Many media post hoax news on April Fool's Day, but the Kyiv Post is going a different way. We've put together excerpts from Ukrainian news over the last few months that look like jokes, but actually aren't.
Policeman attempts an escape from nosy citizens in Kryvyi Rih
It’s not always the criminals who run away from the police. Sometimes a police officer has to run, too. This was the case in Kryvyi Rih in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. On a peaceful day in February a local resident, Yevhen Hidash, was driving his car, when he saw a traffic policeman stop another driver and invite him into the patrol car, which is prohibited by law.
Hidash asked the officers why they broke the law but they were in no mood for talks. They tried to escape from the nosy citizen in the patrol car, and raced through the city at the speed of 120 kilometers per hour, or twice the maximum speed limit, with sirens switched on.
The officers were dismissed after Hidash published a video of the incident on YouTube.
These officers were fired after speeding.
Zhytomyr policeman buys drugs 10 times
Ukrainian police officers frequently make the headlines, and at least once for scrupulousness. According to thenews website Zhytomyr.info, on March 19 two local citizens were detained for drug sales. In order to document the crime, police officers continued to purchase the drug again, and again, and again – 10 times over.
Ukrainian tried to smuggle 450 kilograms of salo to Russia
Salo (pork fat) is one of Ukraine’s favorite delicacies. But this February the national dish landed a man in jail. The 37-year-old citizen of Sumska Oblast was detained by Ukrainian State Border Service while trying to take a bit too much salo to Russia.
During the inspection officers found 18 bags filled with salo in the man’s car, containing the total of 450 kilograms of the product. The border guards confiscated the salo worth some $776. Now the offender will be tried for attempted smuggling.
Gigolo steals money from his sweetheart to buy her a ring
A Ukrainian man from Mykolayiv wanted to give his girlfriend a romantic gift, but found himself with no money to afford it. So he stole the money from the lady.
In March a 37-year-old woman from Mykolayiv told the police that Hr 3,000 disappeared from her bank card. Aftera brief investigation the inspector discovered that the money was stolen by the 21-year-old boyfriend of the victim. The swindler spent part of the stolen money on gifts for his sweetheart. Among them was a ring for Women’s Day. Now the unlucky boyfriend faces a up to eight years in prison.
Russia accuses a Ukrainian oligarch of stealing children’s toys from sandbox
Russian TV channel “Rossiya-1” recently screened a documentary about the Ukrainian oligarch, ex-governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast Igor Kolomoisky. The movie, titled “The Way of Benia [a nickname of Kolomoisky]: From boiled jeans to large-scale drug trafficking,” claims that as a child Kolomoisky liked snatching toys from other kids.
“As a child, Igor came to the sandbox with his toys. Sitting in the sandbox, he put together all his toys and toys of other children and did not give them back. All the children would cry until the (Kolomoisky’s) mother would come and give the toys back to the children,” the authors of the film said.
Igor Kolomoisky
Two slaves and a land plot for every Ukrainian soldier
Early in 2015 Ukrainian Facebook users compiled a list of the fake news about Ukraine that appeared in Russian media in 2014. One of the most famous fakes is the claim by a Russian TV channel about “two slaves and a land plot” Ukrainians are supposed to get.
In November 2014 Russian state-owned TV station Perviy interviewed an unnamed citizen of Donetsk Oblast, who claimed that a soldier of Ukraine’s National Guard told him that each Ukrainian soldier was promised two slaves and a land lot as a reward for fighting the rebels in the east. This claim became one of the most famous memes associated with the war in Ukraine.
Woman faces charges for beating neighbor with geese
This accident happened in winter 2014 in Kharkiv Oblast, and the case is about to be brought to trial almost a year later. According to the local police, two women began arguing when one of them saw that another one’s geese got into her garden.
The woman then attacked her neighbor using two live geese as a weapon. The fight resulted in minor injuries for both women, and two dead geese. A forensic expert concluded that one of the victim’s injuries was caused by “a blunt solid object that could be parts of a goose’s body.” The attacker might be sentenced to community work or paying a fine.
Kyiv Post staff writer Victoria Petrenko can be reached at [email protected].
