Is it true that the Ukrainian Azov regiment is included in the list of terrorist organizations in the USA and Japan?

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In an interview with the BBC, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the Azov regiment was included in the list of terrorist organizations in a number of Western countries, including the USA and Japan. We checked whether the minister was right.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in interview told the British BBC that Russia was forced to declare a “special military operation” because of the “criminal activities” of the West, which was patronizing the neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine. As an illustration of this regime, Lavrov brought Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s response to a CNN correspondent’s question about Azov: “When the CNN correspondent told him (Zelensky - editor’s note) that the Azov regiment was included in some Western countries, in the USA, in Japan, on the list of extremist, terrorist organizations, Zelensky shrugged and said that they have many such battalions and regiments, they are what they are.” These words of Lavrov were quoted by many media outlets, including TASS, RIA Novosti, TV channel "360°", "Arguments and Facts".

Since the beginning of hostilities, Zelensky has given several interview and comments to the American channel CNN. We were unable to find any mention of the Azov regiment in any of them. Perhaps Minister Lavrov meant interview Zelensky to another American channel - Fox News, which took place in April 2022. There, journalist Bret Baier asked Zelensky to comment on reports of Azov’s connection with neo-Nazi ideology. Zelensky replied: “Azov was one of many such (volunteer – editor’s note) battalions. They are who they are, they defended our country. Subsequently, all components of those volunteer battalions were included in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. These Azov fighters are no longer an independent group, but part of the Ukrainian armed forces. Back in 2014, there were situations when these volunteers were surrounded and some of them actually violated laws, the laws of Ukraine, and they were actually brought to trial and sentenced to prison terms. So the law comes first.” At the same time, the Fox News host did not mention in which countries Azov is considered terrorist or extremist.

Lavrov specifically mentioned that the Azov regiment is included in the list of terrorist groups in the USA and Japan. However, “Azov” could not be found in any list foreign terrorist organizations on the US State Department website, nor on website US Director of National Intelligence. In 2019, a group of 40 members of the U.S. House of Representatives asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to explain why Azov is not included in the list of international terrorist organizations. It is unlikely that Azov’s absence from the US blacklist was a secret for the Foreign Ministry. In 2021, Sergei Lavrov’s colleague Maria Zakharova expressed confusion about this.

The Japanese Public Security Service under the Ministry of Justice also does not consider the Azov Regiment a neo-Nazi organization. In 2021, the regiment was mentioned in reference book on international terrorism, which provides data from various sources, including the foreign and Japanese press. In April 2022, Japan Public Security Service stated, that the information in this directory should not be considered the official position of the Japanese government, and removed the mention of “Azov” from the directory to prevent “the dissemination of factually incorrect information.” And again the speaker of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova commented exclusion of the mention of “Azov” from the reference book on international terrorism, saying that Japan “has integrated itself into the Russophobic ranks” and now occupies first place in this regard in the Asian expanses.

It is worth noting that in Russia the Azov regiment is also not recognized terrorist, nor extremist organization. According to law, Russian media always mark organizations from these two lists with the note “recognized as terrorist / extremist and banned in the Russian Federation,” as, for example, in case with Meta. Regiment "Azov" media mention without any footnotes about banned organizations, only sometimes adding that “criminal cases have been initiated against Azov militants in the Russian Federation.”

Thus, in an interview with the BBC, Lavrov, firstly, mixed up the name of the TV channel that asked Zelensky a question about the Azov regiment, and secondly, he thought of adding Azov to the list of terrorist organizations in the USA and Japan, which is not true.

Update 02/08/2022: August 2, 2022 Supreme Court of Russia admitted “Azov” is a terrorist organization and has banned its activities in Russia.

Cover image: Soldier of the Azov regiment. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. Is it true that Ukrainian stores sold Easter cakes with the symbols of the Azov regiment?
2. The New York Review. "Is There a Good Terrorist?"
3. "Radio Liberty". "Who is the terrorist?"