In his speech during the high-level week of the UN General Assembly, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov opened the Christmas holiday season a bit prematurely and presented a kind of disinformation Christmas tree decoration in the form of anti-Western, anti-European and pro-Kremlin messages.
Lavrov's boss, Putin, could not go to New York because he is wanted for deporting Ukrainian children. It seems that Putin does not want his subordinate to surpass him in spreading disinformation, so he personally added a few lies and distortions to the Christmas tree that Lavrov started decorating.
If we continue the Christmas symbolism: Russian disinformation narratives are like Christmas tree decorations that are pulled out of the basement year after year. They hardly ever change, they don't sparkle with imagination, and their impact is due to recognition and repeatability. In the disinformation database of “EUvsDisinfo“ we have recorded hundreds of examples relating to each of the wild claims Lavrov made in his speech to the UN.
The old refrain “The West is to blame” – again at full speed
Let's start with the accusation that everything bad is caused by the desire of the “West” to dominate the world. Lavrov mentioned this on almost every topic he spoke about – The Middle East, Ukraine, UN and Security Council reforms, the Indo-Pacific, Russia's war against Georgia, and Armenian-Azerbaijani relations.
The term “West“ is hazy, and that's handy if you're trying to create an imaginary enemy. The Kremlin usually uses it to address the US, Great Britain and the EU. Russian disinformation is obsessed with conspiracies by the British and “Anglo-Saxons” in order to influence world affairs. The term “West“ is proverbially dated and more appropriate for pre-WWII times. Even the conspiracy theory that Lavrov uses to support this idea in his speech refers to British documents from 1945.
The myth of “NATO expansionism“
The West is responsible for everything and, according to Lavrov's speech, specifically for the brutal full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. First, according to him, the West has broken its promise not to expand NATO. The idea of “NATO expansionism“ is another disinformation myth that Russia constantly repeats to give it credibility. In fact, the very idea of “NATO expansion” is part of the misinformation.
Independent countries are free to exercise their sovereign right to make their own foreign policy and organize their security dimensions as they see fit. This includes, if they choose, applying for NATO membership and committing to the Alliance's founding principles of democracy, freedom and the rule of law. There's no way anyone promised NATO not to expand, because that's not the way NATO works.
Russia as a good man and defender of the people
Second, Lavrov tried to justify the brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine by twisting the part of the UN Charter that proclaims the obligation to respect the right of peoples to self-determination. This manipulative thesis states that the inhabitants of the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories chose to become part of Russia and that the Ukrainian people, and in particular the Russian-speaking population, should have been protected from Ukrainian aggression.
Of course, self-determination is not something that states can choose for the territories of their neighbors. It is absurd to hear a Russian politician make such a claim when his own political regime is daily exterminating Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars and other communities who dare to exercise their right to self-determination – a right that the Kremlin claims to value so highly.
Favorite ornament
We return to that part of the Christmas decoration that Putin personally decided to add to Lavrov's disinformation tree: it is the disinformation related to the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories. Putin “greeted” their residents on the occasion of “Day of Reunification with Russia” and repeated the same lies – how he saved them from the “neo-Nazi dictation of Kiev supported by the West”.
In doing so, Putin drew attention to one of his favorite decorations on the disinformation Christmas tree: the claim that “Western elites” were preparing the Ukrainian army to attack the Russian-occupied areas of Donbass and Crimea, and that this is the reason why Russia launched the invasion.
The lie is this: support for Ukrainian self-defense is now presented as the reason for Russia's aggression. Putin's manipulative claims are as repetitive as the rest of Lavrov's UN speech.
Saboteurs and terrorists everywhere
According to Lavrov, the sabotage of the “Nord Stream” is a US plot to undermine EU competitiveness. In fact, the US and the EU are close economic partners, and the investigation into the “Nordic Stream” still going on.
Lavrov tended to accuse Western countries of being responsible for global terrorism and of starting a war with sanctions against the majority of countries in the world. Indeed, counter-terrorism is an area where NATO and Russia used to work together.
Western sanctions aim to prevent the Russian military machine from killing Ukrainian civilians as it did during the Bucha massacre. And Lavrov blamed the West for this atrocity in his same speech.
The only real peace is Putin's peace
One of the main goals of the UN is to ensure world peace, but there was nothing in Lavrov's speech to indicate that Russia is interested in ending its military aggression against Ukraine in the near future. He rejected Ukrainian peace initiatives, calling them a “dead end” and repeated the lie that Putin's June 2024 peace plan was realistic, when in fact it was a call for Ukraine to surrender. The Kremlin rejects Ukraine's efforts for a just and lasting peace, and at the same time pours ridicule on Zelensky's victory plan and tends to accuse Ukraine of seeking to draw NATO into direct war with Russia.
The Emperor has no friends
Lavrov used his time to speak at the UN to spread obvious lies and distortions, which were then blown up by pro-Kremlin media and disinformation channels. However, he also had another important mission in New York: to build an image of Russia that it is not becoming an increasingly isolated outsider on the international stage.
The Kremlin likes to see itself as a leading member of the “global majority” from countries – former colonies in America, Africa and Asia. Lavrov's comments on “neo-colonial practices” of the Western countries are probably aimed specifically at the representatives of these nations.
The truth about Russia's isolation became apparent again when its diplomats failed to stop UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres' ambitious plan to revive the UN. 143 nations voted in favor of the proposal, with Russia and only six other countries voting against it.
Russia – part of old Europe
The blunder was clearly painful for Lavrov, who mentioned this issue at the very beginning of his speech. He was also embarrassed by the remark of Guterres, who reminded the world that Russia is taking undue advantage of the current configuration in the UN Security Council – it now has three permanent member countries from Europe and none from Africa.
Lavrov said at his own press conference that he asked Guterres if “he really believes that we are in the same package with London and Paris, and he replied: Well, what else would you be?”
Succumbing to your own delusions is one of the things that makes disinformation so dangerous. Target groups may or may not be influenced by the misinformation. But those who spread the lies will sooner or later begin to believe them. The consequences can be serious.
A reminder of this is the way in which the concept of the Russian “global majority” broke at this year's UN meeting – broke like a Christmas ball from the misinformation tree decoration.
Don't be fooled!
Other topics in this week's review from EUvsDisinf:
Europe produces nothing and is a global parasite
The EU is the largest economic area in the world, accounting for 14% of world trade in goods and is the largest trader of manufactured goods and services. The EU is the most important trading partner for 80 countries and ranks first in both inward and outward international investment. These facts do not prevent agents of pro-Kremlin disinformation from spreading narratives about how the European economy was in a catastrophic state. They are trying to discredit the Union in front of the international public and undermine the spirit in the EU. This thesis now often revolves around dependence on Russian hydrocarbon. Otherwise, Russian and Soviet propagandists use versions of this classic narrative of “inevitable collapse” for more than a century.
Ukraine cremates soldiers to cover up organ trade
Ukraine remains the number one target for Russian disinformation campaigns, which do not miss a single claim – even if it is too absurd and deeply corrupt. This particular story claims that Ukraine trades in the organs of its own fallen soldiers. Sensationalism is a key tactic of pro-Kremlin disinformation. Allegations of organ trafficking have been used before, including against NATO, the White Helmets in Syria, the wife of former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and the leadership of Kosovo. Organ transplants are impossible under military conditions, and this baseless claim simply serves to demonize the Ukrainian military and distract from Russian crimes.
Flood victim gets pneumonia because Polish government prioritizes Ukrainians
On the Kremlin's agenda, thwarting support for Ukraine is a high priority. In spreading this message, propagandists readily abuse local events and disasters. During the recent floods in southern Poland, a Facebook post, purportedly by a woman evacuee, claimed that her daughter contracted pneumonia because they were put up in a cold local school instead of a hotel because the hotel was full of Ukrainians. The post turned out to be fake, and an account with the same name and profile picture later posted that the person had neither been evacuated nor had a daughter. Creating fake posts using screenshots from social media is a disinformation tactic described in recent revelations about Russia's “Social Design” agency. (ASD). Polish authorities warned of an increase in Russian and Belarusian disinformation related to the floods, and this warning was also used as a basis for disinformation narratives about Polish “Russophobia”.