Rudy Bouma is a veteran journalist and reporter for Dutch TV. He is a journalist at Nieuwsuur (News Hour) and regularly reports from crisis areas. He recently traveled to Ukraine to report on the current war. He also is an expert at debunking fake news and misinformation. Rudy also covered the Ukrainian war in 2014 and 2015. In 2014 he was one of the first Dutch TV journalists at the crash site of flight MH17. Zamaneh interviewed Rudy about his observations of the recent war in Ukraine, propaganda, and other issues that complicate this conflict.
Zamaneh: It has been about two months since the day Russia invaded Ukraine. Since then, the news of this war has overshadowed other news of the post-pandemic world. In the age of social media, we could see hundreds and thousands of videos and reports from serious journalists in the field and citizen journalists. No reports can compete with first-hand observation. You have been in Ukraine for two weeks and just got back from there. Please tell us about your observations and the atmosphere of the area.
Rudy Bouma: I was based in Lviv and, as you know, Lviv is a charming historical city. I had some stories about the city as well. And obviously, that was the city to go to for a lot of media, so at first I was a bit scared that there were not enough stories for that much press. But after two weeks, I realized there were a lot of original stories to tell. It was very safe in that city, at least until the last day of my visit, because the town was not the target of Russian rockets. On my last day, a Russian missile hit an aircraft plant near Lviv airport. Still, until that moment, other cities were being targeted, like Ivano-Frankivsk International Airport, which is about 150 kilometers away. I went to Ivano-Frankivsk to make a report about the Azov Battalion, which is very much discussed because they have their neo-Nazi roots, and they play a significant role in Mariupol right now. I also went to a military base at the Polish border, which was hit at one point, and 35 people died. There is a tiny village next to the base where a funeral was happening while we were filming. The funeral belonged to a person killed near Kyiv during the battle. We went there, and we filmed that, but we made a lot of reports also about, let’s say, more in-depth topics—for instance, the role of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and its dilemmas.
– From a military point of view, how do you see the cities west of Ukraine? Is it a full-scale war going on there?
When I arrived, there was a lot of anxiety. Old statues were wrapped in protective covers, and the city’s art was taken from the museums and put in basements. People were getting prepared for attacks. Old archives were being stored somewhere. There were checkpoints on the edge of the city. We were hearing air alarms very often, maybe every other day at least, and during the air alarm, we had to go to the basement for cover. When a rocket is being shot from the sea of Azov over the Black Sea, or western Russia or Belarus, they will have an air alarm, and you have to wait for at least half an hour, and sometimes even two hours, for the safe sign again.
These days it’s not only an air alarm in the air, but it’s also on an app. When your app makes a lot of noise, it creates nervousness and anxiety. On the other hand, when it happens more frequently, after a while, people pay less attention and continue what they were doing. In my hotel, after an alarm, I was in the basement with about 20 people at the beginning, then the next night it was 12, and the night after it was five, and the last night it was one person with me, sheltering. Especially when there were a lot of false alarms, people started getting used to it. During my first week there, many restaurants and shops were closed. The second week I was there, some shops were opening up again, so everyday life began again. Nevertheless, a lot of horrible incidents were taking place.
– Did you meet any international volunteers coming to Ukraine to fight?
Of course, I know about them. I’m afraid I can’t tell much because I did not meet them myself. My colleague on the News Hour program at the Polish border met some of them. Yes, there have been a bunch of volunteers from several Western European countries arriving there.
We haven’t caught up with any Dutch volunteers. However, you could see them back in the 2014 and 2015 war. At that time, there were especially people with extreme right tendencies going to fight for Ukraine against separatists in the east, and now it is, let’s say, a broader kind of people, as far as I have read and heard from other reporters. You must be quite an adventurer, and the volunteers are not your average joe. Of course, people are going to Ukraine to fight, but not like in 2014 to 2015. When I went to Ivano-Frankivsk (International Airport) to see the Azov Battalion, they told us they had volunteers. They mentioned Sweden or Finland, or at least some Scandinavian countries and Croatia. They didn’t mention any Dutch, although they got some goods from Dutch people, things like, I don’t know, uniforms and stuff like that.
– Ukraine has long struggled to keep its culture and independence, and Ukrainians are proud of their narrative of the country’s history, which is based on freedom and resistance. How did you find the attitude of the Ukrainian people in the recent war?
I found them very strong and also flexible. In the Lviv central station, the refugee transfer point, was very chaotic and there were many human tragedies. Also, many people didn’t want to flee and were dropping off their families. Many women chose to stay in Ukraine because of nationalistic feelings to defend their country. Ukrainians are very nationalistic, of course, much more than Dutch people. I’m wondering what Dutch people would do in such a situation. I don’t think we would have the “veerkracht” (resilience) in a similar case.
– Every war reminds us of the famous quote attributed to US Senator Hiram Warren Johnson, who said in 1918: “The first casualty of war is the truth.” We also have two narratives in the Ukrainian war: the Ukrainian narrative and the Russian narrative. At the same time, both sides have accused each other of propaganda and spreading fake news. I wonder, how much propaganda is going on these days and what is the most accurate version of the truth?
It’s a good question because my second expertise is debunking fake news; I have been working on this issue, especially before I went to Ukraine, and made a whole segment for News Hour. We can see disinformation from both sides.
On the Russian side, they use the narrative that they’re saving Ukrainians from oppression and fighting neo-Nazis and so on.
And on the Ukrainian side, what we saw, especially in the first week of the war, was that there was some, let’s say, fake news to keep spirits high. For instance, the story that a Russian fighter jet was shot down, and then if you analyze it, it appears to be computer game footage. Another example is a picture of a fighter jet that Ukraine downed, and in fact, it was related to 1993 and an accident at an airbase air show. You also see that Zelenskyy wants all the news stations to work together on one 24-hour news program. So obviously, he’s also trying to, let’s say, control the narrative.
And on the Russian side, sometimes you see ridiculous things. One of these topics is that the Azov Battalion is now being framed as neo-Nazis. I’ve been making reports about the extreme right in Ukraine in 2014 and 2015, and in my recent travel, I did a piece about Azov. So I think I can say I know quite a lot about it, and Azov has neo-Nazi roots. The founder of Azov wrote a fascist pamphlet back in 2017, which is horrible to read. They’ve had neo-Nazi people at their core, especially in the beginning. But things changed because they were incorporated into the National Guard. Right now, they are not using the anti-Semitic or far-right narratives anymore. They’re very nationalistic, very patriotic, and in one part it may be PR, and in the other part, it may be true, but it’s not like in the beginning anymore where they were doing the Hitler salute.
– So in this war, their objective has changed?
Yes, I think so. And also, what you can see is that in 2014 they were also in the political right section and were also in the militia, which is ultra-nationalistic. They were very popular, and you had the Svoboda (meaning freedom). It was a political party with anti-Semitic roots.
But all those parties which had some popularity back then are not popular at all anymore.
They had a coalition of right-wing parties in Ukraine in the 2019 parliamentary election. The coalition only got 2.15% of the votes and failed to win a seat in parliament.
Back to the Russian narrative, if Putin says “we’re going to denazify,” it already happened by itself because people are just not voting for those guys anymore.
And even Azov – which is mystified – right now, you know it’s like they’re either the heroes who were fighting in Mariupol or neo-Nazis. You know there are two narratives about them, but they are, well, by estimation, 1000 right now, and I think the whole army is like 200,000 in Ukraine. So they are about like half a percent. It’s pretty small, but they have a lot of publicity, and the Russian propaganda also makes them more prominent than they are.
As a fake news debunker, I always say that it’s very tempting for social media users to retweet or share account posts that focus on your emotions. Sometimes it’s positive. For instance, this photo went viral of two little kids waving at the Ukrainian tanks. That photo is not from now; it’s an old photo from the last war. The photographer was not in the service of the army, but a volunteer photographer and they cut ties with him because he staged some pictures. And now it is the same with Azov and swastika flags, and … a whole bunch of their photos are real, some are not. So I would advise people not to share or retweet stuff too quickly.
– Besides the Ukraine-Russia war over land disputes and historical narratives, there is another rivalry and a divided house: The Orthodox Church. What does the Ukrainian Orthodox Church say about this war?
So there are still two wings of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. One has been independent for a quite a few years now. Also, after the last war, they distanced themselves even more from Moscow. And there’s still a Ukrainian Orthodox Church affiliated with the Moscow patriarchy.
They’re not the Russian Orthodox Church, but they are still in the Moscow patriarchy, which is complicated. Of course, they’re not so popular these last few years, and they try not to speak out politically and focus on love, peace, and happiness. They haven’t been condemning the invasion like the other church did because the other (independent) church condemned the invasion and compared Russia to the biblical story of Cain and Abel, in which, you know, the jealous brother killed the other one. Some churches didn’t speak out. And there are some stories about church leaders or priests being chased out of the village. I’m not sure where it will end because they can’t do anything on their own as one individual church in one city or village; they have to have permission from their church leaders.
– So after the start of the war in Ukraine, we see some anti-Russian sentiments and, in some cases, “cancel culture.” How was the attitude towards the Russians and Russian culture inside Ukraine?
I can only speak about the west of Ukraine. In the west, it’s very unpopular now to talk in Russian, which is very normal in the east of Ukraine.
But we spoke to a Russian girl living in Lviv because she had a boyfriend of Ukrainian origin and wanted to be a volunteer. She was not pro-Putin and very much pro-Ukraine. She wanted to volunteer, but she couldn’t get a volunteer job. She thinks it’s because of her being Russian. She’s not sure, of course. Then she ended up at the station, being a volunteer by herself. On the other hand, her parents are like the indoctrinated Russians who believe in the Russian state media. And it must be hard for her.
And what I experienced myself a lot is that they’re also very suspicious of potential Russian spies. So I experienced this myself on the first and last days, such as getting thoroughly checked even though I’m a fully accredited journalist. You can Google me; you know exactly who I am. For instance, while we were getting some interviews where the rocket hit the airport, there were three cops who just came up to us and checked our papers and our cell phones, such as every WhatsApp message, every photo. They’re very much suspicious.
I was also at the police station once. Many people were sort of temporarily arrested for screening to see whether they were Russian spies, so I would definitely say there’s huge anti-Russian sentiment, at least in the west of Ukraine.
