Bulgarians that Russia
Bulgarians that Russia did not try to poison Sergei Skripal, a former spy, in the UK last year - despite a wealth of evidence to the contrary. False Russian stories have also included one that Ukrainian soldiers crucified a boy in east Ukraine - a fiction later cited by Russian fighters as a motive for going to war there. "When you go murdering people quoting disinformation messages as your motivation, it's pretty hard to deny that Russian propaganda has an impact," the Atlantic Council's Kalensky said. The concerns on Russian interference come in an environment where votes were being decided by race, it would become a force to be reckoned with. If it pulled together 200 MEPs in ad-hoc coalitions on divisive policies, such as migration, "it would be very, very hard to get things done without them," according to Votewatch, a think tank in Brussels. But those numbers were "not very likely, given the diverse positions of right-wing nationalist parties" in Europe, Votewatch said. For its part, the EU foreign service in Brussels is staffing up its East Stratcom office, set up to counter media propaganda, from 14 to 18 people and boosting its budget from €1.1m to €3m "specifically to address Russian disinformation", an EU official said. Civil society groups, such as Ilga-Europe, have also launched debunking and hate-monitoring projects. That might not sound like much, but transparency can be powerful, Snyder, the US historian, noted. "What's important is framing - if people are asked: 'Do you want lies or do you want the truth?', they generally say: 'Gosh, I'd like the truth'," Snyder said, referring to stories that were red-flagged as Russian or far-right lies. Pro-EU forces also had a compelling story, if they told it right, Snyder added. "The current European story is: 'We stopped bad things from happening 70 years ago', and Europe needs another story," he said, referring to the EU's post-WW2 origins. Everybody could relate to Adrian Coman (l) because he was 'just another Romanian trying to make a better life for himself abroad', Teodora Ion-Rotaru, from Accept, an LGBTI rights group in Bucharest, said Photo: acceptromania.ro narrow margins, he added. Recalling recent Austrian and Czech elections and the Brexit referendum, "to swing these votes, you would need just two or three percent, Kalensky said. Propaganda's "impact may be marginal, but even a marginal change can, in a tight race, make a difference," the Atlantic Council's Nimmo added, in his recent study on Russia's meddling in the 2016 US election. TIGHT RACE If Salvini's group got 140 out of 701 seats in the EU "The way the EU wins is by saying our protection of human rights, including gay rights, is part of a larger style of life which people find enviable," Snyder said. "Things young people care about - like labour mobility, digital privacy, global warming - these are things the European Union is doing the best job in the world of dealing with," he said. LOVE STORY The appeal of the European romance came to light in a recent referendum on banning same-sex marriage in Romania. Romanian voters last October faced an onslaught of homophobic propaganda by state and oligarch-owned media, far-right groups, and shady NGOs. Russian media and social media also pushed 'Gay- 30 — EUROPEAN PARLIAMANT ELECTIONS 2019
Europa' memes to provoke tension. But voters "did not take the bite" and the referendum failed, Teodora Ion-Rotaru, from Accept, an LGBTI rights group in Bucharest, told EUobserver. "Romanians use the EU almost more than any other people in terms of freedom of movement, jobs, and sending money back home," she added. "The EU is essential for us to exist," she said. Romanians rebelled against "intrigues organised from above" and "Russian trolls ... irritated people", she said. The well-known love story of Adrian Coman also played a role, she added. Coman is a Romanian who won an EU court ruling last year which forced Romania to recognise his Belgian marriage to another man. His story helped, Ion-Rotaru said, not because it converted Romanian conservatives, but because it showed that minority rights were part of a larger EUlifestyle that people wanted. "Coman was just another Romanian trying to make a better life for himself abroad, in a way that everybody could relate to," she said. Italian far-right minister Matteo Salvini wore a T-shirt of Russian president Vladimir Putin when he visited the Kremlin Photo: russia.tv
