Kremlin’s Characterization of Moscow Protesters as US Agents Backfires, Gallyamov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, September 10 – The Kremlin calculated it could further isolate the Moscow protesters by describing them as American agents; but that effort has backfired on the authorities, with the approval rating of the US actually having gone up after regime propagandists described the demonstrators in this way, Abbas Gallyamov says.

            Between May and August, the Levada Center reports, the share f Russians who are positively disposed to the US rose from 31 to 42 percent while those negatively inclined fell from 52 to 44 percent, shifts that mean Russian feelings tward the US are nearly in perfect balance (newtimes.ru/articles/detail/184793).

            That means, the Moscow commentator says, that attempts to blacken the reputation f Russian protesters have backfired, with at least some Russians deciding that “if those protesting against authoritarianism are American agents, then America is not so bad [because that means] it is on the right side of the barricades.”

            A similar trend has occurred regarding Russian views of the European Union, with the share of Russians positively inclined to that group rising from 37 to 50 percent and those negatively inclined falling from 44 to 34 percent. “Evidently,” Gallyamov says, “the image of the internal enemy has driven out that of the external one in domestic political consciousness.”