Activity of the Russian Presidential Fund for Cultural Initiatives (PFCI) in the temporarily occupied territories (TOT) of Ukraine is a telling example of instrumentalisation of culture. PFCI was established by presidential decree in May 2021. Since then, PFCI has allocated funds for more than 7,000 projects worth approximately RUB 25.4 billion (almost UAH 11.3 billion). The Fund supports creative industries by financing the projects of non-profit organisations. The fund-operator of presidential grants for the development of civil society is specified as the sole founder of PFCI.

Russians don’t need to fire up gas chambers or turn every occupied settlement into Bucha in order to destroy Ukrainians as a nation. According to the author of the concept of genocide Rafal Lemkin, this crime can be committed by any means. A national, ethnic, religious, or racial group can be wiped out not only by way of killing, deportation or limitation of birth. Often this can be accomplished by undermining the foundations of target group’s life. Lemkin referred to such foundations as political and social institutions, culture, language, religion, a sense of national belonging and pride, collective memory and collective experience, undermining the security of group members, etc. 

Die Menschen, das human capital, sind das Wertvollste eines jeden Staates und die Ukraine wird sich auch nach dem Sieg über Russland nicht vollständig erholen können, wenn es niemanden gibt, der das Land wiederaufbaut und niemanden, für den es wiederaufgebaut werden muss. Wollen die Ukrainer:innen im Ausland zurückkehren? Welche Motivation haben sie und was treibt sie dazu, im Ausland zu bleiben?  Eine Umfrage des Netzwerks OPORA liefert Einblicke.

Messaging service Telegram’s marketing strategy is to present itself as a platform for total freedom of speech in response to the moderation policies of other platforms like Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. Telegram professes to consider content moderation as a philosophical question of ethics and morale, as if any interference has the exclusive function of “disciplining” users. However, this philosophical issue has quite tangible consequences in practice. For example, the findings of an independent impact assessment of Facebook on human rights in Myanmar showed(opens in a new tab) that under-moderation of content in Myanmar language contributed(opens in a new tab) to the act of genocide against the Rohingya Muslims.

However, the opponents of Ukraine are not interested in any explanations. The notorious Fox News journalist Tucker Carlson, referring to the mentioned interviews of Zelensky, concluded that the "main defender of democracy in the world" decided to "abolish democracy in Ukraine." Carlson's disinformation narrative about the “Zelensky dictatorship” and “cancellation of elections” was quickly picked up by other American figures, including US House of Representatives member Marjorie Taylor Green and a journalist Glen Greenwald. Civil Network OPORA investigated who else had joined the discreditation campaign in the American segment of Twitter and Facebook, and what key disinformation narratives about the Ukrainian elections are spreading in these social networks.

From the point of view of the design of disinformation narratives, the most popular tactics of the Russians in the context of the ZNPP are discrediting and disarmament. Russia is systematically mirroring evidence-based accusations by Ukraine and international observers in its direction of systematic shelling of a nuclear energy facility, storage of weapons on its territory, and intentions to use the ZNPP as a tool of pressure.

Two-thirds of respondents expressed their intent to come back to Ukraine, of which only 35% are planning to return home immediately after the end of the war. The key factors that influence immigrants’ intentions to return to Ukraine are: emotional connection with the Motherland and security in the home region (43% each), reunification with family and employment opportunities in Ukraine (38% each).

In the era of Twitter and Facebook just about anyone can create a new media resource with just a few clicks. It’s simple and cheap. This kind of democratization of the information space allows the new media to quickly carve out a niche and promote themselves to attract the attention of target audience, but it also leads to negative consequences by bringing the methods of manipulating public opinion to a whole new level. Over the past few years, Ukrainians have been subjected to many manipulation methods. These include coordinated networks of social media pages, clickbait headlines that trigger emotional reaction and help both truthful and fake news go viral, as well as sock-puppet farms – networks of fake user accounts that comment on social media posts to create an illusion of their popularity. Although the social media companies treat such activities as a violation of their standards, we still see hundreds of fake pages that are using these tools.

The city of Energodar and Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) have been occupied by the Russian army since the early days of the full-scale invasion despite the heroic resistance by local residents. Both the Russian diplomacy and the Russian military have a significant strategic advantage to take the identified dangerous object hostage, since the risks of an accident threaten the nuclear security of the entire region. On March 3, 2022, the Russian army entered Energodar and occupied Zapor...

After the abolition of martial law and the restoration of long-awaited peace, Ukraine will face many new challenges requiring an adequate response from the government and civil society. The post-war elections represent one such challenge. The list of potential problems includes the reformatting of  political space following the prohibition of pro-Russian parties, the prospect of holding vote in the regions that have been occupied since 2014, preparations for expression of the will of the peop...

Whereas by February 2022, new pro-Russian channels had been appearing sporadically, such as several channels per month, after February 2022 they appeared almost daily, often more than one per day. In order to evaluate the content shared by the occupation Telegram resources, we randomly selected 100 channels and overviewed their content. It can be divided into the following thematic blocks.

How oppositionist is the Russian “Opposition”? What ideas do they share in the media, also in Ukrainian media where they are invited even after more than a year into the full-scale war? How does their activity impact the international opinion, and therefore the attitude to the Russian-Ukrainian war? OPORA team was looking for answers to these questions in a thorough study of the media activity of Russians who present themselves as opposition to the current Russian government.