Russian Informational Co-Aggression? Ukraine-Related Disinformation in Belarusian Pro-Government Telegram Channels

This dataset documents over 400 instances of Ukraine-related disinformation identified in more than 80,000 posts published in 2024 across seven major pro-government Telegram channels in Belarus. These channels include: Belorusskiy silovik, Obyektivnyy Yevgen, Zholtyye slivy Premium, Eto drugoye, Zapadnyye zaychiki, BelVPO, and Nevolfovich. Data collection was guided by the definition of disinformation outlined in the Information Disorder report (Wardle & Derakhshan, 2017), which defines disinformation as "information that is false and deliberately created to harm a person, social group, organization, or country" (p. 20). The identified cases were grouped into recurring thematic clusters that emerged during the analysis. Prominent themes include: "Ukraine's military draft," "Negative public opinion on Ukraine-related matters in Western countries," "Corruption." Note that the dataset focuses exclusively on discrete and verifiable claims about specific facts, events, or actions. More general (diffuse) statements without a clearly identifiable factual basis were not added to the analysis, even when they could be interpreted as misleading; such statements include: evaluative assertions, rhetorical expressions, or derogatory remarks. The dataset was compiled by four trained and experienced coders and a team lead. Initially, resource constraints limited the analysis to five Telegram channels. In July 2024, however, two additional sources — Belorusskiy silovik and BelVPO — were added. Each of the seven channels had an estimated audience of at least around 20,000 subscribers in 2024. New in this version (1.1): The new version contains the link to the published journal article based on the data (in Media, War & Conflict) and adds detail to how instances of disinformation were defined (see above and in the updated documentation file).