Minister Chris Philp
(Picture: PA Archive)A Government minister has said he would be “in the streets” defending Croydon if the Russians attacked.
Croydon South MP Chris Philp said Ukrainians were bravely defending their homes and hospitals from Vladimir Putin’s “barbaric” invasion as he accused the Kremlin of sharing disinformation online to create a “false narrative” that the country is preparing to use chemical weapons.
“The Ukrainian army and Ukrainian citizens have every right to defend their homeland, to defend their cities and their towns, to defend their hospitals against this aggression by Russia,” he told Sky News.
“And to be honest, if somebody was attacking Croydon, the place I represent, if somebody was bombing Croydon University Hospital, I tell you what, I would be in the streets defending my hospital. I’d be in the streets defending my town and my neighbours as Ukrainians are quite rightly doing.”
Internal emails from Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta show that terms such as “death to the Russian invaders” will now be allowed along with posts which call for the death of the Russian President and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
The Technology Minister said the Kremlin had blocked many social media sites, including Facebook, to publish its own propaganda unchallenged and stop the Russian people finding out the truth about the war.
He added: “We have seen in the last 24 or 48 hours what appear to be bits of disinformation published by Russian state outlets, including in fact the Russian embassy here in London, putting on things like Twitter information that appear to be creating a false narrative that Ukrainians are considering using chemical weapons, which is clearly ridiculous and totally untrue.
“Sometimes they do that in preparation but I hope that’s not what they’re contemplating, the use of chemical weapons in any theatre of war, certainly one where there are lots of civilians, is totally unacceptable.
“I’m not going to talk about intelligence but using chemical weapons in an area which has lots of civilians would be a barbaric thing to do and I would say to Vladimir Putin and the Russian regime not to cross that line, not do that to Ukrainian civilians.”
