The former Ukrainian Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights, Lyudmila Denisova, has admitted she “exaggerated” reports of sex crimes allegedly committed by Russian soldiers in an effort to "convince the world to provide weapons and pressure" on behalf of the regime in Kiev. In an interview published in a Ukrainian outlet Friday, Denisova claimed her exaggerations succeeded on at least one occasion:
“When, for example, I spoke in the Italian parliament at the Committee on International Affairs, I heard and saw such fatigue from Ukraine, you know? I talked about terrible things in order to somehow push them to make the decisions that Ukraine and the Ukrainian people need.” Italy’s Five Star Movement, Denisova claimed, was originally “against the provision of weapons to us, but after [her] speech, one of the party leaders… said that they will support [us], including by the provision of weapons.”
Denisova was removed from her post as human rights ombudswoman for spreading misinformation following a no-confidence vote of 234-to-9 by Ukraine’s parliament on May 31. As Newsweek reported in the days that followed, one member of the Ukrainian parliament, Pavlo Frolov, provided a number of reasons why Denisova was removed, including "the numerous details of 'unnatural sexual offenses' and child sexual abuses in the occupied territories, which were unsupported by evidence.” Frolov reportedly claimed that such misinformation has “only harmed Ukraine."
But there’s little doubt that Denisova’s penchant for “exaggeration” has harmed Russia as well. Since the beginning of the Russian Federation’s special military operations in Ukraine in February, the disgraced ombudswoman’s dramatized claims have been presented as fact in dozens of mainstream publications, including CNN and the Washington Post.
An open letter by hundreds of Ukrainian journalists, which preceded her firing, pointed out Denisova’s shocking (and apparently unfounded) allegations were frequently taken at face value, citing her claims that “a girl of 6 months, the Russians raped with a teaspoon,” that “two [soldiers] raped babies orally and anally,” and “a nine-month-old daughter was raped with a candle.”
Such accusations bring to mind other horrifying and obscene allegations used to delegitimize governments targeted by NATO, which later proved to be fabrications. In 2011, then-US Ambassador Susan Rice told officials at the UN that the Libyan government of Moammar Gaddafi was distributing Viagara to soldiers to encourage ‘mass rape’–an allegation for which Western-funded human rights organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch later declared there was no evidence.
Denisova has reportedly called her dismissal “illegal” and condemned it as an “unjustified political reprisal,” but there doesn’t seem to be much evidence to support those assertions either. Shortly after she was fired, the office of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky ridiculed her allegations as “an attempt to deflect attention… to some kind of conspiracy theories." Just how many of her other declarations fall under the same category remains to be seen.