Information is the world’s lifeblood. It pulsates in torrents of facts and images. We are swamped with it.

But information can be poison, a dangerous weapon. Disinformation, or organized lying, can be used to wage political warfare. As the historian Thomas Rid wrote in “Active Measures,” his book on the subject, disinformation can weaken a political system that places its trust in truth. “Disinformation operations, in essence, erode the very foundations of open societies,” he wrote.

Russia's state Investigative Committee said on Monday it was examining the alleged use of chemical weapons by Ukrainian forces near the eastern Ukrainian towns of Soledar and Bakhmut.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/without-supplying-evidence-russia-…

February 7, 2023

1-EVIDENCE OF US-FINANCED BIOLOGICAL PROGRAM IN UKRAINE REVEALED BY RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTRY

Tass, March 06, 2022

https://tass.com/defense/1417951,

2-UKRAINE WORKED ON DEVELOPMENT OF BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS NEAR RUSSIAN BORDERS – STATEMENT

TASS, March 08, 2022

https://tass.com/politics/1418689

3-RUSSIAN DIPLOMAT URGES US TO REVEAL INFORMATION ABOUT ACTIVITIES OF LABS IN UKRAINE

China, ostensibly neutral on Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, took a significant step into Moscow's camp on Tuesday when a government official repeated a Russian conspiracy theory about the existence of U.S.-funded biological weapons in the country.

At a regular press briefing in Beijing, Zhao Lijian, a spokesperson for China's Foreign Ministry, read out a Russian media report about the alleged discovery of a "military biological program" in Ukraine in the days after the large-scale offensive began.

Since invading Ukraine in February, the Russian government has tirelessly worked to convince others of the existence of an illicit US-Ukrainian bioweapons program. It’s brought the claims to the UN Security Council, the Biological Weapons Convention, and other international venues, sometimes more than once. Earlier this month, Moscow went to the Security Council for the fourth time this year. This time, Russian diplomats triggered a never-before invoked mechanism to vote on creating a commission to investigate its bioweapons allegations. Once again, few countries sided with Russia.

Russian and separatist media claim that Ukrainian military have used white phosphorus munitions, weapons that are banned under the Geneva Convention. However, the mine fragments they have shown as evidence are of a different type of munition.

On February 19 the Donetsk television station Union reported in its newscast that near the city of Horlivka, some 56 kilometres north of the eastern Ukrainian city Donetsk, the center of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR,  the Ukrainian side had fired white phosphorus bombs on the Russian supported militants.

Myth 3: “Ukraine will use chemical, nuclear and other prohibited weapons against civilians in Donbas."

The United Nations is not aware of any biological weapons programmes in Ukraine, a senior official in the Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) reiterated in a briefing to the Security Council.