Read in our #HybridWeekly rubric:
- Pro-Russian actors, in particular, the “Women For Peace” organization linked to the main pro-Kremlin party in Ukraine, “Opposition Platform – For Life”, have increased the promotion of the idea that Ukraine should accept the Kremlin’s terms of ending the war. They do so under the guise of pacifism and protection of children due to the upcoming International children’s day. In doing so, they use an important emotional trigger (children) to portray Ukrainian government as responsible for hostilities and refusing to end them. It blurs the responsibility of the aggressor-state and pushes towards all the Kremlin’s conditions to reach “peace”, which is exactly what its agents of influence promote.
- The owner of Ukrayinska Pravda (Ukrainian Truth), one of the most popular professional media in Ukraine, has sold 100% of the corporate rights to the Dragon Capital investment management company, agreeing that the editorial policy of the media would remain unchanged. Pro-Kremlin forces have seen it as an opportunity to promote the external governance narrative, the most intense and one of the most dangerous of those imported from Russian propaganda. They have portrayed the selling of corporate rights as the “West” enforcing control over Ukrainian media space. This sows distrust in any media as such and leads to dismay, aiding the strategic goal of disinformation.
- Ukrainian society and government have widely supported Roman Protasevich, the dissident journalist illegally detained by Lukashenko’s regime on May 23. Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine Oleksandr Tkachenko has called out the suppression of freedom of speech in Belarus. Pro-Russian Telegram channels have accused the Ukrainian government of hypocrisy, saying it bans “opposition” channels in Ukraine but advocates for freedom of speech in Belarus. In this way, they attempt to equate journalist Protasevich with Russian propagandists who spread disinformation and work to divide the country, which is not the freedom of speech but its violation.