The Russian Embassy in London made a presentation to the British Foreign Office following a leaked information that pointed to London’s running an anti-Russian media campaign. This was announced on Wednesday, March 10, at the press service of the Russian diplomatic mission.
“The embassy made a presentation to the British Foreign Office in connection with documents related to this department that appeared on the Internet, which reveal the presence of a large-scale program of the British government on systemic influence on the Russian-speaking media space,” the embassy said.
Thus, according to these documents, for several years, with the filing of the British authorities in Russia itself and neighboring countries, under the pretext of supporting the “independent media”, projects were being implemented to artificially detach the audience from Russian and local Russian-language sources of information. In this case, as the embassy emphasized, it is not about encouraging healthy competition in the media, but about targeted assistance only to those media that adhere to the British orientation and promote Western political attitudes.
The diplomatic mission points out that in addition to this, in the documents that have appeared, one can notice attempts to weaken Russia and the activation of content aimed at supporting anti-government protests in the country.
“These activities of the British authorities can in no way be considered as conducive to freedom of speech and expression. Under the guise of a fake fight against disinformation, it is obviously directed against the Russian Federation, ”the diplomats emphasized.
The diplomatic mission expressed deep concern to the United Kingdom over these programs, which, as noted, correspond to the direction of London’s activities to denigrate the image of Moscow before the world community.
In addition, it demanded full disclosure of all information about projects being carried out under the auspices of the British Foreign Ministry and related to Russia.
It also clarifies that the British side was given to understand that such actions in Russia are assessed as gross interference in its internal affairs and are considered as an attempt to destabilize the internal political situation. At the same time, London’s reaction, as noted, “cannot be called constructive.”
“We were told that London does not comment on documents that have not been published by the British government in due course. For our part, we have to admit that this only reinforces the impression of the systemic work of Great Britain in the information environment against the Russian Federation, ”the statement says.
The Russian side will work out further measures to respond to the current situation, the embassy concluded.
Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at the end of February that Russia is awaiting a response from the UK following the recent leak of UK Foreign Office documents on London’s management of various media outlets.
The diplomat noted that information was publicly available indicating an intermediary scheme through which the British government provides and controls the work of a number of media outlets. Moreover, the British authorities have even formed a whole network of agents to “influence the Russian-speaking segment of social networks,” writes Gazeta.ru.
In January it became known that the British Embassy in Kiev would finance projects for the “reintegration” of Crimea into Ukraine. Funding will take place within the framework of the Open Future program, which started on January 1 and will last until March 15 of this year. Its volume will be up to £ 10 thousand (about 1 million rubles).