Infoguerre

On 16 December 2022, the Moldovan Commission for Emergency Situations suspended the broadcasting licenses of six pro-Russian TV stations. They are still active, however, through web platforms, social media or, in some cases, on other TV channels. The decision was taken ‘in order to protect the national information space and prevent the risk of misinformation by spreading false information or attempts to manipulate public opinion, based on the list of individuals and legal entities subject to international sanctions’. […]

On 8 February, Seymour Hersh self-published an article alleging that the US and Norway were behind the sabotage of the two Nord Stream pipelines last year. The problem with Hersh’s story is that his central claim relies on a single anonymous source claiming expert knowledge of all aspects of the matter. This one source supposedly knew about everything… Naturally, Hersh’s story meant a field day for the pro-Kremlin information manipulation ecosystem. The prime time Russian state TV news programme, an agitprop beacon, dedicated a long report to the story on Sunday 12 February. […]

History in Russia is a minefield. A popular saying in the Soviet Union went like this: ‘We know what the future will bring. It’s much more difficult to predict what the past will look like.’ Telling the truth about what happened in Mariupol or Bucha last year can land you several years in jail. Ilya Yasin was sentenced 8.5 years for telling the truth about atrocities committed by Russian forces in Bucha. Alexander Nevzorov (in absentia) received an 8-year sentence for repeating what most of the world recognises: Russian forces bombed a maternity in Mariupol. […]

Church on fire! A false news story shows how lies and manipulation are made in the Kremlin ecosystem and spread with dramatic effect. We investigate the story.
Try to imagine your feelings if you saw your church on fire in the evening TV news. Then imagine your reaction if told that a despicable neighbour had carried out the arson attack upon the mayor’s instructions. This small but provocative question captures the desired effect most propagandists try to ignite. […]

The very first EEAS FIMI report gives us valuable information about the tactics, techniques, and procedures that Russia and China use to manipulate information domain and their audiences. The report sets up a common framework for countering foreign threat actors. It also provides us with a number of juicy details on threat actor behaviour. In this piece, EUvsDiSiNFO team concentrate on the pro-Kremlin ecosystem. […]

This first edition of the report on Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference threats is informed by the work of the European External Action Service’s (EEAS) Stratcom division8 in 2022. It is the first of its kind and can be seen as a pilot project. […]

The Kremlin disinformation machinery continues to fabricate make-believe stories about biolabs in Ukraine and bioweapons testing, while tossing its tentacles near and far. This week it appears that Kremlin propagandists were yet again tasked by their masters’ voices to celebrate a biolabs and bioweapons theme week. We also witnessed the pro-Kremlin disinformation ecosystem targeting Ukrainian refugees in EU countries. […]

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya (in absentia) and Ales Bialiatski are on trial in Belarus as methods to suppress citizens’ civic and political engagement are becoming ever crueller. In Belarus, police brutality, abuse of the court system, and the manipulation and repression of the public space is rife, silencing individual voices. The regime is using new ‘legal’ instruments of coercion to make a grim reality even grimmer […]

The Kremlin’s attempts to justify the invasion of Ukraine by equating it the Nazi regime trivialise the memory of millions of victims of Nazism. According to historians from universities in Berlin and Munich, this narrative has also served as a ready-made excuse to escalate violence to World War II levels and lowered resistance to committing war crimes in Ukraine. At the same time, the imperatives of war propaganda within Russia have erased any limits for what is acceptable on Russian TV. […]

As Western countries commit to sending more heavy weapons to Ukraine for its legitimate self-defence (as enshrined in Article 51 of the UN charter), the Kremlin spins it as leading to ‘further escalation’, or as efforts made in vain because Ukraine’s defeat is certain. As if Russia’s invasion is the escalation that has endangered peaceful co-existence between Ukraine and Russia. The same pro-Kremlin outlets also dismissed the 10th EU sanctions package currently under discussion as having no impact on Russia and European deliberation on the issue as a sign of disunity. […]