By EUvsDisinfo
During 6-9 June, the next elections to the European Parliament will take place across EU Member States in the largest European democratic exercises for hundreds of millions of people. The mandate given by these elections is five years.
In a series of articles, we will bring examples of key tactics, techniques, and procedures employed by pro-Kremlin manipulators and disinformers in connection with the European Parliament elections. This handful of articles will examine attempts to smear leaders, foment distrust, flood social media with falsehoods, turn the public’s agenda against Ukraine, and avoid comparisons uncomfortable to Russia.
An anti-election campaign without the word ‘election’ that…
Russian authorities and pro-Kremlin outlets regularly try to undermine, denigrate, ridicule, and smear the European system and foment distrust in European societies. The word ‘democracy’ or ‘election’ does not need to appear in the Kremlin’s campaign against European Parliament elections while it aims to denigrate their legitimacy and engineer lower voter participation.
…pretends not to care
Russian authorities are interested in the European Parliament elections in spite of rarely mentioning them specifically. With their large reserves of diplomatic experience, Russian leaders in both politics and business are fully aware of the significance of the European elections for the next selection of leaders and political balances in the European system. However, Moscow does not want to give the public impression of paying particular interest to European political dynamics since this would give unwanted credibility to the EU system.
Technique No. 1: go after the leaders
Political debates are obviously driven by personalities, but the Kremlin and Russian authorities are often taking it to new lows in their attempts to smear key EU leaders. Denigrating your opponent is another classic technique in the handbook of manipulators.
The example of President Macron and France
Recently, French President Emmanuel Macron and his family have been the targets of intense smear campaigns and so has the French army. Macron’s statements in March that Russia could not be allowed to win its war against Ukraine likely antagonised Putin and Moscow, especially his refusal to rule out deploying Western troops.
A significant spike in smear attacks against him and his wife unfolded right after Macron’s interview on 14 March. Many wild stories appeared suggesting that his wife Brigitte Macron is a ‘perverted trans’, was born a man, is faking her identity, etc.
President Macron’s statements were twisted and taken out of context. Following Macron’s initial comments on 26 February, at least one pro-Kremlin outlet alleged that he wanted to start a third world war just to remain in power. Falsely claiming that someone is greedy or power-hungry is a classic way to smear the person in the crosshairs.
Massive campaigns against the image and reputation of the French armed forces have also followed. The Russian state affiliated Pravda-xx.com network, for example, relayed an image of French soldiers wearing pink boots with high heels. On 19 March, a picture in another article portrayed French soldiers, led by Macron, as drag queens and presumably transgendered persons parading with a pink-coloured tank. We recently covered how the Kremlin and its affiliates have adopted the tactic of impersonating a bully showering Macron’s family with baseless homophobic and trans-phobic insults.
Smearing attacks with sex
There is a bizarre fascination, almost an obsession, in the personal attacks to smear leaders using or making reference to sex or sexual orientation. Extremist rhetoric is packed full of hate towards LGBTIQ+ persons, a sad fact particularly true of pro-Kremlin disinformation which tend to pander to right-wing extremists, so it is not surprising that they have spread similar slander masquerading as commentary.
Like previous regimes built on strong-man-identity, the Russian leadership idolises virulent manhood while imposing upon women the subservient status of breeders of men. The flip side of that coin is to vilify your adversaries as somehow unmanly and sexually perverted. This is reflected in the smearing.
On 9 January, Gabriel Attal became France’s first openly homosexual prime minister. Most were inclined to celebrate this fact as a win for diversity and acceptance. Above mentioned Pravda in its French language outlet, however, immediately began to have a fatuous obsession about the prime minister’s sexual orientation. Articles routinely referred to Attal as France’s ‘gay prime minister’ even when Attal’s sexual preference was irrelevant to the subject at hand. One piece even called Attal ‘Macron’s main gay’.
This bizarre fixation, however, was just a holding pattern until more attacks started. They first latched onto Attal’s former relationship with another member of the French cabinet, Stéphane Séjourné. Russian state TV-director Dmitry Kiselyov, for example, preposterously alleged that two gay men in positions of power meant that all references to heterosexual relations would soon be forbidden in Europe. Later, an article called Attal and Séjourné two ‘domestic animals’ of ‘Macron’s circle’.
Piotr Tolstoy, deputy president of the Russian State Duma, alleged that France is governed by perverts. This particular slander found its way into the RT network.
Along the way, the above Pravda enthusiastically reported on these events. Then Tsargrad, a Kremlin-affiliated nationalist-far right outlet, went farther, relaying the conspiratorial claims wholesale in an article that Pravda republished. In particular, Tsargrad went out of its way to describe LGBTIQ+ persons as ‘perversions’.
Like in Spain and the US
The pattern described above for France and President Macron remind of the smearing elsewhere. For years, kooks and trolls have smeared Michelle Obama, the wife of former US President Barack Obama, as being biologically male. In Europe, extremist figures have tried to imply that current Spanish Prime Minister Petro Sanchez is somehow connected to gay prostitution.
The example of EU leaders: Ursula von der Leyen and Josep Borrell
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU High Representative Josep Borrell are frequent targets of Kremlin smears. As reflected in our database, the caseload has increased significantly during the last 6-9 month for examples of featuring the Commission President. Headlines such as ‘Ursula von der Leyen finances a proxy war in Ukraine’ or ‘Ursula von der Leyen blamed climate change on Russia’.
Since HRVP Borrell has spoken clearly about armed Russian aggression and the Kremlin’s weaponization of the information space, the frequency and tone in the attacks have hardened with more twists and misrepresentations. The rate of attacks significantly increased after February 2023 when Borrell made public the EEAS Report on Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference which documented Russian operations. Besides mocking cartoons depicting Borrell as Joseph Goebbels, the spike also included fabricated, false articles imitating credible news media, like Deutsche Welle articles. This ‘identity theft’ has become known as “Doppelganger” technique.
Recently, after the publication of Borrell’s book ‘Europe between two wars’, another campaign kicked off across a broad spectrum of prominent pro-Kremlin outlets in many languages targeting Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America. The common element has been claims that Borrell ‘admits to the failure of EU policy’ or ‘Borrell admitted that the EU is at war with Russia’.
President Zelenskyy – the prime target of personal attacks
The top priority of the Kremlin’s smear campaigns is, not surprisingly, Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy. He is blamed for almost anything, from planning chemical or nuclear strikes against Russia and siphoning off millions in EU/US aid to buying private luxury mansions outside Ukraine in order to move there after a nuclear Armageddon. So far our database, which has documented thousands of examples of disinformation since 2015, has more than 800 examples centred on Zelenskyy or his family. Smears against his wife, the Ukrainian first lady, include claims that her foundation trafficked children to paedophiles in Europe.
These campaigns are designed to erode the broad and strong European popular support for assisting Ukraine with financial, military and humanitarian help, documented by the most recent Eurobarometer survey.
All these pro-Kremlin efforts aim to sour the atmosphere in the run-up to European Parliament elections and beyond.
See also our series of articles analysing the five common pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives.
Stay tuned for the next article examining how pro-Kremlin outlets foment public discontent inside the EU countries.
By EUvsDisinfo
