Eyes on Russia: Report 5

The Centre for Information Resilience’s “Eyes on Russia” Project maps, documents, and verifies significant incidents related to Russian aggression toward Ukraine.

Each week, CIR investigators collate, geolocate, and verify information appearing on social media and claims made by parties to the conflict.

Our latest findings can always be found on this Twitter thread.

CIR contextualizes these details amid the discourse and developments of the week. The footage and imagery is added to the Russia-Ukraine Monitor Map, which policymakers, journalists, and other OSINT researchers can use to track the conflict.

As part of this effort, CIR publishes regular written summaries of its research, detailing verified troop and equipment analysis, influence operation narratives, and broader updates. This is the fifth of such regular reports. It can be downloaded below.

• In the past weeks, the city of Mariupol has undergone a major bombing campaign, which saw confirmed and geolocated footage by CIR investigators of deliberate targeting of civilian residential buildings, infrastructure, and casualties.[1][2][3][4]

• There have been continued reports of Russian military forces incurring significant losses in the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, with confirmation that the advances on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, have now come to a halt.

• In the information sphere, CIR analysts have observed that the proliferation of the ‘US biolabs’ conspiracy theory has been circulating in neighboring countries to Ukraine, such as Moldova. Highlighting the Kremlin’s attempts to infiltrate the information environment in the region.[5]

• In addition, analysts have identified accounts which continue to promote the ‘genocide in Donbass and Ukrainian war crimes’ narrative which has been repeatedly used by Russia and aligned media actors to justify the ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Finally, accounts have been noted promoting ‘Anti-NATO’ narratives to Russian speakers in neighboring countries.

• CIR has been able to geolocate and verify ongoing Russian losses as part of the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, with some reports suggesting that Russia is facing significant logistical difficulties and an increased reliance on reserve soldiers.[6]

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/20/world/europe/ukraine-russia-war-mariupol.html.
[2]https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-zelenskyy-kyiv-europe-moscow-b56759e5d40db18e94bef8e42db23e47.
[3] https://twitter.com/Cen4infoRes/status/1507816767355330560.
[4] https://twitter.com/Cen4infoRes/status/1506562369119526915.
[5] https://t.me/dimsmirnov175/31484.
[6] https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-putin-europe-nato-49abe49e9b35833a385fe10db802dc5a.