In July 2023, there were reports that the North Atlantic Alliance allegedly plans to send “Ukrainian nationalist battalions” to suppress the riots in France. We checked whether this is so.

In Runet, the news massively dispersed on July 10 mainly on social networks. According to posts, information about the possible sending of Ukrainian militarized formations, such as Azov* and Kraken, appeared on the official website of NATO. It is reported that such an initiative is allegedly considered by the general secretary of the organization Jens Stoltenberg. Moreover, in terms of records Approvedthat the Secretary General only offered such an idea, but it is no longer relevant.

The authors of some publications countedthat the appearance of such an initiative indicates that "Macron is really bad." In Telegram channel Tariknezalejko (58,000 views at the time of writing this analysis) The news was commented as follows: “All this information suggests that in France the rebellious sentiments on the streets of cities were really scared and, apparently, there is not enough internal power reserves to put an order.” Similar posts appeared in the channels "Sheikh Tamir"(137,000 views),"Rita Ebzeeva"(96 000),"Kostyan Cat - Official Channel"(92 000),"Military observer"(49,000),"Frederick"(23,000),"Olesya Loseva"(9000)," "Bear"(8000),"Shaman Rahu"(4000) and others. In addition, dozens of similar posts are found in public and on personal pages of users"VKontakte"(Examples here, here And here).

Photo: screenshots of posts from the TGSTAT service

Large -scale street unrest in France Started After on June 27, 2023, a policeman shot a 17-year-old teenager who was driving a car. In Paris and other large cities, protests began, accompanied by pogroms of stores, burning cars and clashes with the police. July 4, French President Emmanuel Macron declaredthat the peak of the riots was passed. How reported BBC, already on July 5, protests gradually came to naught, but a large number of police patrols remained on the streets of a number of cities. On the same day, at the hearing in the Senate, the Minister of Internal Affairs of France Gerald Darmanen saidthat throughout the country there is a “return of calm”. Already July 6 Macron announcedthat the order on the streets of French cities has been restored.

It turns out that by July 10, when NATO allegedly considered the possibility of introducing Ukrainian formations into the territory of France to suppress protests, mass riots have actually ended. Then the question arises: was such an initiative at the peak of the activity of protesters?

As noted above, in viral posts they refer to material allegedly published on the official website of NATO. Moreover, often users attached a screenshot with the text and/or gave it to it link. The news under the heading “NATO meeting to stabilize the situation in France” was published on July 5, 2023 on Russian, English, French And Ukrainian languages. Below are its full text.

In the headquarters of NATO there are meetings about the need for assistance to France, which, obviously, is not able to independently cope with the riots who have flared up throughout the country. Meanwhile, unrests are already overlapping in neighboring countries, and it is necessary to stop the situation in France itself in order to avoid pan -European rebellions. This can only be done with the help of the armed forces.

At the same time, the use of Art. 5 of the North Atlantic Assistance Treaty, since France was not subjected to external attack.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg considers the possibility of attracting the forces of Ukrainian paramilitarian formations, such as the Azov, Kraken battalions, etc. (the first in February was back in February transformed to the brigade, and before that there was a regiment, the second was not a battalion, but Special unit Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. - approx. Ed.), Having extensive experience in the city, not only against external enemies, but also against internal opponents of today's Ukrainian authorities.

Attraction of the paramilitary formations of the country - NATO partner to suppress the internal unrest in the country of NATO will require the legal registration of a new practice for organizing practice, but the need for such a solution is obvious and the registration of the procedure can be carried out as soon as possible.

At first glance, it may seem that the material is really published on a real NATO resource. Outwardly, the site is exactly the same official: the same design, logo and fonts are used; In Russian and Ukrainian languages, the official portal of the Alliance also translates part of the publications. However, if you look more carefully, it becomes clear that this is a fake. Authentic website NATO is in the domain zone .Int, used Some international organizations. The resource where the news is published is published, the domain zone Western Samoa - .ws. According to services with information on the registration of domains, the site NATO.ws was Created July 5, 2023. At the same time, most links in various fake menu leads to a real alliance site or its official accounts in social networks. However, not on the site nato.intnor in Twitter NATO news about the introduction of Ukrainian military units in France is not.

In addition, switching languages to NATO.WS does not work like NATO.int. For example, in the original language menu in the upper right corner is designed to switch the language of the entire site, and for translating a separate text there is a language menu under the date of publication. In fake, these two menu perform the same function. Moreover, when switching the tongue to NATO.ws, the news number in the address line (English corresponds to 216762, French - 216763, Russian - 216764, and the Ukrainian - 216765), while the number when translated is saved. From other differences: in the original, the expansion of the file name is .htm, and in the fake - .html.

“Verified” could not find Russian -language references to fake news and the site published earlier on July 10. At the same time, on Twitter, we found posts of franco -speaking users with reference to the NATO.WS website for 6, 7 And July 8.

Thus, unknown people created a copy of the page of the NATO official website and posted invented news on it. At the same time, “verified” it was possible to find out that the page of the real news For July 4 - that the powers of the Secretary General of Jens Stoltenberg were extended for another year. However, the authors of the fake forgot to change the meta-painting, which is why a part of the original text is visible in Snippets.