A Russian Confession of Genocide in Ukraine
A vile column in Russian state media casts doubt on the peace process
On July 30, columnist Kirill Strelnikov published an article in Russia's state-run news agency RIA Novosti entitled, "There is no other option: no one should remain alive in Ukraine." Strelnikov claimed that the Ukrainian army is under control of Western "masters," and that its soldiers' fate is to be "laboratory rats mercilessly killed for experiments." He claimed that Ukrainians are "paradoxically happy" with this, and as such, "all deadlines for epiphanies have passed…if people are consciously and happily ready to die for their masters, that is their choice. There is only one problem: lace underwear is of no use to the dead."
According to the Genocide Convention of 1948, genocide requires the intent to destroy a racial, national, or ethnic group in whole or in part, not only that certain acts cause death or serious bodily harm; Strelnikov's column is part of a long line of genocidal statements coming from Russian officials and state media. In June 2024, Russian official Dmitry Rogozin, heading the occupation of one of the regions of Ukraine, said that it is "time to burn everything Ukrainian down to the root" so that "there is no trace left." In April 2022, RIA Novosti also published an incendiary column saying that Ukrainian cities were really Russian and that "Ukranian Nazis" must be "destroyed…as many of them as possible."
It's tempting to dismiss these nationalists and Russian officials as yahoos; however, these comments are made by people working for state institutions under tight Kremlin control. The news agency RIA Novosti was brought under government control in 2014 after a period of semi-independence; the outlet publishes nothing by accident. Rogozin is in the far-right of Russian politics, but he has served the government in various roles since 2008.
Russian officials have used eliminationist language to justify its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Eliminationism, which serves as a rationale for genocide, holds that a particular group is a cancer on the purity of a nation, and therefore must be excised. Russia has claimed that it invaded Ukraine to "denazify" it from a "neo-Nazi" regime. In other words, Ukrainians have been corrupted by a pro-Western "Nazi" regime and Russia must remove this element.
The Genocide Convention requires actions as well as intent. Russian actions fit squarely within the five categories of Article II of the convention, which Russia has signed and ratified. In invading Ukraine, Russia has indiscriminately killed civilians, gravely harmed civilians by committing torture and sexual assault, undertaken a bombing campaign of cities designed to make life unlivable, bombed maternity hospitals, and abducted Ukrainian children to Russia.
The most recent column came as Russian and Ukrainian negotiators met earlier this month for another round of negotiations that ended without any breakthroughs. Some Western analysts, like Samuel Charap of RAND, have claimed that U.S. President Donald Trump hasn't really engaged Russian leader Vladimir Putin in negotiations and that the U.S. should test him by offering a "real" negotiation process with an experienced American negotiating team undertaking shuttle diplomacy.
However, in continuing to make genocidal statements, the Russian government is confessing what its intentions are: the elimination of Ukraine as an independent state and everyone living there. Ukrainians understand this, with about 80 percent knowing a family or friend who was killed or injured because of the Russian invasion. It's up to the West to believe Russia and send all of the weapons and air defense possible to stop it.
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