Appearing on 60 Minutes Thursday evening, military expert and retired Colonel Yury Knutov opined that Azovstal is hiding secrets of global importance. He speculated that unveiling them would cause a ripple effect, including the possibility of impacting the re-election of French President Emmanuel Macron. His right-wing populist challenger, Marine Le Pen, has long been championed by Russian state media as the Kremlin’s preferred candidate. Even imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny stepped into France’s presidential battle via Twitter, urging French voters to back Macron and reject Le Pen, who is too closely linked to Russia.

During the broadcast of 60 Minutes, Knutov asserted: “Many experts say that likely, aside from members of Azov and Ukraine’s Armed Forces, NATO advisers are there [at Azovstal]—and very high-level ones. And if they end up in the hands of the Russian Army, this will cause an international scandal and have major political implications inside NATO countries. Political leaders, leaders of NATO countries, have claimed that none of their advisers are there and NATO has no part in this, other than providing secondary aid by sending weapons. Suddenly—if this will be proven to be a lie—Macron could be defeated in his election. A number of other politicians might be forced to resign.”