The Main Intelligence Directorate and the Center for Countering Disinformation have launched a list of “Kremlin’s Mouthpieces”
26 December 15:14
The War & Sanctions portal has a new section “Kremlin’s Mouthpieces” with a list of Russian propagandists and media managers. This was reported by the Defense Intelligence of Ukraine and the Center for Countering Disinformation on their information resources, Komersant ukrainskyi reports.
According to the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine, the weaponization of information, that is, its use to attack the information sovereignty of another country, is part of the Russian military doctrine.
“Today, the Kremlin is waging war not only with missiles, tanks and guns. Its information warfare has no clearly defined front line and is spreading around the world. By investing significant resources in it, the Russian authorities are trying to destabilize Ukraine and the world, influence political processes and shape public opinion in different regions of the planet in their own aggressive interests. In the budget for 2025, Russia has allocated $1.42 billion to finance propaganda. Russia spends another half a billion dollars a year on creating propaganda by unrelated structures,” the Defense Intelligence Agency said.
They emphasize that “Russian propaganda has a face that the whole world should know – know in order to block, impose sanctions, ban entry, close bank accounts, and stop any cooperation.”
To this end, the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine and the Center for Countering Disinformation published the first list of 55 individuals. Among those included in this list of “Kremlin mouthpieces” are: conductor and personal friend of Putin Valery Gergiev, organizer of Putin support campaigns Vladimir Tabak, Russian World ideologue Alexander Dugin, Russian military commander Semyon Pegov, comedian Mikhail Galustyan, singer and member of Putin’s team Alexander Marshal (Minkov), and many others.
The DIU promised to add new “mouthpieces” to the section so that none of them would be left out.
What else can be found on the “War & Sanctions” portal
This portal publishes lists of sponsors and accomplices of Russian military aggression in the public domain. There is a list of people involved in the deportation of Ukrainian children and a list of “Champions of Terror” – athletes who have become a tool of Russian propaganda. The portal also has a section on foreign components and equipment used by Russia in its weapons production, and in October, three new selections were added: on ships used by Russia to transport weapons and resources; on individuals under sanctions by Ukraine’s partners in the international coalition; and on stolen Ukrainian cultural heritage.
Russia’s information attacks against Ukraine
Weponization, a phenomenon where information is used as a weapon to attack the information sovereignty of another country, has its own particular manifestations.
As noted in the publication of Glavkom, the Russian propaganda machine regularly uses this tool to spread disinformation messages favorable to Russia and achieve political goals. Victims of veponization can be both states, such as Ukraine, which Russia has been calling a so-called failed state for more than 8 years, and individual groups of people, in other words, communities. For example, this is how Russia has used information about Ukrainian refugees, women, or children to promote its desired messages to European and other societies.
In particular, Russian propagandists tried to create an image of Ukrainian women as “unreliable,” “incapable of anything,” and “lazy” women who, fleeing the war, can only engage in sex work and send “nude photos” to survive. In this way, propagandists humiliated the dignity of Ukrainian women and devalued their achievements.
Russian propagandists also use everyday topics as a weapon. For example, by calling Ukrainian refugees Nazis (in the sense of radical xenophobes) or claiming that they are not ready to work to support themselves, but only live off the taxes of Europeans. Agitprop also tries to portray Ukrainians as criminals who are allegedly destroying Europe and bringing its economy to collapse, etc.
Research shows that Russia is a global leader in the use of disinformation on the Internet in influence campaigns. Russia is responsible for 62% of such interference in the internal affairs of other countries. There are also studies that demonstrate how Russian disinformation narratives evolve, change, and quickly adapt to the changing news cycle. According to a study by the European Policy Center, important events in the world, including the so-called migration crises, become a catalyst for the spread of disinformation; provide a platform for inciting hatred and spreading fear; and change the tone and content of the discourse.
