Today, it is hard to say whether the unraveling COVID-19 pandemic provided the reason for the Russian government to dust off their old textbooks, but the spread of the disease beyond China’s borders served as the occasion for the Russian propaganda to open a new “front” in the information war.
Free Russia Foundation 30.06.2021
The Kremlin propaganda machine has used the global spread of COVID-19 to open a new “front” in the information war. Its main goal was to instigate suspicion and animosity toward the West in the minds of the Russian people, discredit liberal values and democratic forms of governance. However, its targets were not limited to the domestic audiences in Russia, as it purposefully planted conspiracy theories into the media space of other countries, primarily of those with large Russian-speaking populations. This report documents and analyses such instances of media manipulation by the Kremlin, coordinated and controlled insertion of destructive misinformation and campaigning within the context of the pandemic.