In April 2024, a quote attributed to the Ukrainian star went viral on social networks, according to which she “despises cheaters” and, together with her husband in London, explains that “not all men in Ukraine are so pathetic.” We checked whether she stated this.
In most publications, Freimut’s viral quote is given in the following formulation: “I deeply despise ukhilants (draft dodgers - editor’s note), and I am disgusted by men who do not want to fight for their country. I am ashamed of the British, I don’t know how to explain to them such baseness of the Uhilants. Here in London my husband and I explain to them that not all men in Ukraine are so pathetic.” The authors of many posts considered the statement hypocritical and ridiculed the TV presenter living in the UK, who allegedly uttered these words.
According to the TGStat service, by the time of writing this analysis on Telegram, about 200 channels had reported Freimut’s alleged statement, whose publications in total had received almost 2 million views. So, the channels wrote about this statement “Russia now"(251,000 views), "Observer"(214,000), "Open Ukraine | Open Ukraine"(211,000 including reposts in the channel "Sheikh Tamir"), "Ukraine.ru"(132,000), "Petya the First"(87,000), "Denazification of Ukraine"(74,000), "Angry Bunny 18+" (72,000), "Gasparyan" (70,000), "Federation" (70,000), "Whisper from the front"(53,000), etc. Similar publications have become popular on VKontakte (examples here, here, here, here And here), LiveJournal (here And here) And social networks X. In addition, some media outlets wrote about the quote, including the publication “Segodnya.ru”, who took a comment on this from a certain political scientist Alexei Belov.
Shortly before the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, Freimut and his younger children went to vacation in France, and her husband, producer and general director of the Ukrainian “New Channel” Vladimir Lokotko, according to the presenter, then remained in Kyiv. Then Freimut with two children moved to London. Ukrainian media reportthat now the TV presenter and her husband live permanently in the UK, but sometimes come to Ukraine.
None of the posts mentioned above indicate when or where Freimuth made the statement attributed to her about draft dodgers. "Verified" studied verified account leading on Instagram, but did not find any posts with a similar quote there. It was also not possible to find a similar statement in any of her interviews.
The quote also spread in the Ukrainian-language segment of social networks. Under one of these publications Freimut herself left her comment on Instagram. "What is this? What husband? Whose text is this? — wrote TV presenter.
Soon, Freimut published two stories in which she also denied the authorship of the quote being circulated. “During the war, I have not given and will not give a single interview. Whoever wrote this came up with a text with a primitive language. I don't even use that kind of vocabulary. Please ignore" conveys her words “RBC Ukraine”. In addition, the TV presenter recorded a video message in which she stated that she plans to sue journalists for a fake interview with false quotes on her behalf (quote - according to the publication “Briefly about”).
Friends, since the war in Ukraine I have not given a single interview. No, I gave one to the BBC and GB News in the UK. I also gave an interview to the Times newspaper, but I did not give an interview to the Ukrainian press. And what is happening now and they are ascribing to me some quotes with Russianisms, cheap language and vulgar thoughts is a planned attack on my name. My name is very important to me, so my lawyers are already looking for whoever wrote this news about draft dodgers and attributed it as my quote. I hope that we can sue and find the owner of this page (the _patriotu Instagram account, the post of which Freimut previously commented on. - Ed.). So please don't believe it. Believe me.
In fact, the presenter’s statement that since February 24, 2022 she has not given a single interview to the Ukrainian press is not entirely correct. So, on August 31, 2022, in the same publication “Briefly about” (then it was called “KP in Ukraine”) there was published large text interview with Freimut. She probably just forgot about that conversation.
As for the original source of the false quote, some Ukrainian media called namely the above-mentioned Instagram profile _patriotu, where a post with a fake statement appeared on April 10. So believes and the editors of the Russian TV channel Tsargrad: “The meme created by a certain channel _patriotu (probably for laughter or hype) clearly got out of control - Freimut began writing threats and nasty things because of “her position.” In fact, that phrase indicating the authorship of Freimut appeared on the social network X at least on April 8, as evidenced by the screenshot shown in many of the publications mentioned at the beginning of this analysis.
The screenshot shows that the author of the tweet is a user under the nickname Pan Friend Brother Stormtrooper (@fightforermak). This profile was created in November 2023, and at the time of writing this analysis already unavailable. And although original link post also doesn't work, "Verified" confirms that the tweet from the screenshot actually existed, since we found it saved copy in Google cache. We couldn't find any publications that used this quote before @fightforrmak's post.
Thus, Freimut was not the author of the viral quote about contempt for Ukrainian draft dodgers. This phrase is not on the presenter’s social networks or in her interviews. In addition, the star herself publicly denied that she uttered these words, and the earliest appearance of this phrase took place in an anonymous and now deleted profile on the social network X.
Cover photo: @freimutolia (Instagram) / @roman_ketkov (Instagram)
- “Briefly about.” Olga Freimut - about life in exile, work in London, returning to Ukraine and a new self
- Is it true that in the Kharkov region they awarded wives who “surrendered” their husbands to the military registration and enlistment office?
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