“A full-scale information war is being waged against Ukraine”

European Union countries seem to be more and more aware of the danger of Russian propaganda. It will be recalled that the EU launched a task force, East StratCom Team, in April to fight against the Russian disinformation campaign. The team presented the other day a new informational project – the Disinformation Review weekly.

As David Stulik, EU Delegation to Ukraine Press Officer, commented to The Day, the project’s goal is to draw public attention to a large number of information attacks against European audiences. “The new initiative shows that the EU is taking a serious view of the problem,” Mr. Stulik says. “Unfortunately, European society is not yet fully aware of a full-scale information war that is being waged today against not only Ukraine, but also the EU as a whole and some of its members. For Europe has not been meeting this kind of challenges until now. The Russian media regularly deliver a host of concocted stories aimed at compromising the entire democratic world.” The review’s goal is to gather as much information as possible in a week’s time, which will show the European audience the true scale of the problem. “People must see that it is an important problem,” Mr. Stulik explains.

The task force published its second review, which comprises a brief description of disinformation instances recorded in second part of October. Experts indicate the time and place of such a report, the target audience, and a link to the information that disproves it. For example, on October 24 the propagandistic website sputnikbig.ru published the article “A New Sect in Ukraine under the Guise of Leadership Academy.” It is about an alleged “new sect organized by the American agents” that “aims at upbringing new Maidan leaders and says that the graduates will represent a new Ukraine, full of nationalists who hate everything non-Ukrainian.” Incidentally, the article authors note that Prime Minister Yatseniuk “belongs to a Scientology sect.” StratCom experts believe that this instance of disinformation is aimed, above all, against Ukrainian and Russian audiences. At the same time, they quote an October 22 article on Den/The Day’s website, which disproves the propagandistic material. It says that President Poroshenko took part in the opening of the Ukrainian Academy of Leadership for high school graduates. The education project will last for 10 months. The review also focuses on disinformation in English-language, German, Georgian, and other media.

Any individual, organization or governmental body can inform the Brussels experts of a fact of disinformation. “This is only the first step. When we see the scale of the problem, we will be able to map out the strategy of counteraction,” Mr. Stulik says. “Once all the facts have been gathered in one place, the EU or other interested parties will be able to begin to effectively fight against this phenomenon, but we must first come to know how exactly these stories are created. There is a Europe-wide network of people who help gather information. They are journalists, experts, and public activists, who work on a nonprofit basis. The more people wish to take part in the program, the more effective it will be.”

The task force further plans to work directly with the audience and put out a certain media product. “The EU is going to actively form its own messages, i.e. special denials and alternative information reports, which will shed light on the real state of affairs. It is not just counterpropaganda – it is something opposite to propaganda,” Mr. Stulik says.

We will be able to see the effectiveness of a new EU initiative in the near future. All we can say for sure today is that this initiative should have been taken one and a half or two years ago, which could have perhaps helped European politicians avoid many stereotypes and myths imposed on them by Russia. EU diplomats also share this point of view privately.