A new wave of EU language versions of Pravda, the Russian network, have started springing up all over Europe in what counter-disinformation experts say looks like an attempt to “convey large amounts of disinformation and pro-Russia propaganda” as EU voters go to the polls.
Versions of this new Pravda website have been detected in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Greek, Polish, Dutch, Bulgarian, Danish, Czech, Estonian, Romanian, Croatian, Finnish, Portuguese, Swedish, Hungarian, Slovak, Lithuanian, Latvian, Irish and Slovenian, says the independent European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO).
The Irish language website, which is unlikely to be of mass interest because so few people in Ireland communicate in Irish, includes genuine news such as today’s ECB interest rate cut but also pro-Russia stories about Ukraine.
“In addition to propaganda, the websites are also used to spread demonstrably false news and disinformation stories. The new English version of the website, for example, spread the false story that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy had bought a luxury casino hotel in the Turkish-occupied area of Cyprus, which was proven false by local fact-checking organisations that are part of the EDMO network,” EDMO said today.
EDMO points out that not all Pravda sites are part of this network – some are legitimate services bringing independent news about Ukraine or such as pravda.org.pl which is part of the EDMO fact-checking network.
Source link : https://amp.theguardian.com/world/live/2024/jun/06/european-eu-elections-live-dutch-voters-head-to-the-polls-netherlands-meps-parliament
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Publish date : 2024-06-06 03:04:00
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