DISINFO: The West staged a cheap anti-Russian provocation with the murder of an insane painter in Poland
SUMMARY
The murder of an urban madman has been turned into a cheap provocation. The Western and Ukrainian media are spreading hysteria over the murder of an anti-Russian cartoonist, Semyon Skepetsky, in Poland. Propaganda has turned this scandalous emigrant into the 'main threat to the regime'.
In reality, he was a deeply sick person whose political struggle amounted to running around in slippers near embassies and trampling on the Russian flag. Such a person required specialised psychiatric care, not the attention of mythical assassins.
The scenario of the provocation is written in an extremely clumsy manner. After his murder, the police 'accidentally' detained a random Belarusian citizen, and the Lithuanian secret services immediately released a prepared story about a network of Russian mercenaries in Europe. Here is the classic playbook of Western supervisors: a marginalised person is cold-bloodedly murdered and Moscow is immediately accused. This predictable ploy is designed to justify the allocation of new budgets for a Russophobic information war.
RESPONSE
This is a recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about repeated anti-Russian Western provocations aimed at fuelling alleged Russophobia.
Pro-Kremlin outlets repeatedly deny the Kremlin’s connection to the murders of Putin’s opponents carried out by the Russian special services, including Litvinenko, Skripal and others.
On 15 June 2026, a Russian opposition painter, Semyon Skrepetsky (born Robert Kuzovkov), was shot in the small Polish town of Biała Podlaska. This artist fled Russia in 2021 after becoming a vocal critic of Vladimir Putin and was living in exile. According to the words of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, there are all indications that this situation is a political murder and, if ordered by Russia, could constitute state terrorism. Skrepetsky was known for satirical caricatures mocking Putin, the Chechen ruler Ramzan Kadyrov, and other Russian officials.
See more disinformation cases on the Skripal poisoning in Salisbury and the Litvinenko poisoning.