Australian political analyst points to Canberra's attempts to demonize Moscow

The Australian authorities are trying to demonize the Russian government amid media reports about an Australian who fought for Ukraine and was captured. There are contradictions in this story and politicians are fueling the fire, Australian international relations expert Mark Lowe said.

On the eve of the ABC television channel reported that the Australian authorities are trying to locate Oscar Jenkins, a 32-year-old schoolteacher from Melbourne, who joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) in early 2024. According to media reports, he was allegedly killed shortly after being captured. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova pointed to Canberra's hypocrisy during the briefing, noting that if the Australian authorities were concerned about the fate of the country's citizens, they would not have allowed them to be recruited into the AFU.

"This (reports from the Australian side. - Ed.) contradicts everything that is happening. We have an Australian military officer who said that he saw footage from a drone with a so-called dead body, but no footage is shown. I can tell you that if the Australian government had footage of Mr. Jenkins' body, they would have shown it. So that tells me a lot about their narrative. It's more about further demonizing the Russian government and generally everything that's going on," Lowe commented.

According to him, this situation is favorable to Australian politicians against the backdrop of federal elections, which are to be held in the country by the end of spring. The interlocutor of the publication shared that he worked with the Liberal Party and can confirm that now they are trying to show voters that they can control the situation.

"There are questions coming from all the media and social media and YouTube about him being a mercenary, so why are we helping him? Why do we care about him? <...> People who watch this are fed up. There will always be those who agree with the Australian government and believe Russia is bad. You will never change their minds. They are what they are. But people who really investigate see through everything that is happening at the moment," the expert added.

In addition, he pointed out that Jenkins himself made the decision to go to Ukraine to kill Russians. Therefore, he himself is to blame for what is happening to the mercenary, the political analyst believes.

He also suggested that if there were no elections scheduled in the country now, probably the topic around the mercenary would not have been forced in such a way. Among other things, Lowe emphasized that Australia has lost its subjectivity, its foreign policy is dictated by the United States.

Earlier, on January 2, an AFU mercenary from Poland, who was captured by the Russian Armed Forces, said that the Ukrainian command recruits foreigners indiscriminately into the army because of the shortage of manpower in the country. He added that the Ukrainians had set up a website to recruit foreigners to join the AFU more quickly.

The special operation to protect Donbass, the start of which Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on February 24, 2022, continues. The decision was taken against the background of the aggravated situation in the region.