Russian state-controlled RT media outlet is facing widespread backlash and calls for the outlet to be banned globally for inciting genocide after a presenter said Ukrainian children who saw Russians as occupiers under the Soviet Union should be drowned or burned alive.
In a show broadcast last week, RT presenter Anton Krasovsky – a pro-war commentator on Russian TV who has been sanctioned by the European Union – said children who criticized Russia should have been “thrown straight into a river with a strong current”.
“They should have been drowned in the Tysyna (river),” Krasovsky said according to Reuters. “Just drown those children, drown them.” Alternatively, he said, they could be shoved into huts and burned.”
Krasovsky’s comments came in response to an account made by Russian author Sergei Lukyanenko about how, when he first visited Ukraine in the 1980s, children told him they would live better lives were it not for Moscow occupying their country.
In the same segment, Krasovsky also laughed at reports that Russian soldiers had raped elderly Ukrainian women during the invasion.
The comments prompted Ukrainian officials to call for a global ban on the Russian station.
“Governments which have still not banned RT must watch this excerpt,” Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said in a tweet that linked to a clip of the interview.
“Aggressive genocide incitement (we will put this person on trial for it), which has nothing to do with freedom of speech. Ban RT worldwide,” Kuleba added.
Meanwhile on Russia's state-funded RT, director of broadcasting Anton Krasovsky suggests drowning or burning Ukrainian children, makes hideous comments about the rapes by Russian soldiers in Ukraine, says Ukraine should not exist and Ukrainians who resist Russia should be shot. pic.twitter.com/BGIaBNok4v
— Julia Davis (@JuliaDavisNews) October 23, 2022
