A Russian state TV host recently said Ukrainian children should be drowned and burned in huts, leading to his suspension from the network.
“Just drown those children,” said RT presenter Anton Krasovsky, adding with a smile, “Shove them right into those huts and burn them up.”
He was interviewing science fiction author Sergey Lukyanenko, who said when he visited Ukraine in 1980, children told him the country was “occupied by” Russians and, if not for that, “they would live like France.”
Krasovsky said “whoever says” Russians occupied them, “you throw them in the river with a strong undercurrent.”
After the author referenced a report that Russia had given its soldiers Viagra to rape Ukrainian women, Krasovsky joked that the erectile dysfunction medication helped soldiers to “rape Ukrainian grannies.”
“Those grannies would spend their burial savings to get raped by Russian soldiers,” he said.
He later said Ukraine is “not supposed to exist at all,” asking the author if the country should “remain on the map of the world.”
RT itself reported that the network’s editor-in-chief suspended Krasovsky’s contract and called his words “wild and disgusting” in a statement on behalf of all network staff.
The presenter’s “sharp statements” are also being probed by Russia’s state Investigative Committee, according to Reuters.
In a tweet, Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba called for a global ban on Russian state-controlled RT. He labeled Krasovsky’s rant “aggressive genocide incitement” and said Krasovsky would be “put on trial for it.”
RT and Sputnik, another state media agency, were banned in the European Union early in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, now in its eighth month, as reported by Bloomberg.
Krasovsky apologized on Monday, saying he got “carried away” and was “really embarrassed.”
The presenter emerged in Russia as an LGBT activist after coming out on-air in 2013, according to RT. He has been a pro-war voice since the invasion and was sanctioned in its early days by the European Union, according to Euractiv.
