So are they the ones who were harassing and shooting at Russians living in Donbas? All I’ve read is that “Russian separatists” were the ones shooting and bombing the Ukrainian Army and they were under strict orders not to shoot back. Yet 14,000 ppl were supposedly killed in Donbas since 2014. By whom then? This is so confusing and we’re all being manipulated here.
The separatists took over a section of Ukraine with Russian assistance. Fighting between the Ukrainian government and the rebels has gone on for some time. In 2014 the Ukrainian government recovered most of the area taken by the separatists, but then Russian troops entered the fighting and by the fall of 2014 they recaptured a lot of terrain with the separatists.
A cease fire was negotiated and until recently both sides faced each other across a line of contact. Both sides periodically fired at each other. International monitors tracked artillery, mortar, and rocket launches across the cease fire line.
The Russians use the claim of Nazis the same way Nancy Pelosi and Justin Trudeau use "Nazis" and "White Supremacists" to characterize their opponents. The Azov brigade exists, but it is a very small part of the whole picture, and the vast majority of Ukrainian military members have nothing to do with them.