Sputnik: There were reports that you pranked the American journalist into thinking that he had the support of the Ukrainian official. Is that true?
Alexei 'Lexus' Stolyarov: Yes, that’s definitely true. We talked when he was in the office in his media and he left us his phone number and he was not surprised by that call, so we did that.
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Sputnik: What prompted you to do this?
Alexei 'Lexus' Stolyarov: So, I saw some Russian headlines and it looked strange how journalists advised to bomb a foreign government and I know that there are some journalists in Russia who made such claims, but I am sure it is unacceptable and now I see that many officials in Ukraine support his position, particularly some Nazis and some deputies in “Virhovnaya Rada.”
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Also I have some personal reason because that journalist wrote about my friend who died last month and he wrote that he was killed by Putin; that’s another reason why I decided to talk to him, its journalist Maxim Borodin, who died in Yekaterinburg.
Sputnik: Explain to us how you first read about this when you first came across this story and the reaction when you found out that there was an American journalist who was publically calling for such actions and not people of government or military. It is outrageous, this kind of a reaction from a journalist, isn’t it?
Alexei 'Lexus' Stolyarov: Yes, absolutely. I think that a journalist, of course, can have his own opinion but he should stay a journalist. So of course he can’t express his opinion if he wants to bomb a peaceful population, especially how it happened in the media.
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Sputnik: Explain to us a little bit about this prank, how did it go? What did you say? Give us a background to the actual incident; I am sure our Sputnik listeners will be interested to hear your story.
Alexei 'Lexus' Stolyarov: Well we sent him an email and requested to talk to him and he said that he was flexible. He left us his phone number, we called and we spoke for about fifteen minutes. We spoke about that the Ukrainian government wants to give him some award in the field of journalism. He agreed and he was surprised. He said that he would be happy if the minister of foreign affairs of Ukraine would come to Washington and drink some beer with him. He also said that he could advise to bomb south-east area of Ukraine.
In our conversation he also said that he had a father from the Department of State and that his mother is from England. His father texted him a message, saying, “Kick those Russians in the belly.”
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