On Thursday, Poland — a longtime foe of Moscow — announced the country would ban the Russian TV channel.
Within the past few days, European capitals have also ramped up the pressure, imposing sanctions on the TV network’s editor-in-chief. The U.K. has questioned whether the channel should be allowed to broadcast in the country, and French lawmakers formally asked for its license to be removed — only weeks after Germany imposed an outright ban.
A French star reporter, Frédéric Taddeï, also announced he would stop hosting his daily talk show on RT “out of loyalty for France.”
Described in the West as a propaganda tool for the Kremlin, RT — formerly known as Russia Today — is part of an effort to disseminate pro-Russian rhetoric asserting that President Vladimir Putin is a peacemaker and that the NATO alliance is an aggressive warmonger. The Russian ruler has repeated that rhetoric in recent days to justify his invasion of Ukraine.
In the weeks leading up to the invasion of Ukraine, a massive information war unfolded both online and offline between Kremlin-backed news outlets and online trolls and media and actors both in Ukraine and across the West. According to French public radio France Inter, RT France's coverage of Ukraine was obviously one-sided and biased toward the Russian government.
On the other hand, RT is part of a much wider, decades-long Russian information operation, and prohibiting just one broadcaster might be meaningless or counterproductive, some politicians and experts warn.
Asked whether she was in favor of an RT ban in Europe, Commission Vice President for Values and Transparency Věra Jourová told POLITICO in a statement that “it is not up to me to decide, it is up to independent national media regulators … We all rely on the extra vigilance of regulators and coordinated action.”
“We should have a broader look and not focus only on [RT and Sputnik],” she warned. “The Kremlin has weaponized information. Disinformation is part of Russia military doctrine and so is running of foreign influence operations.”
France makes three
France is the third Western country to increase pressure on RT, weeks after President Emmanuel Macron explicitly targeted foreign “propaganda media” in his New Year speech to the press. (Politico Europe)
RT.com online has been offline most of the day (at least where we are).
Funny how quickly Freedom and DemocracyTM resorts to information suppression/repression when faced with a bit of opposition.
Their stance sounds very "Putinesque"...
ReplyDeleteSlavoj Zizek, "For Putin, freedom means that everyone knows their place"
Aleksander Dugin, Putin's court philosopher, follows in Ilyin's footsteps and adds only a postmodern variant of historicist relativism: “Postmodernism shows that any so-called truth is a matter of belief. So we believe in what we do, we believe in what we say. And that is the only way to define the truth. So we have our special Russian truth that you have to accept.
...and I would have taken it one step further, FREEDOm!
ReplyDeleteThe book burners have it.
ReplyDeleteYesterday some talking heads on BBC radio were babbling about RT's 'propaganda and misinformation' and how 'we' should deal with it. Guess how?
When I went looking for Zizek articles at RT this morning I flashed through a US DoD Security screen checking my browser. They didn't block me, but they let me know that they were watching me.
ReplyDeleteIt was EXACTLY the same here.
DeleteIt seems to have 'normalised' somewhat today.
Manufacturing consent.
Delete