An emerging trend: EU sanctions against Russia
Russian media has shown growing interest this week in the forthcoming review of EU restrictive measures against Russia.
Pro-Kremlin disinformation outlets for instance eagerly reported about “Venice Parliament voting to recognize the Crimean peninsula as part of the Russian Federation and to lift EU sanctions imposed against Russia”. The story first appeared on the online version of Russian newspaper Izvestia (http://bit.ly/1TcmzzV) and quickly reached other websites such as vz.ru (http://bit.ly/22kgXUB), rbc.ru (http://bit.ly/1TPaOd5) or lenta.ru (http://bit.ly/1XpMweX). Although the council of the Italian region of Veneto indeed adopted a resolution calling to lift EU sanctions imposed on Russia and to recognize Crimea as part of the Russian Federation (http://bit.ly/20mlfcD), pro-Kremlin journalists failed to mention that the council has no authority over Italy’s foreign policy and the resolution on Crimea is not binding (http://bit.ly/1U5GYDK).
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In demonstrating the "waning support" for the extension of EU restrictive measures, rubaltic.ru recalls that in April 2016 the "majority of deputies of the French National Assembly" also voted to lift anti-Russian sanctions (http://bit.ly/1YLGGDy). The minor detail ignored by rubaltic.ru is that the proposal was supported by only 55 out of the 577 MPs in the lower house of the French Parliament (there were only 101 MPs present during the anti-sanction vote) (http://bit.ly/1STzB1V). Rubaltic.ru also speculates that one of the main reasons for the "growing anti-sanction sentiment in the EU" is "Europeans’ fear of strengthening US hegemony". Finding the link between the two issues is left to the reader’s imagination. (Image: Izvestiya)
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NATO: still high on the Kremlin's agenda
While in the previous issue of the Disinformation Review (http://bit.ly/1WK2Tnn) we noted that pro-Kremlin commentators had already started talking about the upcoming NATO Summit in July 2016, last week saw intensified attacks against the Alliance.
It has been repeated that the United States is "trying to encircle Russia", Washington is "preparing for war" (http://bit.ly/1NzNMu0) and the "militarisation of the Baltic region increases the likelihood of a military conflict" there (http://bit.ly/1TqEP3a). Additionally, several Russian and Czech disinformation outlets recycled the well-known narrative, according to which the US anti-missile system in Eastern Europe is being built with the aim of threatening Russia (http://bit.ly/1s2K81X, http://bit.ly/1U7aOrv, http://bit.ly/1qCDUEW).
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The latest evidence pro-Kremlin media presented to prove NATO's hostility towards Russia is an interview Radio Polsha is claimed to have had with Zbigniew Brzezinski, former US National Security Advisor. Brzezinski allegedly stated that "Moscow does not respect NATO" and also called for a "harder approach towards Russian provocations" even by "buzzing Russian military aircrafts and warships" (http://bit.ly/1XmHBLQ). Just one problem – it was the wrong Brzezinski. In reality, Radio Polsha interviewed US security expert, Ian Brzezinski, who is currently a Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council's Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security (http://bit.ly/1ONJsb3). (Image: Vz.ru)
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Nazis, Nazis everywhere
A frequently used formula by pro-Kremlin journalists and commentators is labelling Russia's adversaries as "radicals", "nationalists", "Nazis" or "fascists". The latest Disinformation Review table includes several examples of the aforementioned technique, demonstrating its highly versatile nature.
The term "Ukro-fascist", which had practically become an epithet of the Ukrainian government in the Kremlin's narrative, was repeated in a recent disinformation video published by the so-called "South-East Information-Analytical Agency" (http://bit.ly/1VeTvHA). In the video it was also reported that nationalist Turkish mercenaries (the so-called Grey Wolves) help the Ukrainian army in Donbass.
As already mentioned above, another victim of the pro-Kremlin media's smear campaign is Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's former security advisor. Brzezinski was called a "fascist leader" by Georgian newspaper Asaval Dasavali. According to the newspaper, his motto is: "we destroyed the Soviet Union, now it is the turn of Orthodoxy."
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The possibilities are truly inexhaustible: prisonplanet.com for instance labeled the European Union "a Nazi brainchild" (http://bit.ly/1YOpMUI), while the Bulgarian bultimes.com declared that Jamala won Eurovision 2016 with a "fascist song" (http://bit.ly/27DjLjE). (Image: Bulgarian Times).
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