“Nobody believes in our victory like I do. Nobody,” Zelensky told TIME in an interview after his trip to Washington, D.C.
That article caused quite the stir.
Usually, we don’t remove posts simply because they are critical, but this one raised a few red flags and after some research, we decided to take it down and won’t have it posted on r/ukraine.
First, the author. Simon Shuster is Russian. He moved to the US in 1989 and moved back to Moscow, where he worked for the Moscow Times in 2006.
He coined such articles as:
Violence in Ukraine: Can russia or the west make it stop? Jan. 28, 2014
Ukraine moves closer to civil war. Feb 20, 2014
No, russia will not intervene in Ukraine. Feb. 25, 2014
Many Ukrainians want russia to invade. Mar. 01, 2014
as u/VioletLimb noted:
"On February 20, 2014, russia invaded Crimea, but for this russian author it did not exist, for him the war began only in 2022. His article is based on the absurd “Support for the war is decreasing”.
Who writes like that? We did not start this war.
He also had articles in 2015 about the fact that russians and Ukrainians are actually brothers, but propaganda from both sides prevents this.
2-3 weeks before the full-scale invasion, he said that russia would not attack Ukraine."
Now, if you say this is old news, there is this gem from Darka Hirna, who had her own experiences with Simon Shuster from 2018:
Translation:
"I will tell you a story related to the journalist Simon Shuster. And you already decide how to read his materials in The Time or elsewhere after that. It was in 2018. u/OstapYarysh and I wrote a report for Gro about the Norwegian Joachim Furholm, who came to Ukraine to join the Armed Forces. A Norwegian who wants to join the Armed Forces - in 2018, this is still a very unusual story and definitely worth covering.
Of course, no one knew the motives or the background of this dude yet. A few hours after the intv agreement, Furholm calls me from the hospital and barely tells me that he was beaten by unknown people and told to get out of the country. Later, his story will explain why. But at that moment the situation was like this: a foreigner, wants to fight against the Russians in the Armed Forces, crawled to the hospital and was beaten by unknown people, without food and a roof over his head. With one phone of an old friend of the military commissar. All the information.
What do I do in this situation? I am writing to everyone in the Armed Forces, whom I know, to sign him up for a couple of nights at least at some base. Of all of them, only “Azov” responded and hosted him in Kyiv for two days. Just humanly. All. No conspiracy theory.
What is Simon Schuster doing in 2019. It comes out with a huge article in The Time, just when the US Congress wanted to recognize “Azov” as a terrorist organization. And uses this story you just read as proof that “Azov” recruits crazy far-right Nazis from all over the world. And the story with Furholm’s host at the “Azov” base is a type of proof, and he was kicked out, as if because “he didn’t have enough combat experience.”
I literally watched in shock as he reprimanded Biletskyi for this on Shuster’s broadcast. That is, this is not just a story about exaggerating the problem of right-wing radicals in Ukraine. This is some kind of fiction, not factual journalism. Yes and such."
(Context: Azov, as a national guard unit, are not allowed to employ foreigners AT ALL. Not possible.
Just in case you were wondering were that rumor that Azov are recruiting foreign Nazis came from. Yep. This guy.
While Azov was converted into a NG unit in 2018 and might technically still have been recruiting foreigners before that, the TIME article came out on Jan. 7 2021, years later and, funnily, right before the russian invasion.)
Several sources out of Ukraine also have it, that the “advisor” he talked to is Arestovych, who got fired after this (correction), and has previous said things like: “LGBT people are people with disabilities”. Has is also deeply unpopular among Ukrainians for his previous close contact to the so called “russian opposition”.
I was about to write a closing statement, but, honestly, you all have been in this with us for long enough now to see the same signs we do.
And that is why we won’t allow the article on the sub.
from r/Ukraine
Thank you very much for your input.
I must admit I am not a fan of Time magazine. So far, and according to my knowledge, I highly appreciated Shuster even though I seldom agree with him, and I held a high opinion of his reporting. As it happens, I agree with his take this time.
The testimony of Darka Hirna is news to me and I have to take it into consideration.
Within the next week I will hopefully have the time to reevaluate his journalistic approach, taking into account what is mentioned above. If I have something to add, it will be in a comment bellow. Unless this post is removed anyway.
In case you have some additional elements that would help me in this research, please provide them here. I would be grateful.
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