Zelenskyy against Putin: Whose truth is stronger? | To the Point

no let up at all in the fighting in ukraine and the propaganda war is also intensifying a clinic comes under attack who's to blame residential areas flattened the same question who is to blame the whole city cut off again who's to blame it's a battle of words between a man whose country clearly stands behind him and an autocrat with a long record of pulverizing opposition on to the point we are selensky against putin whose truth is stronger [Music] [Music] well thank you very much for joining us today and my guests here in the studio are natalia smolenzeva a russian-born journalist now with deutsche weller here in germany also with us is suitor david wilke from the german marshall fund and a warm welcome to tomorrow's scat man chief reporter with the german magazine cicero thank you all three for being with us here today and on this show today we wanted to look at the power of words and the power of images and where better to begin them with natalya i'd like to ask you natalia to decipher for us some video that a lot of people have been seeing that has had a lot of influence give us your take on what it's all about here we go so we see this as a live broadcast on monday night on one of the main russian state channels and for a couple of seconds editor marina sanikova rushed into the studio behind the presenter holding a sign saying basically no to war and saying don't believe in propaganda they are lying to you this is this was just a short moment it was cut then in the live tv but it spread immediately on social huge impact exactly it was discussed both in russia and outside of russia we have to know that some social media is already restricted in russia so i guess not a lot of people have seen it or not everyone has seen it but among those who have seen it it was uh you know debated whether it was real or fake and whether it's a heroic act or is it just the way for her what's your take on it was it real was it fake it was real and now we know because we know this person and she's been already um she had a court hearing already she was already given you know a fine for this action so we do know it's real and we do know that why she did it she also released the video saying that um her personal story this is very important for her her father is ukraine and her mother in russian despite the fact that she's been working for russian state tv russian propaganda essentially for past years this is the red line she couldn't cross basically it's really powerful stuff yeah uh moritz could you tell us we're going to bring up now and uh a photo image which i'd like to ask you to uh tell tell us what it signifies for you yeah well this is a photo from the city mariupol which is like half a million in ukraine and it's a besieged city and what we see is the impact of a russian rocket attack on a hospital in mariupol several days ago and we see a pregnant woman who was carried away even though the photographer it's a ukrainian photographer who is in the city until now and of course this is a very very emotional picture and it of course it doesn't fit totally doesn't fit with the the idea that russia is trying to uh to give of this war russia is saying it's a special operation uh against the ukrainian military against some nazis and of course in the moment when when they attack hospitals in ukraine and this leads to to this impact uh it's it's horrifying and uh absolutely yeah okay well to reiterate what we've seen we've seen the images of that dreadful attack on the maternity hospital a pregnant woman and her baby died when the hospital where she was meant to give birth was attacked i'd like to ask you david wilt what are your thoughts about those two series of images well there are two images that have certainly struck a chord um both in terms of the bravery of this woman that um stood up in the face of great danger but spoke her mind because many russians who don't agree with putin's actions are leaving the country so the ones that are staying behind are certainly under risk for speaking out and as you mentioned she went through two days of you know lack of sleep and probably fear for her life and is now out but who knows what you know will happen to her next and the other image also of course strikes fears for the civilian population in ukraine because this of course brings about questions about is our you know is this regime in russia committing war crimes because there is a deliberate attack on civilian infrastructure and on hospitals and um w.h.o has actually already spoken out against it well natalia what would you say about this about these discussions now about war crimes and genocide i mean you you grew up in russia that's where you spent most of your life tell us how you reflect on that what you're seeing now well for me as russian it's really hard to see what russia my country essentially is doing in ukraine um i've been in russia just recently just um two weeks ago and this moment when the war started was you know i guess one of the worst moments i've experienced honestly because until the last moment i couldn't believe this was possible even when the um and i think many people i read this that you had said this you couldn't believe it i mean for me as a little bit of an outsider we'd seen this symbolic uh gesture this huge dramatic theatrical gesture of the convoy moving forward so threateningly we've seen this as well and a lot of people i've been talking in in moscow like during my reports and just on the daily live they said no it's all staged it's all the game putin is playing he wants to you know get something else from the west he wants to get an agreement he wants to be recognized as the superpower but he will never ever wage a war against ukraine this is just insane and you know we all woke up on the morning of 24th and understood that it is insane the world had changed the world completely has changed i mean one thing that i want to add i arrived in ukraine and the eastern part of ukraine the day before the war started and even there people didn't want to believe that this kind of war would start that a large-scale war against the whole country would start people thought that maybe there would be some escalation at the front line or anything but but they couldn't believe that this would happen even like right next to this to these peoples republics where people knew what war was like they didn't want to believe one thing i wanted to add concerning these pictures you know i've lived five years in russia i have relatives there i have friends there and what's really hard for me to understand how russians i mean these pictures they also arrive in russia what's what's happening there and i mean the the whole the houses the people the faces the way people talk they are it's very similar to russian cities these places how they look like all these houses from soviet times they could be in vladivostok in moscow in saint petersburg anywhere and i can't understand how uh russians can can can accept and can somehow realize that this is happening that people and places who are very similar to them and they get bombed by their army at the moment what's your answer to that question because i think you know we're all thinking about it sure it's very interesting that you bring that up because this picture of um the woman being carted out of the hospital the pregnant woman you know russia has said that this is a crisis actor and if you look to for example the united states you hear fringe voices on the right also talking about you know gun violence school shootings like what happened in connecticut to the kindergarten sandy hook as being you know those were all crisis actors so somehow people are being you know brainwashed with disinformation about what the actual state is as you mentioned before uh putin has prepared the russian people to think that this is a war a glorious war of you know freeing the ukrainians from nazis right so he's tried to hearken back to a time of russian patriotism namely world war ii okay before we move on because it's very interesting let's just listen to how vladimir putin himself explains why he began this awful war and he gave this speech in an address to ukrainian soldiers that's important to mention dear comrades your grandfathers and great grandfathers did not fight the nazis and defend our common fatherland so that neo-nazis could seize power in ukraine you made an oath to serve the ukrainian people they are a fascist who have seized power they are plundering ukraine and exploiting its people don't fulfill their criminal orders lay down your weapons and go home okay so we want to talk a little bit about language today and i think it's very important or very interesting there uh moritz that uh we there's vladimir putin who has said you have been talking about the fact that there is a war being fought that there is devastation and destruction vladimir putin is telling his people that they may not use the word war to describe what is going on how shocking is that what does that tell us well actually to be honest uh no nation that's who's starting a war is talking about war actually i mean we know it from germany we know it from other countries people liked it politicians who started war they like to to talk about special operations about operations limited operations whatever they they're not saying we are going to war we are waging a war war is unpopular everywhere and so putin is trying to copy western leaders maybe but the i think the problem is that nobody is buying this in the country he's attacking he's talking to the ukrainian soldiers and to the ukrainian people and telling them that russia comes to liberate the country from a nazi junta i just want to add that zelensky is a jew you know the president of the country is an important point yeah it's an important point and maybe there are lots of ukrainians who were dissatisfied with the president before this war started there are several points of critique of course it's no perfect country it's no perfect democracy but it's definitely no junta and people in ukraine they didn't want to be liberated and that's why maybe the only people who are believing this are some alt-right people in the in the u.s and some russians who believe in the state propaganda but in ukraine this didn't work not at all exactly i think the question is whether this is actually addressed to the ukrainian population and putin is just so like russian um leadership is so full that ukraine is is waiting for for russian army to being liberated or whether this is actually addressed to the russian population to reinforce this narrative that you know what we are doing is not they're actually saying this what we are doing is not the war is the prevention of the war which is like calling black white and white black so to say so in this this that was the point i mean i mean you're saying it's standard practice for a country going to war but for i i feel as though it is a total abuse of language orwellian abusive language that you say that one thing is another thing you turn it on its head you make a mockery of language but but i think that uh putin believed in what he was saying i think putin and maybe the people around him they believe that still in ukraine a russian-speaking person means a pro-russian person you know in odessa odessa is a russian-speaking city kharkiv which is under attack now as a russian-speaking city and he thought that the fact that they speak russian means that they are pro-russian and when the russians attack they would come out uh with russian flags and would greet the liberators but it totally didn't work out i just checked the the other day there are some pro-russian politicians in kharkiv for example the former governor who was always very pro-russian and anti-revolution in 2014 you know but but he's defending the city now against the russian occupiers how they are called in ukraine at the moment so yeah so i think i have a feeling they've obviously miscalculated this and i mean i don't know personally why but there is this feeling that you know maybe also because of the pandemic that putin has been um you know quite an isolation and this political elite has been in isolation and it seems like they've um the propaganda they've created all the narrative they've created for their own public at some point they started believing their own the distance from the real world that absurd table for example that we've seen time and again exactly this gap from what exactly is happening in ukraine or elsewhere in the world and how this is portrayed in the head so i don't know when was the calculation back there but it doesn't seem that the calculation was to hold this war for such a long time it was obviously this bliss creek and and fast operation and hope that they will be probably greeted with flowers as it's portrayed in russian tv so maybe this was the idea in the very putin's head that didn't really match the reality so um we have a uh group in our organization called the alliance for securing democracy and we monitor russian disinformation and some of the narratives that are being put out right now are about ukraine having chemical and biological weapons you know resuscitating its nuclear program being a vassal state of the united states right so these are things that are out there but in a way it sort of foreshadows what russia perhaps intends to do right what the and in that way justifies perhaps future actions of russia so i think it's yes propaganda for its people but also in a way um you know sort of projecting in the mirror what russia intends to do in ukraine as well it has to be said in all fairness that the the us has a track record as well um colin powell you know i think that that was a war um that it was it was not a war that the united states provoked sure there was faulty intelligence but um there was um it wasn't a war of choice perhaps you know i mean to say what blinken said because i i mean i think that there is a clear difference um it was a different time this is an unprovoked unjustified act of aggression on the part of russia but i want to add as a german who has lots to do with russians who was discussing with russians over the last 20 years i'm thinking about the iraq war all the time over the last days i was demonstrating against the iraq war in germany at that moment but still we couldn't prevent it and i would say that the harm this war did we also see it today because russia is using something like the iraq war as a justification to uh its own people because russia says template the americans are also doing this we can do it too and i i at this moment i can't really uh answer no it's not true i mean i think there's a clear difference between um the united states and russia in terms of you know the united states has caused harm with the iraq war no doubt about it but it still sees itself as a benign power it still believes in the rule of law it believes in democratic values i don't think you can compare the united states with russia and the what about ism that putin is trying to put out there is exactly what we need to stand to get up against in order to have resolve in the west against putin's actions in ukraine but the iraq war still um made the make the position of the west or the moral position of especially the us uh much weaker i think i think you can all point to i mean we're changing the topic of this program but i think you could point to the united states in several occasions over history but the point is that the united states also has a track record of correcting itself and being a benign power for the liberal international order that's my belief let's get back to ukraine it's very important we do so the the conflict has uh promoted has prompted ukrainian uh president vladimir salinsky to uh turn on his to his people uh on what seems like a sort of a daily basis you'd almost have to say and it's very dramatic what he has to say and it's often very strong stuff let's listen in today we must be united in condemning this war crime of russia which reflects all the evil that the occupiers have brought to our land all of the destroyed cities and everything they've done the bombing of a maternity hospital is conclusive evidence that what is happening is a genocide of ukrainians [Music] natalie what do you say to that that accusation of genocide that's the a very very very downer crime yeah the genocide is used in this speech which is also used in the russian propaganda actually so it's it's a very very serious accusation and i cannot always speak for the russian government or even for the russian people there for me it's it's really painful to see what's happening there and as a russian i feel horrible every day talking to my friends talking to my friends in ukraine about it but if we um see right now this is also on the informational part this this um war between these narratives as you mentioned the very beginning and we also have to um have to see what the russian side has to say well the ukrainian side has to say on this in the senate that they're trying to build this narrative and of course the ukrainian narrative is supported or what the president is saying is supported by the west and it seems to be that it's the the truth narrative there but then in order to win i think we need to find a way how to fight the propaganda and misinformation that's happening in russia this is very crucial and that's very crucial to be a lies of these people who stand up to this as well russia could end up very very very isolated indeed at the end of this whole uh this war that it could be it could take almost a lifetime to recover to get back to where people were how how disturbing is that for you it is very disturbing and the past week i've been at home um i've been in moscow that time i've seen people just sitting looking at this not believing in huge shock of what's happening and no matter where they stand in this position that most of people i know they're against this and they they in shock what's happening and they don't support this they're just seeing their lives being thrown out of the window they've seen all their you know projects all their savings everything just get out and it's beyond all belief it's just not where what we expected obviously and the sanctions will hit really hard especially these people people who are open-minded who are you know in their 30s 40s who've managed to do something with their lives and now one day to another they just don't have it all and of course we can talk about that they're also to blame and people in russia are probably also responsible to to large extent what's happening there but does it help does it help us to fight putin i would add that the crazy thing is that one of putin's main points of his uh why people still voted for him after 20 years was the word stability you know yeah that i mean he said okay the 90s were a time of chaos of uh poverty and we rebuilt this country and i guarantee stability and now he's throwing all the stability out of the window to wage this war against ukraine and this brings me to the point that to think that uh putin has somehow lost uh the the last contact with with reality he's thinking in categories of being a historic person of being some kind of napoleon with a historic mission and he doesn't care about things like economy anymore important points very very very important by suitor i just like to come back to you because we sort of ganged up on you just a little bit just now uh as as being an american i just want to uh the americans are obviously a key player in what's going on in the in central europe at this point in time it's a long way away but it isn't for americans can you explain how people are sort of reading the situation for us well i think for one thing um the ukrainian people have won the hearts and minds of the united states uh zielinski will be speaking to a joint session of the us congress and i think that um it's made the people in the united states realize that freedom and democracy are not um to be taken for granted so i think that has definitely waken people woken people up about um the fragility of democracy and of course when you think about the region it also shows that the united states still plays a major role in keeping the stability of europe and i think if it were up to countries in central and eastern europe they certainly want a strong united states present and this whole idea of europe taking its security into its own hands or this concept of strategic autonomy is um certainly on the back burner for now okay maurice we're running out of time just a little bit but i did want to come back to you because there was uh you wrote an item about uh what you experienced when you were still recently in ukraine and you you you were quite explicit in it and just a little bit sort of unjournalistic in that you said it broke your heart that's that's how it felt to me tell me a little bit more about how it broke your heart it actually broke my heart because uh i'm not only writing about this eastern european region about russia ukraine armenia and all these countries over the last 20 years i have many friends there i have relatives there and i somehow saw my mission in explaining russia to the germans explaining germans to the russians uh and building bridges actually and my belief is that i mean there are a lot of setbacks you know like putin's getting more authoritarian everything and all his his campaigns against gay people and so on but still i was i believed in that we were going in the right direction and of course this moment when when when russia and the russian army attacks ukraine where i also have many friends it destroys everything and i think it will take a very long time to let me pick up on that because one one of my colleagues said that he could imagine he said it's a quirky position perhaps have at this point in time but we could be out of this in a couple of weeks time is that in any way likely or is this a dig a deep wall we really don't know i think from what i hear from the you know people um assessing the military of the separations cannot drag for more than a couple of weeks but then again nobody expected this to start in the first place so at this point i think we can't really okay we've got to leave it there i'm afraid thanks very much for joining us if you've er i hope we've given you at least food for thought for now goodbye and just [Music] [Music] you

Channel: DW News

Views: 357,098

Keywords: DW News, Putin, Zelenskyy, Ukraine, Russia, war in Ukraine, russian invasion of Ukraine, To the Point, Selensky

Id: Rge9Bd6fsb0

Length: 26min 6sec (1566 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 17 2022