Infoguerre

Russian state-affiliated disinformation outlets try to ‘borrow’ credibility by impersonating legitimate media and government institutions. It is a deceitful information manipulation tactic to spread pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives. The EU took action and now they are exposed. On 13 June, the French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Catherine Colonna, issued a statement revealing a digital information manipulation campaign against France involving Russian actors, including Russian government entities spreading disinformation. This revelation was based on a thorough investigation and report by the French agency to fight foreign disinformation (VIGINUM) that sits within the General Secretariat for Defence and National Security (SGDSN) of France. […]

Last week we covered in detail the new uptick in the Kremlin’s disinformation and manipulation concerning Moscow’s decision to effectively terminate the Black Sea Grain Initiative – BSGI. Claims included that Western countries were blackmailing Russia by exploiting the deal for commercial gain while diverting the grain away from poor countries, that the Ukraine and its Western partners were using civilian ships to smuggle arms into Ukraine, and similar nonsense. Since last week, things have gone from bad to worse, and not only on the ground and at sea. We have also seen the Kremlin stoop to new lows for lying when trying to deflect responsibility for its actions. […]

The Srebrenica Memorial Center published the report “Denial of the Srebrenica genocide in the Russian media”. It shows how prominent Russian mass media outlets, as well as bloggers, commentators, and political figures denied the historical facts about the genocide in Srebrenica to strengthen their denial narratives about Russia’s crimes. The main example analysed by the report is related Bucha. “The impact of such denial narratives can be significant, as they shape public opinion and foster scepticism towards well-established historical truths. It is crucial to recognize and critically assess the sources of information, particularly in cases where denialism is employed to distort historical events“. […]

On 24 July, in preperation of the Russia-Africa Summit, the Kremlin published an article, allegedly penned by none other than the liar-in-chief Vladimir Putin himself, pondering joining Russian and African ‘efforts for peace, progress and a successful future’. Besides the usual anti-Western rhetoric, this article was also a prime example on an information manipulation tactic we like to call ‘Kremlin Newspeak’. In fact, we have already published several volumes on EuvsDisinfo, translating the Kremlin and its master’s newspeak for the world to see. […]

Russia failed in their blackmail and now holds the world’s poor hostage, while spouting lies in all directions. A quick glance at the mirror would uncover the real culprit. Only hours after Russia officially withdrew from the Black Sea Grain Initiative (BSGI), Russia attacked the harbour infrastructure in Ukraine’s southern port city of Odesa, the main hub for Ukrainian grain exports to the world. In its usual manipulative manner, Russian official communi-cations framed the attacks as retaliation. Never-theless, as EUvsDiSiNFO has covered before, strikes on Odesa, Mykolaiv, and most recently, Chorno-morsk, were just the latest in a string of Russian systemic attacks against Ukraine’s ability to export its grain, severely affecting global food security. […]

Less than three weeks after Prigozhin and his Wagnerite lackeys marched toward Moscow with rebellious if somewhat unclear demands, the pro-Kremlin disinformation ecosystem is still careful to tiptoe around this issue. When confronted with uncomfortable reality, Kremlin disinformation outlets often resort to one of their go-to information manipu-lation tactics – distraction. Kremlin disinformation outlets seek to distract from the Ukrainian counter-offensive and the aftermath of Prigozhin’s rebellion, setting their sights on the NATO Summit in Vilnius and the US decision to deliver cluster munitions to Ukraine. Their aim is clear – divide Ukraine’s allies and distract from the trouble brewing at home. […]

Ever since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February, Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe, has been a hot-button issue. Understandably so. Given Russia’s track record of sabotage and subversion, it is not far-fetched to believe that it might deliberately target the power plant, which would bring about a major humanitarian catastrophe. Destroying the Kakhovka dam did not really mitigate those fears. Neither did recent signals that Russia is reducing its presence in Zaporizhzhia. Moreover, last week, Ukrainian intelligence publicly claimed that Russia is planning a terrorist strike against the plant both to unleash critical levels of radiation and to pin the blame on Ukraine. Since Russia’s aggression against Ukraine in 2014 and the subsequent decision by EU leaders to set up the East StratCom Task Force, EUvsDiSiNFO has been 8 years long countering Russian disinformation and information manipulation… […]

While Russia’s war against Ukraine is ongoing, it has been an extraordinary few days inside Russia, with the weekend mutiny by Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Wagner force. In this edition of the Disinformation Review, we take a closer look at how developments were labelled, documented, and spun as they unfolded. We now see the Russian disinformation machinery re-writing the mutiny’s chronology and re-branding its events. In the early phase on Friday-Saturday, Russian state-controlled outlets had difficulty taking a firm stance on Prigozhin. Instead, they just reported on events before switching to over-the-top loyalty towards Putin. So how has the campaign to restore Putin’s authority, smear Prigozhin, and regain a firmer control of the public space developed? What happens when a fragile political system shows cracks? […]

A delegation of African leaders, hailing from Senegal, Egypt, Zambia, Uganda, Congo Republic, Comoros, and South Africa, embarked on a mission to Kyiv and St. Petersburg, seeking ways to find and agree on ‘confidence building measures’ between Ukraine and Russia. An opportunity for Putin to interrupt the African delegation’s presentation and embark on a lie-filled and mind-numbing monologue… […]

It has been more than 15 months since Russia launched its 3-day “special military operation” against Ukraine. As Russia’s war keeps dragging on with no victory in sight for the invaders, the Kremlin needs to keep coming up with new excuses on why nothing is going to plan… One of the juicier claims that recently came out of the pro-Kremlin disinformation eco-system is an idea that Ukrainian soldiers use drugs that turn them into modern-day berserkers: “The substances made the soldiers imperceptible to small arms bullet strikes. A bullet knocks him off his feet, but he gets up and carries on walking like there is no pain – so powerful are the drugs”. This came hand-in-hand with a claim that Ukraine has been running military pharmaceutical programs and developing psychoactive drugs for combat use for years. […]