The post, essentially, says that the support for Ukraine extended by the functionaries of VMRO-DPMNE is the same as the alleged support for “Nazism and Fascism in Ukraine and in the EU”, which is not true. This narrative corresponds to the pro-Kremlin narrative that “denazification is ongoing in Ukraine”, a term used by the top Russian leadership to justify the unprovoked military invasion in Ukraine initiated on the 24th of February 2022
We are fact-checking a post on the social network Facebook claiming the following:
VMRO-DPMNE is publicly supporting Nazism and Fascism in the EU and in Ukraine. What is not clear to the Macedonians who voted for them?
Are they blind and deaf and don’t they understand the meaning of denazification. Translated, that means six feet under.
Essentially, the fact-checked post states that the support for Ukraine extended by the functionaries of VMRO-DPMNE is the same as the alleged support for “Nazism and Fascism in Ukraine and in the EU”, which is not true. This narrative corresponds to the pro-Kremlin narrative that “denazification is ongoing in Ukraine”, a term mentioned and used by the Russian high leadership to justify the unprovoked military invasion initiated in Ukraine at the beginning of 2022.
Ukraine is a country where millions of people got killed fighting against Nazism in the Second World War. Nazi ideology is banned in Ukraine, nevertheless, the Kremlin is persistently pushing the narrative that Ukraine is a Nazi country. The database of EUvsDisinfo contains numerous examples of pro-Kremlin disinformation claims about “Nazi/Fascist Ukraine”.
Many historians argue that the military aggression in Ukraine cannot be correlated with some kind of denazification, which is one of the main Kremlin narratives used to justify the military invasion.
Putin is misusing the term “denazify,” pointing out that denazification refers to a particular moment in time in the post-war era, and that Putin’s use of the term is propaganda aimed at his fears about the current democratic government in the Ukraine. There’s a very specific historical meaning [to denazification], which is the process undergone in Germany after the Second World War, says Timothy Snyder, an expert on Ukraine and author of “The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America” for the Time Magazine.
As a reminder, Ukraine banned the promotion of nazism back in 2015.
Hand in hand with the presentation of Ukraine as a “Nazi and fascist” country, goes the presentation of the European Union in a similar fashion. The European Union, however, was established on founding principles and goals completely opposite to Nazism and fascism. It is a political and economic union of 27 member states primarily located in Europe, with policies securing the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital on the internal market, and common policies for trade, agriculture, and regional development.
On the 25th of October 2018, the European Parliament stated that it was concerned about the increased trend of normalization of fascism, racism, and xenophobia and called on all member states of the European Union to ban neo-fascist and neo-Nazi groups.
The Members of the European Parliament (MEP) believe that extreme right-wing organizations in some of the member states were one of the causes for the rise in violence, affecting the whole of society and specifically targeting Jews, Muslims, Roma, LGBTI pe,ople, etc.
They proposed the establishment of a police unit for fighting hate crimes to ensure that such incidents are prosecuted and investigated. MEPs encouraged national governments to effectively ban neo-fascist and neo-Nazi groups, including all other foundations and associations that glorify Nazism and fascism.
The European Parliament calls on the member states to clearly condemn and sanction hate crimes, hate speech, and scapegoating by politicians as they normalize hatred and violence. In addition, they added that measures are needed to counteract the spread of racism, fascism, and xenophobia through the internet, in cooperation with social media companies.
The Resolution demands that member states and national sports federations, in particular football clubs, counteract the scourge of racism, fascism, and xenophobia in stadiums and sports culture by condemning and punishing such actions. In addition, it proposes EU member states to develop programs to help individuals to leave violent neo-fascist and neo-Nazi groups. Members of the Parliament also stress the importance of education, to increase history awareness among the youth and call for a clear rejection of the fascist crimes of the past. They underline that the truth about the Holocaust must not be trivialized.
Therefore, quite clearly, the commitments of the European Union are not fascist and they are solidly grounded on anti-fascist policies, recommendations, and actions. Truthmeter has already covered and debunked some narratives that attempted to smear EU functionaries as connected with fascism.
Neither VMRO-DPMNE supports fascism and Nazism in the EU, nor is fascism and Nazism in the EU and Ukraine at a level greater than an exception, i.e., isolated groups, not representative on higher levels of policy-making. On the contrary, that is happening on the level of individuals and radical groups which the EU and Ukraine actively oppose.
Due to all of the above-noted facts, the fact-checked post is assessed as untrue.
