In the next article to follow, starting with Yurash as the first example, I'll show you how all these volunteer experts including Higgins get paid. The article will further cement and establish the relationships between Bellingcat, Weisburd, Watts and other intel and news headline providers with each other as well as their employers.
For now, the admission made by the Ukrainian Information Ministry and Aric Toler will have to be enough.
"September 29 and November 19, 2015 in Kharkov Crisis Infocentre Information Policy Advisor to the Minister Dmitry Zolotukhin conducted training on the search for information in open sources for journalists and bloggers in Kharkov.
In addition, already 21 November Dmitry Zolotukhin met with his US counterpart, team representative Bellingcat Arik Toler, who conducted a similar training for journalists in Kyiv on the invitation of Media Development Foundation. They also discussed the possibility of holding a conference in Kiev on thematic instruments OSINT-use techniques in the modern media."
One of the Media Development Center's sponsors is NATO. It is a project of the US Embassy in Kiev because of the association with the embassy's diplomatic paper, the Kyiv Post.
If that isn't enough, let's see how close Bellingcat's Aric Toler views the relationship.
According to both Information Policy Advisor Dmitry Zolotukhin and Toler, they are partners. Eric Toler and Eliot Higgins(Bellingcat), along with Aaron Weisburd, Clint Watts, and Joel Harding have been working with the same Ukrainian Information Ministry that started the "Mytorovyets" or Peacekeeper website.
They help the SBU geo-locate people in Ukraine. As shown above, they also train people to geo-locate anyone considered anti-Maidan or anti-nationalist in Ukraine. They didn't disappoint.
The Ministry of Information has been targeting journalists in Ukraine by geo-location for arrest or murder. The first public case was the Ukrainian journalist Oleh Buzina in May 2015. This was one month after my first article about Peacekeeper showed clearly that this was its purpose.
I think this pretty well sums up how independent Bellingcat's investigation has been. To add insult to injury, Higgins and Toler work directly with previously identified Ukrainian Intelligence hackers and Pravy Sektor members (ultra-nationalist Ukrainians) to get Bellingcat "independent research" information.
InformNapalm and its hackers are Ukrainian Intel agents working for the Information Ministry. In their own words- The main activities of the project are collecting and analyzing OSINT-information, found in open sources, including social networks. InformNapalm's investigation of 53rd Artillery Brigade commander colonel Sergei Muchkayev, suspected of killing the MH17 passengers, was used in the report of the Bellingcat research team.
Who was the information source for independent researchers at Bellingcat? Dimitry Yarosh's best friend, Valentyn Nalivaychenko was one of them. In the spring of 2014, he replaced SBU(Ukraine's Security Service) personnel with ultra-nationalists because they had the right ideology. Another was Anton Gerashchenko who is responsible for persecuting the press in Ukraine.
"In few days and hours after the crash of MH17 Ukrainian officials widely publicly discussed all that data (except the photo of "Paris Match") anonymously downloaded by someone to social nets. For example on July 17 Gerashchenko (The ministry of internal affairs) showed the photo of Buk at Torez; on July 18 Avakov (The ministry of internal affairs) showed the video of Buk at Luhansk; also on July 18 Nalivaychenko (the chief of Ukrainian security service) showed the video of Buk at Snizhne, and on July 19 Vitaliy Naida (Ukrainian security service) showed shot fragment of video frame (not the video itself) from Zugres."
Under the best circumstances, Bellingcat's research can only be seen as a Ukrainian Intelligence production. If neither Higgins or Toler were actively engaged with Ukrainian operations on the many levels that they are, their source material is still very tainted. When all your research material comes from a party under investigation, you are no longer a neutral party. You can't pee in a blood sample and call it evidence. Are Higgins and Toler credible? You decide.
Max van der Werff has become a go-to resource for understanding information about MH-17. I have spoken at length with Max and his fellow researchers. This linked article shows the strength of research these REAL volunteers have brought to the MH-17 investigation. I had to ask Max the great who-dun-it question. His response was after thousands of hours of research, he didn't know. Too many people were withholding information and remaining uncooperative on all sides.
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