Syria and western Iraq, the group’s central leadership had little need of its newly established affiliates to launch operations in Europe, as it had all resources to hand with foreign recruits, money and training camps. This led to a series of lethal attacks in France and Belgium.
However, years of counterterrorism operations by local security forces, the US and others, have degraded IS in its former strongholds, and the group is fragmented and weak.
Western security officials with close knowledge of IS in Iraq and Syria said the group had abandoned its project of rebuilding the so-called caliphate but that successful strikes against international targets were seen as “good for morale and the IS brand and compensate for failure closer to home”.
US dismisses 'nonsense, propaganda' Russian concert attack claims against Ukraine
Here’s more from the White House’s national security spokesperson, John Kirby, who has dismissed as “nonsense” Russia’s allegations of Ukraine’s involvement in last week’s attack on Moscow’s Crocus City concert hall.
In a briefing to reporters on Thursday, Kirby said the US passed to Russian security services a written warning of an extremist attack on large gatherings in Moscow, one of many provided in advance. Kirby said:
It is abundantly clear that Isis (Islamic State) was solely responsible for the horrific attack in Moscow last week. In fact, the United States tried to help prevent this terrorist attack and the Kremlin knows this.
He was speaking shortly after Russian investigators claimed they had uncovered evidence that the gunmen who killed more than 140 people in last week’s attacks were linked to “Ukrainian nationalists”.
Kirby described the Russian allegations as “nonsense and propaganda”, adding that the US had provided multiple advance warnings to Russian authorities of extremist attacks on concerts and large gatherings in Moscow.
The US passed, “following normal procedures and through established channels that have been employed many times previously ... a warning in writing to Russian security services”, he added.
At least five independent journalists in Moscow have been detained by police over the past 24 hours, according to OVD-Info, a leading Russian human rights organisation.
SOTAvision journalist Antonina Favorskaya was taken for interrogation late Wednesday after serving 10 days’ jail for laying flowers at late opposition politician Alexei Navalny’s grave, AFP reported.
Her colleagues, Alexandra Astakhova and Anastasia Musatova, who came to meet her at the detention centre where she was set to be released, were also detained by police, SOTAVision said.
SOTAvision reporter Ekaterina Anikievich and Konstantin Zharov from RusNews were arrested by police early on Thursday while filming near Favorskaya’s home, it said.
Zharov told RusNews that he was beaten while in custody:
They kicked me, put a foot on my head, twisted my fingers, mocked me when I tried to get up, demanded to show my rucksack as if it might contain explosives.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he has spoken with the US speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, in which he urged him to hold a vote approving US military aid for Ukraine.
Posting to social media, the Ukrainian president wrote:
Quick passage of US aid to Ukraine by Congress is vital. We recognize that there are differing views in the House of Representatives on how to proceed, but the key is to keep the issue of aid to Ukraine as a unifying factor.
I spoke with @SpeakerJohnson and thanked him personally, both parties, the American people, and President Biden for their critical support of Ukraine since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion.
I briefed Speaker Johnson on the battlefield situation, specifically the…
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) March 28, 2024
The US announced a new package of weapons and equipment to Ukraine earlier this month, as the bill to fund military aid has stalled in Congress amid Republican opposition.
Zelenskiy warns war 'can come to Europe, and to the US'
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, has warned that Vladimir Putin will push Russia’s war “very quickly” on to Nato soil unless he is stopped in Ukraine.
In an interview with CBS published today, Zelenskiy acknowledged that his troops are not prepared to defend against another imminent major Russian offensive.
“We need help now,” the Ukrainian leader said, highlighting the urgency for American Patriot missile defense systems and more artillery.
Zelenskiy warned that if Ukraine does lose, Putin will not stop there. He said:
At the moment, it’s us, then Kazakhstan, then Baltic states, then Poland, then Germany. At least half of Germany … This aggression, and Putin’s army, can come to Europe, and then the citizens of the United States, the soldiers of the United States, will have to protect Europe because they’re the Nato members.
He added that Ukraine is grateful for US support “but the United States don’t have the war going on … but it can come to Europe, and to the United States of America. It can come very quickly to Europe.”
It has gone 6pm in Kyiv and 7pm in Moscow. Here is a recap of today’s latest developments:
Russian investigators claimed on Thursday they had uncovered evidence that the gunmen who killed more than 140 people in an attack on a concert hall near Moscow last week were linked to “Ukrainian nationalists”. While it described the nature of the alleged evidence, it did not publish it. In a statement, the state investigative committee claimed the attackers had received significant amounts of cash and cryptocurrency from Ukraine, and that another suspect involved in terrorist financing had been detained.
The White House on Thursday described Russia’s allegation that Ukraine was involved in the attack on the Crocus city concert hall as “nonsense”, saying it was clear that Islamic State was “solely responsible”. In a briefing to reporters, the White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said that the US passed a written warning of an extremist attack to Russian security services, one of many provided in advance to Moscow.
Russia vetoed on Thursday the annual renewal of a panel of experts monitoring enforcement of longstanding UN sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programme. The move comes amid US-led accusations that North Korea has transferred weapons to Russia, which Moscow has used in its war in Ukraine. Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied the accusations.
The White House called Russia’s veto of the renewal of North Korea sanctions monitors a “reckless action” that “further undermines” the UN security council’s actions on North Korea. South Korea’s UN ambassador Joonkook Hwang said the veto was “almost comparable to destroying a CCTV to avoid being caught red-handed”, while the deputy US ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told the council that Moscow had “undermined the prospect of the peaceful, diplomatic resolution of one of the world’s most dangerous nuclear proliferation issues”.
Russia has no designs on any Nato country and will not attack Poland, the Baltic states or the Czech Republic but if the west supplies F-16 fighters to Ukraine then they will be shot down by Russian forces, president Vladimir Putin said late on Wednesday. “The idea that we will attack some other country – Poland, the Baltic States, and the Czechs are also being scared – is complete nonsense. It’s just drivel,” Putin said, according to a Kremlin transcript released on Thursday.
Poland’s prime minister on Thursday hosted his Ukrainian counterpart for long-awaited talks designed to ease friction over Ukrainian farm imports and border blockades by disgruntled Polish farmers. On Thursday, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk welcomed his counterpart Denys Shmyhal to Warsaw.
Putin’s foreign intelligence chief paid a visit to North Korea this week to deepen bilateral cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang and discuss broader regional security, Russia’s spy service said on Thursday. Sergei Naryshkin, the head the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service, visited Pyongyang on 25-27 March, the SVR said. North Korea’s KCNA state media first reported the visit, said Reuters.
The Kremlin gave no indication on Thursday that Russian president Vladimir Putin plans to visit family members of those killed in last Friday’s attack on a Moscow concert hall, which killed 143 people. “If any contacts are necessary, we will inform you accordingly,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, when asked if Putin planned to meet family members of the dead.
Security measures in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv will be tightened after a spate of Russian ballistic missile attacks and threats of escalation, a city official said on Thursday. Russia staged concerted airstrikes on Ukraine’s energy system last week in what Moscow said was part of a series of “revenge” strikes in response to Kyiv’s bombardment of Russian regions.
Russia struck the north-eastern city of Kharkiv with aerial bombs on Wednesday for the first time since 2022, killing at least one civilian and wounding 16 others, local officials said. The airstrikes caused widespread damage, hitting several residential buildings and damaging the city’s institute for emergency surgery.
Authorities in the Mykolaiv region, near the Black Sea in southern Ukraine, said 12 people were injured and six residential buildings were damaged in a Russian strike on the city on Wednesday afternoon with a ballistic missile.
In an overnight attack on the southern Ukraine region of Zaporizhzhia, Shahed drones struck a residential area, injuring two women aged 72 and 74, according to regional governor Ivan Fedorov. Rescue services said seven buildings were damaged.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, has appointed Oleh Ivashchenko as the new head of Ukraine’s foreign intelligence service.
A Russian military aircraft crashed into the sea on Thursday off the Crimean port of Sevastopol, the Russian-installed governor of the region, Mikhail Razvozhayev, said. The pilot safely ejected and was picked up by rescuers, he added.
The Kremlin said on Thursday complete silence was needed when it came to discussions about possible prisoner exchanges involving Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter arrested in Russia a year ago on suspicion of espionage. Gershkovich, 32, became the first US journalist arrested on spying charges in Russia since the cold war when he was detained by the Federal Security Service (FSB) on 29 March. The reporter, the Wall Street Journal and the US government all deny he is a spy.
Ukraine asked western allies for additional air defences in an extraordinary meeting of the Nato-Ukraine Council that took place at the ambassadors level on Thursday. Rustem Umerov, the Ukrainian defence minister, briefed the ambassadors and “called on Nato member states to provide additional air defence systems and missiles to protect Ukrainian cities and citizens”.
Ukraine’s foreign minister arrived in New Delhi on Thursday for a two-day visit to boost bilateral ties and cooperation with India, which considers Russia a time-tested ally from the cold war era.
Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW) has carried out searches as part of an investigation with other European security services into alleged Russian espionage, the agency said on Thursday.
French authorities uncovered a website containing a fake recruitment drive for French volunteers to join the war in Ukraine, the defence ministry said on Thursday. The site has been taken down by French services, a government source, who asked not to be named, told AFP without giving further details on the nature of the operation.
Reuters have more detail on the Russian military aircraft that crashed into the sea off of Sevastopol (see 15:35 GMT)
According to Reuters, the Russian military aircraft crashed into the sea on Thursday off the Crimean port of Sevastopol, the Russian-installed governor of the region said.
The pilot safely ejected and was picked up by rescuers, Sevastopol governor Mikhail Razvozhayev said.
Earlier, Russian Telegram channels reported that a Russian Su-35 fighter jet had crashed near Sevastopol. It was not clear what caused the incident.
Russia claims evidence links concert hall attackers to 'Ukrainian nationalist'
Russian investigators claimed on Thursday they had uncovered evidence that the gunmen who killed more than 140 people in an attack on a concert hall near Moscow last week were linked to “Ukrainian nationalists”, reports Reuters.
Russia has said from the outset that it is pursuing a Ukrainian link to the attack, even though Kyiv has denied it and the militant group Islamic State has claimed responsibility.
According to Reuters, in a statement, the state investigative committee said for the first time that it had uncovered evidence of a Ukrainian link. While it described the nature of the alleged evidence, it did not publish it.
“As a result of working with detained terrorists, studying the technical devices seized from them, and analysing information about financial transactions, evidence was obtained of their connection with Ukrainian nationalists,” the statement said.
It claimed the attackers had received significant amounts of cash and cryptocurrency from Ukraine, and that another suspect involved in terrorist financing had been detained.
Eleven people were arrested in the first 24 hours after last Friday’s attack and eight of these, including the four suspected gunmen, have been placed in pre-trial detention. Seven are from Tajikistan and the other from Kyrgyzstan.
The US had publicly warned before the concert shooting that it had received intelligence of a possible attack by extremists in Russia. US officials say they believe it was Islamic State Khorasan, the network’s Afghan branch, that was responsible.
Russia says it is suspicious that the US was able to name the alleged perpetrator of the attack so soon after it took place. The head of Russia’s FSB Security Service said earlier this week, again without providing evidence, that he believed Ukraine, along with the US and the UK, were involved.
Western security analysts have said that the attack raised questions about the resourcing and priorities of Russian intelligence agencies that have been heavily focused on the Ukraine war and the need to stamp out opposition to it within Russia.
White House says US passed written warning of Moscow attack to Russia
The White House on Thursday described Russia’s allegation that Ukraine was involved in the attack on the Crocus city concert hall as “nonsense”, saying it was clear that Islamic State was “solely responsible”.
According to Reuters, in a briefing to reporters, the White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said that the US passed a written warning of an extremist attack to Russian security services, one of many provided in advance to Moscow.
Russia's veto of North Korea sanctions monitors a 'reckless action', says the White House
The White House has called Russia’s veto of the renewal of North Korea sanctions monitors a “reckless action” that “further undermines” the UN security council’s actions on North Korea.
“This is almost comparable to destroying a CCTV to avoid being caught red-handed,” South Korea’s UN ambassador Joonkook Hwang said of Russia’s veto of the renewal of North Korea sanctions monitors, reports Reuters.
“Moscow has undermined the prospect of the peaceful, diplomatic resolution of one of the world’s most dangerous nuclear proliferation issues,” deputy US ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told the council.
According to Reuters, Russia’s UN ambassador Vassily Nebenzia questioned the experts’ work, telling the security council before the vote: “Its work is increasingly being reduced to playing into the hands of western approaches, reprinting biased information and analysing newspaper headlines and poor quality photos.”
North Korea has been under UN sanctions for its ballistic missile and nuclear programmes since 2006 and those measures have been strengthened over the years.
The panel of independent experts has monitored those UN sanctions for the past 15 years, reporting twice a year to the security council and recommending action for improved implementation of the measures.
The mandate for the current panel of experts will expire on 30 April 2024.
The panel’s most recent report was made public earlier this month and said it was investigating dozens of suspected cyber-attacks by North Korea that raked in $3bn to help it further develop its nuclear weapons programme.
“The panel, through its work to expose sanctions non-compliance, was an inconvenience for Russia,” said the UK’s UN ambassador Barbara Woodward. “But let me be clear to Russia – the sanctions regime remains in place and the UK remains committed to holding DPRK to account for its compliance.”
For the past several years the UN security council has been divided over how to deal with Pyongyang. Russia and China, veto powers along with the US, the UK and France, have said more sanctions will not help and want such measures to be eased.
China and Russia say joint military drills by the US and South Korea provoke Pyongyang, while Washington accuses Beijing and Moscow of emboldening North Korea by shielding it from more sanctions.
Russian investigators say they have obtained evidence of links between Moscow concert hall attackers and Ukraine - RIA report
Reuters has a couple of breaking news lines on the wires about Russia’s investigative committee saying it has obtained evidence of links between the Crocus city concert hall attackers and Ukraine. Reuters are citing the Russian state news agency RIA.
According to the RIA report, as shared by Reuters, Russian investigators said another suspect involved in “terrorist financing” has been detained.
Russia blocks renewal of North Korea sanctions monitors
Russia vetoed on Thursday the annual renewal of a panel of experts monitoring enforcement of longstanding UN sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programme, reports Reuters.
The move comes amid US-led accusations that North Korea has transferred weapons to Russia, which Moscow has used in its war in Ukraine. Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied the accusations, but vowed last year to deepen military relations.
China abstained from the vote on Thursday, while the remaining 13 council members voted in favor.
Authorities in the Mykolaiv region, near the Black Sea in southern Ukraine, said 12 people were injured and six residential buildings were damaged in a Russian strike on the city on Wednesday afternoon with a ballistic missile, according to the Associated Press (AP).
In an overnight attack on the southern Ukraine region of Zaporizhzhia, Shahed drones struck a residential area, injuring two women aged 72 and 74, according to regional governor Ivan Fedorov. Rescue services said seven buildings were damaged.
The Black Sea city of Odesa repelled three missile and drone attacks, officials said.
A duty that the EU plans to impose on Russian wheat supplies will hit the European market, Sergei Dankvert, head of Russian agriculture watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor, was quoted as saying by state-owned news agency Tass.
The imposition of duties could lead to a loss of grain handling capacity, while Russia would be able to divert to other markets the 2.5-3m metric tons of grain it had been shipping to the EU, Dankvert said, according to Reuters.
France blocks fake Ukraine war recruitment website
French authorities have uncovered a website containing a fake recruitment drive for French volunteers to join the war in Ukraine, the defence ministry said on Thursday, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The site has now been taken down by French services, a government source, who asked not to be named, told AFP without giving further details on the nature of the operation.
The site, which is now inaccessible, said 200,000 French people were invited to “enlist in Ukraine”, with immigrants given priority.
A link to the site – that resembled the French army’s genuine recruitment portal – had been posted on X, the French defence ministry said.
“The site is a fake government site,” the ministry said, also on X, “and has been reposted by malevolent accounts as part of a disinformation campaign”.
According to AFP, the ministry did not name any suspects in the website spoof, but a government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the site bore “the hallmarks of a Russian or pro-Russian effort as part of a disinformation campaign claiming that the French army is preparing to send troops to Ukraine”.
French president Emmanuel Macron angered the Russian leadership last month by hardening his tone on the conflict sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, refusing to rule out sending ground troops and insisting Europe had to do all that was needed for a Russian defeat.
Similar recent examples of disinformation posts included pictures of French army convoys wrongly presented as moving towards the Ukrainian border, the official said.
The fake website invited potential recruits to contact “unit commander Paul” for information about joining.
The defence ministry and government cyber units are investigating, ministry staff told AFP.
The French government has recently stepped up efforts to denounce and fight what it says are Russian disinformation and destabilisation campaigns aimed at undermining French public support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.
