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Pekka Kallioniemi

Nov 9 • 10 tweets • 4 min read

In today's #vatnik soup I'll be introducing a man behind both 🇷🇺's private war organization and its disinformation and propaganda machine: an oligarch and a businessman Yevgeni Prigozhin. This thread will be divided into 2 (or 3) parts since his "achievements" are plentiful. 1/10

Like many oligarchs, Yevgeni used to be a petty criminal and spent 9 years in prison in the 80's for robbery and fraud. After his release, he started various lucrative food businesses, eventually opening a restaurant in St. Petersburg called New Island.

2/10

It quickly became the most fashionable restaurant in St. Petersburg and Putin himself started dining there with people like Jacques Chirac and George W. Bush. By 2003, Prigozhin had become a confidante of Putin and people started calling him "Putin's chef".

3/10

In 2012 his company, Concord Catering, received a contract with the Russian military worth 1,2 billion USD. Allegedly some of this money was used to start his troll farm masterpiece, Internet Research Agency (IRA): fontanka.ru/2014/05/29/170/

4/10

IRA is a company conducting online propaganda and information operations on behalf of Russia. NYT wrote an extensive (and paywalled) article about the IRA already back in 2018: nytimes.com/2018/02/18/wor… At IRA, the employees spread Russian propaganda and disinfo 24/7.

5/10

The topics and themes were given each day, at first focusing on crushing the opposition, and after that on bashing Ukraine and the "decadent West". The group was allegedly led by Dzheykhun Aslanov, who's now wanted the by the FBI.

6/10

IRA is best known for its meddling with US elections in 2016. They were no doubt involved in 2020's election, too. On the 7th of Nov, 2022, Prigozhin finally admitted that "[...] we interfered, we interfere and we will interfere" in regards to elections in the US.

7/10

@bellingcat

The troll factory has produced fake videos, such as the Dutch Terror Threat video. This video depicts six soldiers, supposedly from the Azov Battalion, speaking in Ukrainian before burning a Dutch flag. The video was proven to be fake by @bellingcat: bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-eu…

8/10

IRA has also organized and promoted several rallies in the 🇺🇸, usually provoking two opposing sides to each have their own. These rallies were very common during BLM: doi.org/10.36643/mjrl.… IRA has also outsourced some of its work to countries like Ghana and Nigeria.

9/10

It is also worth mentioning that West and Ukraine are not the only propaganda targets of IRA - research found out that they are conducting these campaigns around the globe, including in Africa and in India: gov.uk/government/new…

10/10

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More from @P_Kallioniemi

Pekka Kallioniemi

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Nov 10

In today's #vatnik soup,I'll go through the many motives in creation of pro-🇷🇺 "useful idiots".By useful idiot I refer to a person who spreads propaganda and disinfo for a cause, either consciously or unconsciously. It's by no means a comprehensive list,but it's a good intro.1/13

I have divided these methods into four distinct categories, but individuals can of course be affected by multiple methods. These methods are: 1) wealth, 2) power, 3) anxiety/disenfranchisement, and 4) kompromat. 2/13

1) Wealth: You can include many politicians and businessmen on this list. After the collapse of USSR, Russia opened up its businesses to the West, and many answered to this call. In case you were willing to ignore the human rights violations and ongoing invasions by 🇷🇺, 3/13

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In this thread I'll be discussing 🇷🇺 genocide in Ukraine. I'll focus on the child abductions & will be providing evidence that 🇷🇺 has planned this for a long time and that their intent has been announced in the state-owned media at least since the beginning of April, 2022.

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On April 3rd 2022, 🇷🇺 state-owned news agency RIA Novosti published an op-ed by Timofey Sergeytsev. Sergeytsev once was a consultant to pro-🇷🇺 Viktor Yanukovych and Euractiv described him as "one of the ideologists of modern Russian fascism". 2/10

In his article,Timofey called for the full destruction of Ukraine as a state and also its national identity.This, according to Timofey, should be done to accomplish Ukraine's "denazification". The article caused outrage & it has been condemned as evidence of genocidal intent.3/10

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Fringe pro-🇷🇺 bloggers such as the @TheGrayzoneNews like to keep the 🇷🇺 narrative of Ukrainian neo-nazis and the need for "denazification" inside Ukraine. Today I'll be introducing a real Russian #vatnik, co-leader of the Rusich group and a neo-nazi called Aleksei Milchakov. 1/8

Aleksei is a real piece of work. He came to public attention in 2011 after he made a home movie of him torturing, decapitating and allegedly eating a puppy. newsru.com/crime/28nov201…

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On what claims can we call Aleksei a nazi? He's admitted it himself: in 2020, a video with two men discussing was published on a 🇷🇺 nationalist Youtube channel. One of them is Aleksei. In the video he states that "I’m a nationalist, a patriot, an imperialist [...] I'm a nazi."3/8

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@aaronjmate

In today's #vatnik soup I'll be introducing a Canadian writer and reporter, Aaron Maté (.@aaronjmate). Aaron is part of the Grayzone posse together with RT poster boys/girls Max Blumenthal, Alex Rubinstein (.@RealAlexRubi) and Anya Parampil (.@anyaparampil).

1/9

This group could be characterized as anti-🇺🇸, and the Grayzone is basically build around this idea. Mr Maté is obviously a very intelligent person and he knows how to defend (and advertise) himself online. But, he's also a pro-🇷🇺/Assad disinfo spreader, no doubt about that.

2/9

He was actually named as one of the most profilic disinfo spreaders about the Syrian conflict in The Guardian article by Mark Townsend: theguardian.com/world/2022/jun…

Mr. Maté himself has disagreed with this statement, as can be seen in the footnote.

3/9

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Pekka Kallioniemi

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Oct 30

@Partisangirl

Welcome to the 1st edition of international #vatnik's! Today I'll be discussing a prominent figure in the disinfo/conspiracy scene - a lady called Maram Susli AKA PartisanGirl (.@Partisangirl). Originally from Damascus, her family moved to Australia when she was a child.

1/7

She has a degree in biophysics and chemistry, which apparently makes her an expert on geopolitical issues. In her Twitter profile she claims to be a "Scientist", yet she has written only opinion pieces and outright propaganda without a single trace of actual research.

2/7

Maram emerged as an online personality in 2011 during the Arab Spring, but became much more active at the time of the Syrian Civil War. Her stance has generally been anti-US and Syrian rebels and pro-al-Assad and Russia.

thedailybeast.com/the-kardashian…

3/7

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Pekka Kallioniemi

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@TurtiainenAno

Today's Finnish #vatnik is a former powerlifter turned politician and evangelist,Ano Turtiainen (.@TurtiainenAno). Since 🇷🇺's invasion of 🇺🇦,Ano has become a proponent of Putin's politics. He has spoken against all 🇷🇺 sanctions and has criticized "war crimes committed by 🇺🇦". 1/9

His views are also anti-NATO and anti-EU.Ano himself has said that he would like 🇫🇮 politics to be similar to Trump/US doctrine.His rhetoric follows the typical 🇷🇺 disinfo playbook:the decadence of West,conservatism,corruption of 🇺🇦,NATO's "proxy war" & COVID-19 conspiracies 2/9

Nowadays all of this is also decorated with religious babble and declaration of the end times. He has also stated that everyone who gets the COVID-19 vaccination will die in the near future and has compared the whole event to Holocaust. 3/9