Sunday, December 31, 2023

Kremlin Using Telegram Channels to Work Around Bans on ‘Russia Today,’ ‘Novaya Gazeta Evropa’ Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Dec. 30 – To spread its propaganda abroad and especially among émigré groups, the Kremlin is now exploiting a network of telegram channels now that many Western governments have blocked Russia Today, the Moscow-controlled television channel on which it had relied earlier, according to an investigation by Novaya Gazeta Evropa.

            The paper has identified more than 100 telegram channels in various languages that spread the same line and cooperate with each other even though they are nominally independent and traces the way in which the Putin regime has been funding and directing them over the last six months (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/12/30/golosa-kremlia).

            While none of these has the audience that Russia Today did before it was blocked – most have only a few thousand or tens of thousands of visitors – together they are giving Moscow a powerful tool to continue to reach opinion leaders in various countries, one that the paper says the West does not yet appear to recognize as a danger.

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