Just before the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a Detektor journalist team visited Kyiv, where the fight against Russian media disinformation is considered part of the war, since that can be destructive, almost like weapons. Experts in the fight against disinformation warn that the intensification of Russian disinformation activity can be a precursor to more aggressive action by Russia, a fact which warrants caution in BiH.
Namely, when the Euromaidan protests took place in Kyiv in early 2014, the Russian government referred to them as a coup d’etat and the end of Ukrainian independence. Not long after, Moscow annexed Crimea and pro-Russian forces declared the eastern parts of Ukraine independent. At the time, even the most optimistic Ukrainian journalists started to look at the content of Russian media from a new perspective.
Disinformation – journalists were told during a visit to one of the most influential Ukrainian news outlets focused on exposing lies – is not just plain absence of truth but an opportunity to find out the unexpected truth.
“It was March 2014 when (Viktor) Yanukovich, our former president, left the country. Some strange events in Crimea just started. Before that moment, we didn’t pay attention to Russian disinformation,” said Ruslan Deynychenko, the director of StopFake, a fact-checking website uncovering pro-Russian disinformation. “We thought, who cares about Russian disinformation and what they show on their TV networks? But then we realized that was a huge mistake.”
According to Deynychenko, detailed investigations on disinformation may have some power to foresee future events. He referred specifically to March 2014 when Russian media was reporting on Ukrainian refugees in Russia despite, he said, there not being any.
Media narratives said that “thousands of Ukrainians were entering Russia and they wanted to escape from Ukraine, from neo-Nazis,” Deynychenko said. “When I started checking this information, I called the Russian Federal Immigration Service and asked how many Ukrainians asked for political asylum or how many refugees from Ukraine they have. The lady I spoke with said they had just five phone calls and there were no refugees.”
He said the official told him they had received an order to buy food, tents and supplies for refugees and they were carrying out the order.
For years, the Russian TV network RT has produced videos and articles promoting false narratives concerning the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). Detektor previously reported that Kremlin-controlled media such as RT often compare the murders of civilians and captives in Bucha near Kyiv with those in Srebrenica, calling both events faked by the West. Deniers of the war-time civilian deaths at the Markale market in Sarajevo also describe the massacre as fictional, in line with Moscow’s stance.
Russian media under the control of the Russian Ministry of Defense or those close to Vladimir Putin have recently intensified their focus on citizens of BiH and Serbia. These media narratives often accuse NATO of creating potential conflicts and present Russia as a factor for peace and stability.
Russian state media such as Sputnik have operated in Serbia for years and RT Balkans is available in BiH. In late 2023, RT announced the opening of a newsroom in BiH, Detektor writes.
E.Dz.
