![]() NAFO later compared the footage, which included her voice and home décor, with Donbas Devushka's postings. She appeared on an episode of the Aquarium Co-op Podcast, an online show about fish tanks, in June 2020. Ms Bils’s enthusiasm for tropical fish was to prove her undoing. Her reputation among tropical fish enthusiasts was good, with the community regarding her as well-informed and trustworthy. She also divided her time between serving in the Navy and running Cascade Aquatics, a business selling tropical fish and imported food from Poland. The reality, however, was that she was embroiled in a court case with her husband of three years in Oak Harbor, Washington. She claimed that back then Kyiv was killing people in Luhansk where the population is 53 per cent Ukrainian and 47 per cent Russian. Ms Bils told her followers that in 2014 she had been travelling between the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and Luhansk in Ukraine. ![]() The discrepancies between her social media persona and reality are striking. Enthusiasm for tropical fish to prove her undoingĪccording to public information records she was born in Voorhees, New Jersey and enlisted with the US Navy in November 2009. In one profile, Ms Bils says she is studying at the online School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University. She also created a YouTube channel last July and then another Twitter account, under the handle also, at least on social media, claims to be an expert on geopolitics and history. Ms Bils has been unmasked by the North Atlantic Fella Organisation – NAFO – which devotes itself to raising funds for Ukraine and combating disinformation.Īs Donbas Devushka, she posted photographs on Twitter, giving her first name as Mila. Several of her Twitter accounts were suspended, but undaunted she built up Donbas Devushka’s disinformation empire – branded "girl and cat against the whole world". Using assorted pseudonyms including CheburekiVibes, MeatballSubZero, YuGopnik, GhostofLugansk, she has amassed 135,000 subscribers to her podcast on which she broadcasts with a cod “Russian” accent. “I obviously know the gravity of top-secret classified materials. However, Ms Bils denied being personally involved. She built up a sizeable social media following on Twitter, Telegram and YouTube, emerging as the face of Russian propaganda, raising money and selling merchandise for the Russian cause.Īnd according to the Wall Street Journal, the Donbas Devushka Telegram account played a key role in the dissemination of intelligence documents allegedly leaked by Airman First Class Jack Teixeira, by reposting them onto an array of obscure online chat rooms. To her devoted followers, “Donbas Devushka” – or Donbas Girl – is a Russian Jew from the occupied Ukrainian city of Luhansk, who has faithfully broadcast Kremlin propaganda for months.īut in reality, she is Sarah Bils, a 37-year-old divorcee from New Jersey and a US Navy veteran who served as an aviation electronics technician at Whitby Island in Washington State.ĭonbas Devushka emerged after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February last year.
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