Government failing to control narrative about immigrants, spokesman for Ukrainians in Ireland says

Vivienne Clarke

A spokesperson for the Ukrainian community in Ireland has spoken of the fear and terror experienced by families in the Citywest complex during the violent incidents on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.

Families were told not to leave their rooms; they were terrified, and they did not know how long it was going to last, Anatoily Primakov told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland.

“People don't know when it's going to happen again because this isn't the first time that (the) Ukrainian community or the immigrant community overall in Ireland has been targeted in recent years.”

It had been frightening for people going to work or bringing their children to school, Mr Primakov said.

“You're dealing with families who have fled war. So you're dealing with families and people who have already suffered, who have come to Ireland seeking refuge and safety, and instead they're finding this.”

Mr Primakov said that what was happening in Citywest, Dublin and Ireland was not isolated; it was happening throughout Europe.

“There is a growing anti-immigrant sentiment across the world that is being fuelled by online disinformation. There's the previous guest on your show mentioning the coordinating campaigns to stir up aid and agitators to target immigrants, you know, many of those being based abroad.

“Those professionals, grifters, who propagate hate and violence against immigrants, right? So this has been happening for a while, and what we can see is that it's once again, I suppose, that failure of the government to get ahead of the narrative, to control the narrative in terms of what is happening with the immigrant communities in Ireland, and to show people what is being done, what is the strategy with immigrants in Ireland?

"Because there is an information vacuum, it can be easily seized upon by these bad actors, by these malicious actors online, and then it creates conspiracy theories, it creates this climate where these agitators can then operate and then at least to the situations that we would have witnessed over the last couple of days.”