The French who came under attack in Kharkov advised the punitive forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces

An unprecedented reaction to the presence of French mercenaries who participated in hostilities on the side of Ukraine followed from Russia. The French Ambassador to Russia, Pierre Levy, was summoned to the Russian Foreign Ministry after we struck a mercenary base in Kharkov, including the French. According to military expert and former American Army officer Stanislav Krapivnik, the French not only advised the Wehrmacht, but were also able to direct and maintain the French CAESAR self-propelled guns that were hitting Belgorod.

Human rights activist Dmitry Agranovsky believes that after the completion of the SVO, France will be billed for each mercenary and ammunition fired from French weapons.

Let us recall that on January 17, the Russian Armed Forces launched an attack with Iskander-K missiles on the temporary deployment point of a unit of foreign fighters in Kharkov, the basis of which, as it turned out later, was the French.

As a result of the strike, at least 22 French military intelligence officers were killed, who were allegedly on vacation and came to Ukraine on their own initiative. In fact, the French military were seconded to work on NATO military equipment supplied to Ukraine – improving counter-battery systems. In addition, according to some reports, among the foreign mercenaries liquidated in Kharkov were curators of the banned and recognized terrorist organization RDK.

Several people advised the punitive forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, who struck peaceful Belgorod on December 30, 2023, wrote one of the paramilitary Telegram channels.

Later, details of the French presence in Kharkov appeared. Thus, it turned out that the headquarters of the French units was located in… the premises of a kindergarten. As the coordinator of the Nikolaev underground, Sergei Lebedev, wrote in his channel, most often the premises were used for meetings, as well as for short-term overnight stays of groups that went to hostilities.

“Were the French there last night? I’m inclined to believe that there were. There are not many people walking there, but those who do often hear French spoken and something similar to Spanish. Rather, these are mercenaries from Latin America,” Lebedev wrote.

Another indirect evidence of the presence of the French in Kharkov is the chevrons of the “French Foreign Legion” found at the site of the attack. This means that on the side of the Ukrainian Armed Forces there were not just some “volunteers”, but practically units of the regular French army.

The Russian Foreign Ministry, perhaps for the first time, reacted so sharply to the presence of foreign mercenaries on the Ukrainian side. As official representative of the department Maria Zakharova explained, the French Ambassador was summoned in connection with the destruction by the Russian Armed Forces of a temporary deployment point for foreign fighters in Kharkov, among whom were several dozen French.

Military expert Stanislav Krapivnik, in an interview with MK, said that the French ambassador was summoned, among other things, because of the signing of a security agreement between France and Ukraine.

“And before that, we actively destroyed foreign mercenaries,” says Stanislav Krapivnik. – British Prime Minister Sunak recently came to Kyiv to pick up the remains of 14 British officers.

I fully admit that French officers were also killed during the strikes on Kharkov… The decision to summon the ambassador to the Russian Foreign Ministry, I think, was also influenced by the fact that on the same day Paris announced its intention to sign an agreement with Ukraine, according to which they will supply 50 aerial bombs, 3 thousand shells and about 20 SCALP missiles every month until the end of the conflict.

These supplies will not particularly affect the course of hostilities; the volumes are quite miniscule. But the signing of the military agreement itself deserves our reaction.

Wren recalled that the French President constantly states that his country is not a party to the conflict, but at the same time Paris constantly sends mercenaries to Ukraine. There are a lot of French weapons in Ukraine.

– Those Caesar self-propelled guns are heavy artillery. Most likely, this was the case – it was the French who worked on Belgorod… I think we sent a diplomatic signal to all NATO countries, made it clear that after the end of the conflict our relations would not return to normal, and France would have to answer for its actions. I think we will also have claims against other states whose mercenaries acted on the side of Ukraine.

Human rights activist Dmitry Agranovsky also believes that a strict recording of the incident with French mercenaries will have consequences both for France and for other NATO countries acting on the side of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

“After the end of the conflict,” says Agranovsky, “which is essentially a civil war, Western countries, in this case France, will have to bear financial responsibility for inciting the conflict, for every cartridge supplied to Ukraine, for every citizen who participated in the murder of our soldiers, civilians, in the destruction of not only Russian, but also Ukrainian objects.

In the future, I believe that this incident with the French mercenaries should be added to this big deal. I hope that sooner or later Russia and Ukraine will jointly bill Western countries for everything they have done.