Leaked tape on Kiev sniper attacks

Everyone Agrees that Ukraine Sniper Attacks Were a False Flag … They Only Argue About WHO Is the Culprit

Washington's Blog,

9 March, 2014

Who Stood to Gain from a False Flag Operation?

We pointed out Wednesday that the Estonian foreign minister claims that the new Ukrainian coalitiondeployed snipers to discredit the former government of Ukraine.

We documented Thursday that snipers are a common form of false flag terrorism.

Interestingly, while the new Ukranian coalition denies that it deployed snipers, it is now accusing someone else – Russia – of deploying the snipers as a false flag event to create chaos.

AP reports today:

One of the biggest mysteries hanging over the protest mayhem that drove Ukraine’s president from power: Who was behind the snipers who sowed death and terror in Kiev?

That riddle has become the latest flashpoint of feuding over Ukraine — with the nation’s fledgling government and the Kremlin giving starkly different interpretations of events that could either undermine or bolster the legitimacy of the new rulers.

Ukrainian authorities are investigating the Feb. 18-20 bloodbath, and they have shifted their focus from ousted President Viktor Yanukovych’s government to Vladimir Putin’s Russia — pursuing the theory that the Kremlin was intent on sowing mayhem as a pretext for military incursion. Russia suggests that the snipers were organized by opposition leaders trying to whip up local and international outrage against the government.

The government’s new health minister — a doctor who helped oversee medical treatment for casualties during the protests — told The Associated Press that the similarity of bullet wounds suffered by opposition victims and police indicates the shooters were trying to stoke tensions on both sides and spark even greater violence, with the goal of toppling Yanukovych.

“I think it wasn’t just a part of the old regime that (plotted the provocation), but it was also the work of Russian special forces who served and maintained the ideology of the (old) regime,” Health Minister Oleh Musiy said.

***

On Tuesday, Interior Minister Arsen Avakov signaled that investigators may be turning their attention away from Ukrainian responsibility.

“I can say only one thing: the key factor in this uprising, that spilled blood in Kiev and that turned the country upside down and shocked it, was a third force,” Avakov was quoted as saying by Interfax. “And this force was not Ukrainian.”

***

Musiy, who spent more than two months organizing medical units on Maidan, said that on Feb. 20 roughly 40 civilians and protesters were brought with fatal bullet wounds to the makeshift hospital set up near the square. But he said medics also treated three police officers whose wounds were identical.

Forensic evidence, in particular the similarity of the bullet wounds, led him and others to conclude that snipers were targeting both sides of the standoff at Maidan — and that the shootings were intended to generate a wave of revulsion so strong that it would topple Yanukovych and also justify a Russian invasion.

Since Russia supported Yanukovych, it makes no sense that the people who ordered the sniper attacks would want to topple Yanukovych and launch a Russian invasion. Specifically, they would either want tooverthrow the Russia-friendly Yanukovych or launch a Russian invasion to support a Russia-friendly Ukrainian government.

In any event, AP continues:

Russia has used the uncertainty surrounding the bloodshed to discredit Ukraine’s current government. During a news conference Tuesday, Putin addressed the issue in response to a reporter’s question, suggesting that the snipers in fact “may have been provocateurs from opposition parties.”

***

A former top security official with Ukraine’s main security agency, the SBU, waded into the confusion, in an interview published Thursday with the respected newspaper Dzerkalo Tizhnya. Hennady Moskal, who was deputy head of the agency, told the newspaper that snipers from the Interior Ministry and SBU were responsible for the shootings, not foreign agents.

“In addition to this, snipers received orders to shoot not only protesters, but also police forces. This was all done in order to escalate the conflict, in order to justify the police operation to clear Maidan,” he was quoted as saying.

In other words, everyone agrees that the snipers were false flag terrorists sewing chaos and confusion … they only disagree about who the responsible party is.

This is the first mention I've seen in the western media of the leaked tape

Russia calls for OSCE probe into Kiev sniper deaths 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday called for an investigation into who was behind the deaths of dozens of people in Kiev last month in attacks by snipers, saying the truth could no longer be "covered up".

7 News,

9 March, 2014

Lavrov's comments came after Estonia's top diplomat told EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton in a phone call leaked this week that the then-Ukrainian opposition to president Viktor Yanukovych may have been involved in the attacks.

The leaked call has been played up by Russian state media over the last few days and Lavrov's comments were the latest sign Moscow wants to use the sniper controversy as an argument to discredit Ukraine's new authorities.

"The latest information about the so-called snipers case can no longer be covered up," Lavrov told a news conference in Moscow with his Tajik counterpart.

"We have proposed that the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe) takes up an objective investigation of this and we will ensure there is justice.

"There have been too many lies, and this lie has been used too long to push European public opinion in the wrong direction, contrary to the objective facts."

Western states have blamed Yanukovych's now disbanded elite riot police force for much of the killing that rocked Kiev in February.

However Russia has strongly emphasised the leaked phone call between Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet and Ashton as evidence for its argument that the new post-Yanukovych government in Kiev is made up of dangerous extremists.

"If all those things were to be investigated, then, I think, a completely different picture would be drawn compared to what is being depicted by American media and, unfortunately, by some American and European politicians," Russia's ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin told the state-run English language RT channel.

The new anti-Yanukovych Ukrainian government has meanwhile implied that Russia may have itself had a hand in the bloodshed.

Moscow's call for an OSCE investigation comes as unarmed observers from the same organisation have been blocked from entering Crimea on three separate occasions. On Saturday they were stopped after shots were fired as they approached a checkpoint manned by pro-Russian forces.

- Have you not heard? -

In the audio of the February 26 call, whose authenticity was confirmed by Estonia, Paet told Ashton he was informed in Kiev that "they were the same snipers killing people from both sides".

Dozens of protesters and around 15 police officers were killed in the attacks.

Paet, who had held talks with Ukraine's new leaders on February 25, added: "It's really disturbing that now the new coalition, they don't want to investigate what exactly happened."

Ashton sounds taken aback by his remarks: "I think we do want to investigate. I mean I didn't know. I didn't pick that up. Gosh."

Russian President Vladimir Putin had appeared to allude to the controversy in his news conference on Tuesday, a day before the audio tape was posted on Wednesday.

"Have you not heard that now there is the opinion... that these (snipers) were provocateurs from one of the opposition parties? Have you not heard about that?" Putin asked a reporter, saying the information was available on "open sources".

The release of the tape echoed another tape leaked in February when US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and US ambassador to Kiev, Geoff Pyatt, were heard discussing which opposition figures should be in a new Ukrainian government.

Nuland also used colourful language to criticise the EU, exposing tensions with the bloc at a crucial time. The source of the tape was never made clear but US officials strongly implied Russia was to blame.

The Estonian foreign ministry said it rejected the claim that Paet was "giving an assessment of the opposition?s involvement in the violence".

"The fact that this phone call has been leaked is not a coincidence," it quoted Paet as saying.