Thread by @jinpeili

CCTV FOLLIES (a thread)
April 20 news
The early AM report uses the broken Irpin Bridge as background. Scenes of war damage are limited, never graphic, but narration and chryons are telling:
-This is what US wants
-NATO adds fuel to fire
-RU/UKR "conflict" wrecks global economy

CCTV parades the usual suspects on camera.
Russian "friends" get the most air-time and can speak in their own voices.

Rare clips of Zelensky are typically voiced-over.

Putin: "Western sanctions are an utter failure"
Lavrov: New stage of East Ukraine "advance" is underway

Duma Vice-Chair Tolstoy Petr Olegovich gets a sympathetic sit-down interview, addressing CCTV's concerns that the US has been bullying Russia for a long time.
"They are trying to ruin us! They have declared war on us! Ukraine is their proxy!"
@polijunkie_aus

General Shoigu says the Russian Army in the Donbas is implementing plans in an orderly fashion
Does he protest too loudly? Possibly a preemptive hedge against war crime accusations?
Both Russia and China claim the Bucha massacre was 'fake news' but maybe it unnerves them anyway.

As usual, CCTV enjoys access to a wide range of Russian Defense Ministry video rolls, but nothing gritty or graphic. Scenes are selected to impress. High production value shots showing missiles of immense destructive prowess and modern aircraft is typical.

The results of such firepower are not pretty, but sometimes an aerial bombing run makes it into the news clip, without any detail or context offered.

Lest the scenes of Russian military prowess create the politically incorrect impression that a war of invasion has taken place, CCTV segues to the Pentagon to heap blame on the US and UK for providing weapons and training for the Ukrainians.

In another tip of the hat to the social media mavens at #TheGreatTranslationMovement, CCTV selects translates some little gems from Western social media @TGTM_Official

Quotes cherry-picked here support CCTV's thesis that most Europeans are against economic sanctions on Russia.

That "the people" hate sanctions but they are imposed by unfeeling Western "governments" is a common theme on CCTV, and Germany gets special attention, because it is dependent on Russian gas and has shown some signs of resistance to EU solidarity.

April 20 news cycle (update)
Russia Defense Ministry spokesman assures viewers that the "special military operation" has entered a new stage.
@polijunkie_aus @TGTM_Official

Russia is opening up humanitarian corridors.

Russian report: Many foreign mercenaries have been obliterated. As for those foreign fighters still hiding out in the Azov Steel Factory, they are not in good fortune.

(helicopter footage of "liberated" Mariupol provided by Moscow-based RIA Novosti)

A typical CCTV two-shot.
The conceit is that all China cares about is peace, Ukrainians not so much.
-UN head Guterres says there must be cease fire and negotiations
-Ukrainian representative says it's hard to say when negotiations are likely to resume

Not only are US and UK providing more military aid to Ukraine, but they want war and the media love the war
(unfortunately for Western war-mongers this is only a 'Special Military Operation')

CCTV, not prone to cliche or cant, is careful to source its sweeping generalizations:

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