Report
Latvia Weekly: How Outrage Is Fueling a Populist Surge
The previously fringe Union of New Latvians party is now polling to pass the 5% threshold for Riga’s city council. Its leaders Glorija Grevcova and Rūdolfs Brēmanis are generating social media engagement through content which can be described as “outrage porn.” They are stirring up outrage in their audience using charged and even fake topics to provoke strong emotional reactions. Guess the populist political party which gained the most engagements for its posts on Facebook, TikTok and Telegram? It was not Roslikovs, the leader of Stability! party. It was not Ainārs Šlesers, Trump-like leader of Latvia First party. It was Glorija Grevcova and Rūdolfs Brēmanis from the Union New Latvians.
Weekly Reports
Lithuania Weekly: Another Removed Citizenship?
During this reporting period, Kremlin-aligned media channels in Lithuania promoted “Lithuanians are Russophobes” narrative. Following on the removal of Drobiazko’s citizenship, another case appeared in the Lithuanian media: famous Russian ballet dancer Ilzė Liepa, who openly praises Putin and his war in Ukraine, and who holds Lithuanian citizenship, is now being considered for removal of it. Some posts backed up the argument of Russophobia and called Liepa a “victim”, “Drobiazko-2”, and the whole situation as “outraging the Russophobes”.
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Latvia Weekly: Distrust in Latvian Politicians and Traditional Family
From the findings examined this week, the main narrative has switched from the Istanbul Convention as it is moving forward to be potentially ratified by the judicial committee signaling the failure of the prior disinformation attempts. The two most discussed topics in the examined week are the referendum for the dismissal of the current Latvian parliament and the excessive spending of the previous prime minister and current foreign minister Krišjānis Kariņš who has spent around 600 000 euros in private jet flights during his post-as a prime minister. There is a noticeable trend of content posted on Facebook and TikTok reaching audiences that do not support the views of the creator and express a more critical view. Additionally, more content is being posted on Twitter however it reaches little to no engagement.
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Estonia Weekly: Discrimination of Russian Speakers and Ukraine
This week primarily maintained the topics of economic situation, national language policy in Estonian schools and war in Ukraine. Also, the matters of European Union affairs are rather important, this week focusing on the question of veto rights for the EU member countries
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Lithuania Weekly: Diminishing Support for Ukraine
Kremlin-aligned media emphasised continuous criticism of the proposed property tax, rising prices, and increasing crime rates in the country, arguing that it is becoming dangerous to live in Lithuania. These hostile actors also continued to undermine Lithuania’s ongoing support for Ukraine by either backing up their arguments that Ukraine is being prioritised over domestic matters, or by claiming that other countries in the world (primarily, the U.S.) have already withdrawn their support and insisting that Lithuania should follow suit.
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Latvia Weekly: Istanbul Convention and Traditional Family
At the centre of discussion during the examined week was the Istanbul Convention. Although the Istanbul Convention had been a widely addressed topic prior to the examined week, the voting on the submission of the Istanbul Convention to the judicial commission of the Latvian parliament made the topic of primary importance as the ratification of the Convention in the near future became seemingly likely. What is more, the disinformation narratives relating to the Istanbul Convention (being against the traditional family, introducing social gender, and reinforcing pedophilia) are commonly shared between the most vocal and popular members of opposition parties. The content examined targeted both Latvian and Russian-speaking audiences. The primary difference between the two is the lack of any engagement by the Russian speaking audience that would be critical of the narratives expressed.
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Estonia Weekly: Distrust in the Government
This week posts over the social media and web-based news outlets were mainly focusing on the issue of Russian language status, economic issues, places of memory for the Soviet soldiers, as well as the “standard” Kremlin propaganda messages regarding the Estonian membership in NATO and European Union. Two “arguments” would highlight the week – that Estonian expenditures towards the national defense will destroy the production and manufacturing industry in Estonia, and that Estonian government would reinstate its independence and serve its citizens best, if Estonia would withdraw from EU and NATO and resume full scale economic ties with Russia. The main narratives of this week are as follows: that Estonian government intentionally is destroying production and industry in Estonia; the national policy of Estonia is discriminating Russian language; that Estonian government makes fun of the memory of Soviet soldiers who died in World War II by destroying their memorials; that war in Ukraine is a pretext to discriminate Russian language in Estonian schools for Russian speaking children; That while Estonia is a member of NATO and EU and until economic ties with Russia are restored, there is no independent Estonian government, that would care about interests of Estonian people.
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Lithuania Weekly: Protest’s Echoes
Kremlin-aligned outlets this week heavily concentrated on anti-government sentiments. Majority of the most engaged stories from this type of media covered domestic issues, harshly criticising either specific officials or the whole government in general. Issues related to Ukraine also remained of high importance, narratives concerning its prioritisation over Lithuania’s domestic issues and Ukraine’s “hardly possible” victory, were highly prominent. Of way lesser importance, but still prominent was the narrative covering war between Israel and Hamas. This time, far more articles emphasised military actions from Israel towards Gaza than in the previous period.
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Latvia Weekly: Istanbul Convention and LGBTQ
From the findings of the examined week, similar disinformation narratives to prior weeks have been followed. The main topic discussed throughout the content of various authors across several platforms is the Istanbul Convention. As the Latvian parliament moved closer to allowing the registration of same-sex partnerships, disinformation from authors close to the opposition parties or within the opposition parties themselves followed. The content examined tends to group the Istanbul Convention and same-sex partnerships under one roof despite the former addressing issues of domestic violence against women which has nothing in common with the latter. The main narratives include that the Istanbul Convention will somehow affect children’s teaching, which will be harmful. Additionally, a common narrative is that the United States is paying for the “lgbt propaganda” which is reflected in same-sex partnerships and the Istanbul Convention. However, when examining the sources to which the authors making such posts refer they lead to the United States government sites in which they talk about the budget given to fighting inequality of gender pay which has nothing to do with the lgbt movement.
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Estonia Weekly: Government Destroying Free Media and the Economy
This week Estonian media outlets and social media commentators were concerned about the economic issues and the strike of Estonian teachers, which was also utilized by the disinformation activists as a chance to address the national policy of transition to only Estonian teaching language in all state funded schools. Very interesting post on Facebook raised the issue of how the Russian speaking population relates to the Russian disinformation campaigns, and found no correlation in this regard. On a pure financial and economic note, the taxation policy of the current government is discussed this week, so arguing that “Kai Kallas’ government raises taxes and cuts costs during a recession, the same was done in 2008. during the crisis of the year also the Andrus Ansip government, which led Estonia to a deep economic downturn. Whis comes to the this week narratives, is that it is incorrect to relate Russian speaking population with any kind of Kremlin Propaganda and influence operations; That this is failure of Estonian government successfully to implement the transition to education in Estonian language for the Russian schools; That government does not care about family, their priorities are LGBT rights, language policy, military spending, that State loyal media is not reliable and That current Estonian taxation policies can lead to the same economic effects of 2008 world economic crisis.
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