# US-Ukraine ‘biolabs story’ likely authored by Russian intelligence


CyberBerkut, a hacking group that was [identified](https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/reckless-campaign-cyber-attacks-russian-military-intelligence-service-exposed) by UK intelligence as a front for the GRU (an arm of Russian intelligence), [published](https://web.archive.org/web/20170829041837/https://cyber-berkut.org/en/) the false Ukrainian bioweapons story in 2017. That wasn’t the true beginning of it, though.

A similar story involving Georgia, which Russia [invaded in 2008](https://hoaxlines.org/putins-approval-and-aggression-abroad/timeline-of-putin-approval-and-aggression-toward-other-countries#beea8bceb76d41b0bed94a5bba00a313), dates back to [2011](https://web.archive.org/web/20220323122300/https://jonis-geonews.livejournal.com/38424.html). Milton Leitenberg, a [long-time researcher](https://cissm.umd.edu/our-community/faculty-staff/milton-leitenberg) at the Center for International and Security Studies and [the author](https://armscontrolcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/M-Leitenbergs-full-Army-War-College-Book.pdf) of “Assessing the Biological Weapons and Bioterrorism Threat,” has written about the beginnings of this tale.

Leitenberg [described](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/citedby/10.1080/10736700.2021.1964755?scroll=top&needAccess=true) an article from 2011 [written by](https://web.archive.org/web/20220323122300/https://jonis-geonews.livejournal.com/38424.html) “a Georgian journalist, Joni Simonishvili, in Geonews, a Russian proxy disinformation.” Simonishvili “turned to the Lugar Center in earnest.” The Nunn-Lugar Center was a real laboratory in Georgia. That’s where reality ends in this story.

By [2013](https://archive.ph/Cuxlu), the Georgian story had fully formed. Then, in 2017, the story shifted toward Ukraine in a detailed story that borrowed from successful campaigns in the past, like [Operation Denver](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tR_6dibpDfo).

- The story remains remarkably unchanged from 2017 to 2022, which may reflect its relatively dormant state after initial attention in 2018. Stories generally [evolve](https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3359229).
- Leitenberg [said](https://cissm.umd.edu/sites/default/files/2019-12/Russian%20Disinformation%20on%20Biological%20Weapons%20in%20the%20Putin%20PPT%2011%20Dec%202019.pdf) of the Ukrainian “biolabs” narrative, “This is ALL KGB/FSB work.”

In August 2017, Cyber Berkut published the story. Days later, an article [in TASS](https://web.archive.org/web/20170826162732/http://tass.com/world/961928), a Russian state-controlled news outlet, covered it. [Later](https://archive.ph/Jrse2)in early 2018, the [FSB-controlled](https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0126#:~:text=The%20FSB%20directly,presidential%20election%20cycle) (FSB is another arm of Russian intelligence) outlet South Front ran the story under the name [Dilyana Gaytandzhieva](https://mythdetector.ge/en/profiles/gaytandzhieva-dilyana/).

Gaytandzhieva was the credited author of an investigative-style version of the GRU [story](https://archive.ph/Jrse2) from 2017. She also [promoted](https://archive.ph/wip/6GSO7) [the same](https://archive.ph/EFvj1) false claims in 2022, connecting the 2022 narrative to the claims made in 2017 and 2018. Gaytandzhieva identified the 2022 Ukrainian biolabs story as one and the same as the [2018 article](https://archive.ph/oxMJB). Eliminating doubt about whether it was the same story, [she linked](https://archive.ph/6GSO7) the [2018 version](https://archive.ph/oxMJB) in [a tweet](https://archive.ph/6GSO7) referencing Ukrainian biolabs in early 2022.

- [Gaytandzhieva](https://mythdetector.ge/en/profiles/gaytandzhieva-dilyana/) appeared on Chinese [state media](https://archive.ph/20220319064809/https://twitter.com/CGTN_Dialogue/status/1504411657723731969) related to her false biological weapons claims. Notably, China [promoted](https://hoaxlines.org/2022/russia-changed-its-story-about-bioweapons-then-russia-and-china-opened-the-disinformation-floodgates) false claims alongside the Russian state in early March 2022.

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[^1]: FSB is another arm of Russian intelligence