Early on in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a bizarre rumor emerged that 1980’s action star Steven Seagal had taken up arms to fight alongside the Russians. Though those reports turned out to be false, a Russian news site posted a video featuring Seagal pushing a conspiracy for the Russian government.
Seagal has been a friend of Putin for years, receiving a Russian passport in 2016. In 2017, he was banned from entering Ukraine who labeled him a national security threat.
In the video, published on TVZVEZDA’s website, Seagal stands among the wreckage of Olenvika detention center in one of Ukraine’s Russia controlled territories; where on July 29, an explosion ripped through the building killing 53 Ukrainian prisoners of war and injuring 70 others. No Russian deaths were reported.
Segal toured the ruins, holding up shrapnel to the cameras while he talked. His actual voice was diminished by a Russian dub.
“It definitely looks like a rocket,” Seagal is reported to have said, echoing the Kremlin’s talking point that a Ukraine-launched, US-supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, or HIMARS, had caused the blast. “If you look at the burning and other details, of course it’s not a bomb. Not to mention the fact that Russia really has a lot of artifacts from HIMARS. This is where HIMARS hit, 50 people were killed, another 70 were injured.”
There have been varying reports coming from Kremlin-backed outlets, but the main story they go with is that Ukraine was trying to deter defectors or had just aimed to kill a high-ranking Ukrainian Nazi who was set to work with Russia.
“The interesting thing is that one of the killed Nazis is a Nazi who just started talking a lot about Zelensky,” Seagal added, “and that Zelensky is responsible for the orders about torture and other atrocities that violate not only the Geneva War Convention, but are also crimes against humanity.”
Ukraine has released satellite images of Russia moving the POWs to the facility days before the blast. They accused Russia of detonating “a thermobaric explosion,” aka a vacuum bomb, “from the inside.” To back up their claims, Ukraine released more satellite photos that show the surrounding buildings nearly untouched, with the outside of Olenvika prison remaining intact.
Check out the video here:
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