Experts met Tuesday to discuss with the Helsinki Commission Russia’s extensive and apparently effective propaganda campaign regarding Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Peter Pomerantsev, who was born in Kyiv but worked as a journalist in Russia for 10 years, spoke about Russian President Vladimir Putin
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“He’s relying on their feeling that, in the words of his own spin doctors, there is no alternative to Putin,” said Pomerantsev, who is now a fellow at Johns Hopkins University’s Agora Institute, referring to the Russian People.
“And that’s why he does so much to control the information environment, emotions and perceptions at home. That’s why breaking through the new Iron Curtain is a challenge that is both psychological and technical,” he added.
Also during the hearing, Fatima Tlis, a Russian-American journalist, spoke about the variety of tactics Russia uses against national and international groups.
“The Kremlin’s disinformation operations are coordinated. They use traditional media, social media platforms and cyberattacks to bombard people inside and outside Russia with specific messages, each intended for a specific audience,” Tlis said.
“In targeting Russian domestic audiences, the Kremlin employs disinformation and propaganda designed as entertainment,” she added, noting that the propaganda “tells robust and compelling outright lies.”
“Russia uses well-crafted, intelligently crafted and precisely targeted disinformation in targeting foreign countries,” she said, adding that Russian propaganda portrays the US as “the super villain and prime target forever.”
After describing the state of affairs in the Russian media, the experts offered some solutions to provide accurate information to the Russian public.
“We cannot take a shotgun approach in the face of a concentrated, concerted and coordinated enemy. That’s just not enough,” Pomerantsev said, acknowledging that a solution “must involve collaboration between governments, between tech companies, between media and academia. “
“Of course, only Russians can and should change the political situation,” Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian journalist and opposition politician, told the committee.
“This change is coming in our country. And I’m thinking faster than you thought before February 24,” he added.
The policy forbids Russian state news channels and networks from even calling Moscow’s attacks on Ukraine an invasion or a war. Instead, they must call it a “military special operation” or face up to 15 years in prison.
But some, like Marina Ovsyannikova, editor at popular Russian broadcaster Channel One, have spoken out.
Earlier this month, Ovsyannikova held a sign behind a newsreader that read, “Stop the war. Don’t believe the propaganda. They are lying to you here.”
She was then fined and detained by the authorities.
The editor later told CNN that some Russians were “brainwashed” by the information provided in the country.
“From morning to evening, state propaganda blares from all state television stations,” she said at the time. “There is an information war.”