Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia’s UN Mission Chargé d’Affaires, told the UN Security Council yesterday that Ukrainian troops shot down a Russian military plane carrying Ukrainian POWs in order to derail a prisoner swap. “All data that is available to us today indicates that this was a deliberate, carefully plotted crime. The Ukrainian leadership was perfectly aware of the route and method of transportation of the POWs to the previously agreed location. The exchange should have taken place yesterday, Jan. 24, in the afternoon. It wouldn’t have been the first exchange operation of such kind, but this time around the Kiev regime, for some inexplicable reason decided to thwart it in the most barbaric way possible.” He left open the question of “whether we are talking about a lack of coordination among Ukrainian military and someone’s independent initiative, or about a deliberate, well-considered crime that does not fit into any moral frame of references,” but made clear that it was an important matter to resolve.
He described that, immediately after the attack, the General Staff of the Ukrainian armed forces “issued a triumphant statement, from which it follows that the plane had been deliberately downed by valiant Ukrainian soldiers.… The news went viral on Ukrainian media. However, as soon as it was clear that there had been Ukrainian POWs on board, the Kiev regime panicked and started to ‘cover tracks’ feverishly. The initial confessions about the involvement of the Ukrainian armed forces were very cleverly ‘cleaned up’ on the Internet. At the same time, new absurd versions started to emerge…. What we have seen so far were primitive and cowardly attempts by representatives of the Kiev authorities to disavow any responsibility for this crime, contrary to the obvious facts. By doing so, they have embarrassed and confused themselves and are burying themselves in this lie ever deeper.”
