Imagine a weird small island on outlying fringes of the continental landmass. Its ruling party has been infiltrated by Russian interests.
It recently changed its constitution after populists won a poll that election officials say was tainted & corrupt.
And this man paid for it
As fighting across Europe intensifies, the riverside capital remains calm.
State-run media refuses to confirm or deny that the supreme leader covertly met Kremlin officials at a drug-laced ‘bonga bonga’ party.
However, cracks are now starting to emerge in pro govt news outlets
(With apologies to @gathara. Patrick help me out here.)
Although stories of 'tennis-for-roubles' circulated in opposition media for years, a crackdown on journalists by individuals with ties to the ruling party successfully quashed reporting.
Observers note press freedom is now lower in the kingdom than Uruguay, Samoa & Ghana
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Very proud to have been part of this tonight. @frontlineclub projected the Ukrainian flag onto the Russian embassy in London tonight to support the work of independent journalists reporting from Ukraine 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
All journalists reporting from Ukraine are doing vital work. Without them, Putin’s lies will win. But freelance journalists do this work without the support of a news organisation. And whole purpose of @frontlineclub is to try & keep them safe.
I didn’t get a clear shot but no-one understands this better than @waadalkateab. She’s the amazing filmmaker who documented destruction of her city, Aleppo. ‘It’s not a war,’ she said ‘It’s mass murder.’ Standing here with picture of killed journalist, Oleksandra Kushynova
Britain has a Russia problem. And his name is Nigel Farage.
Today, Ofcom finally banned RT. 8 long years after Russia illegally invaded Crimea.
But this is their man. RT - whose editor described it as a "weapon" of the Russian state - is what made Farage into who is today. 1/
RT is not just a TV channel. It's at centre of a whole ecosystem of Kremlin propaganda. Clips uploaded to YouTube were laced between mesmerising videos of tsunamis & tornadoes.
It was clickbait wizardry.
As ex-YouTuber @gchaslot told me no-one milked YouTube's algo like RT. 2/
And who was RT's favourite man in the West?
This man. It's not just that Farage was paid by RT - the Russian state - for appearances over years. Though he was.
It's that RT - the biggest news channel on YouTube - made him a star. 3/
I don’t think the people who have cheerleaded this man, who have repeated his talking points & helped his political objectives should have a way back from this.
He’s just called for a ‘self-purification’ of Russia. We know where we’ve heard that before.
Maybe there’s a way back from it. But it’s not this. Farage voted in favour of Kremlin’s foreign policy for years. This claim about ‘Russia hoax’ is actually obscene.
It’s Putin’s line. Delivered with less than zero evidence. From a man who actually appears in Mueller Report
Fox TV’s Tucker Carlson is Putin’s boy. Russian TV has actually been commanded to show more Carlson. And these clips from Dec 2016 with Farage - when the details of Russian hacking op first began to emerge - show how clearly in lockstep they’ve been.