In July 2014, during the war in Donbass, Kurginyan accused Igor Girkin (Strelkov) of surrendering Sloviansk and not keeping his oath to die in Sloviansk. Kurginyan believes that surrendering Sloviansk is a war crime, and Strelkov should be responsible for that. Donbass insurgent Pavel Gubarev whacked Kurginyan in the face, and another Donbass insurgent Alexander Borodai promised to shoot Kurginyan to death. According to Aleksandr Dugin, Kurginyan is a traitor and is working for oligarchs, Yukos and Israel. In the words of journalist Alexander Nevzorov, if we had had Kurginyan and Dugin instead of Putin, "there would have been hell for all of us to pay, they would have unleashed a European and World War without a shadow of a doubt, without considering consequences at all". But "Dugin and Kurginyan do not have the slightest impact on what is going on in the Kremlin and do not even get coaching there".