Ukrainian Law Firm Releases Statement Rejecting Accusations Made in Russian Media.
"Reasonable people should be aware of the fact that the situation in Ukraine is the beginning of a global military conflict of third world war scale with unimaginable consequences for the world."
These words come near the end of a bold and emotional two-page statement posted on the LinkedIn page of Ukraine's Arzinger law firm and distributed by the firm's partners to clients and contacts. The document -- called an "Update" by the firm -- is a point-by-point rejection of the stories presented in Russian media about purported threats to Russians living in Ukraine. According to the Arzinger partners, the suggestion that Russians living in Ukraine are in any danger is untrue, counter-factual, and in fact part of a deliberate propaganda war the Kremlin is waging to justify its own actions.
In an exclusive interview with CEE Legal Matters, Timur Bondaryev, the Managing Partner of Arzinger, explained that the firm's partners "just decided that we have to bring the real situation to the world." Bondaryev said that "we watch the Russian media, and what they were reporting was just incredible. Just lies, actually." He said that "everything that happened on Maidan [the Russian media] reported in their own way, so we created this document just to let our friends know that the situation is quite different."
Bondaryev has first-hand experience with the Russian experience in Ukraine, as he grew up in the Russian part of Ukraine, and his family spoke only Russian -- never Ukrainian. But he dismissed any suggestion that Russian-speakers are being harassed or threatened. "I'm fine. My parents speak Russian, watch Russian TV, and it's fine. Nobody's being harassed. It's just Russian propaganda."
Still, he has no doubt that the stories reported by Russian media are having the planned effect. "I'm really pissed off, because they seem to really believe what's reported there. This Cold War, that everybody's trying to undermine the Putins and the Russians. It's really incredible. They'e intelligent people but they really believe what's in the media."
Bondaryev admits that the firm has received a number of requests from Russian clients -- some made fairly aggressively -- that they take the document down or disavow it. But Bondaryev and his Partners are unmoved. "We're not worried about losing business, we're worried about avoiding a war."
And the firm has received a substantial amount of positive feedback since publishing and distributing the Update as well. Bondaryev explained that even many of the firm's Russian clients wrote letters of support, and many told him that, "you know, we didn't believe the Russian propaganda anyway, but it's very good that you sent that message anyway." Still, Bondaryev claims that "the main recipient of the message wasn't Russians, it was the rest of the world."