How Russian Media Networks are Seeking to Manipulate the Arabic Content on Twitter
This is the English version of a report that was published in Arabic on June 21st 2022. Since then most of the accounts mentioned in the report were suspended by Twitter.
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Coinciding with the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the 24th of last February, hundreds of Arabic-speaking accounts appeared on Twitter, which were created recently and joined with relatively old accounts.
All these new and relatively old accounts are implicated in promotion and publicity campaigns for Moscow. Alongside spreading false and deceptive information about the facts of the war that has been happening there for months, and with a quick look at the activities of these accounts, it seems that they are Russian networks that function as a part of a harmonized campaign that seeks to promote Moscow’s point of view.
It is striking to note that all these Arabic-speaking accounts which are supportive of Russia in their dealing with the war, embrace the highlighting of the narrative of “The Just War” and repeats Moscow’s narrative that “It is fighting a just war to defend its interests and the interests of poor countries, against Western countries that rule the world under the banner of the “New World Order”.
The war in Ukraine has placed Western countries, headed by the United States of America, in direct confrontation with Russia, after Washington and several other Western capitals executed a bunch of strict sanctions on Moscow.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has also influenced the flow of wheat supplies to the world, since Kyiv and Moscow are considered amongst the leading exporters of wheat in the world. This catastrophe has cast its shadows on poor countries, especially on the African continent, where the Russian presence has been outspreading for years, particularly in Sudan.
Most of the accounts subject to the investigation appear mainly under the title, Al-ahdath or “The events”. For example, there are accounts under the name “American Events”, “Chinese Events” and “Russian Events”. Moreover, there are other accounts with Russian names that involve people who are claiming to be Russian journalists, media personnel and diplomats.
The publishing approach practiced by these accounts is based on spreading false, fabricated or fragmented news, in what is done in many situations; That these different accounts post similar content, even though it is presumed that there is no objective connection between an account dealing with American news, and another dealing with Russian news, for example.
These accounts also publish news about Russian war and military equipment.
Furthermore, these accounts sometimes retweet from official Russian journalistic platforms such as RT Arabic. For instance, the “American Events” account re-tweeted a video of a march in Jerusalem on the 4th of June 2022 , which was initially published by the official Russian agency.
In some cases, these accounts publish news that generally have no objective link in the way they are handled with regard to its main publishing activity. For example, an account under the name “Urgent||War||News” which is primarily active in the Russian-Ukrainian war news was followed by over 14,000 individuals at the time of publishing of this report last year. It now has over 100K followers.
This account posted news about members of the Indian government insulting the Islamic religion, which Muslim rulers formally condemned, but the account intentionally triggered religious strife by insulting and demeaning one of the Indian religions, which reinforces the belief that these accounts specifically aim at the influence on Arabic speakers on Twitter, besides that it basically revives the tone of hatred among the different nations of the world.
These accounts also function as media platforms for Russian war propaganda, and that is through publishing some of the Russian strikes on Ukraine. They also work on refining the image of the Russia by sharing stories of them with Ukrainian captives that reflect humane behavior.
Among the accounts that popularize the Russian propaganda extensively is an account named “Political Events). This account is active in disseminating misleading and fabricated news by associating it to American newspapers, or Ukrainian or European administrators. Taking this tweet for instance, numerous accounts commented on it with the same standpoint, without there being an objective link between them, which proposes that these accounts work within one media network with synchronized activity.
Every so often, accounts – whether new or indistinct – rush to publish these tweets, or comment on them according to Russian propaganda and interests. For example, on the past 26th of May, an account named “The Russian Empire” (now suspended), followed by more than 16,000 people, published a tweet about what it allegedly proposed was “a special and qualitative operation performed by the Russian forces, according to which they captured American (kamikaze) drones that were in the custody of the Ukrainian army.” Instantly, 122 other accounts quickly retweeted it, while an account named “Khaled” that displays a photo of the Russian President Vladimir Putin on its profile, shared it as a Quote Tweet under the caption “excellent”. Commentors engaged in praising “the Russian triumph” over the United States. Most of the accounts that have commented or reposted the tweet are new and ambiguous accounts.
In a further example, an account named “Chechnya Forces” (now suspended) which was created last April and had more than 8K followers, posted a photo on the 6th of June 2022, about “The Russian Kitchen” which posted before that by an account under the name “The Russian Military Correspondence”, created last April too. It was followed by about 10K people on the same day. Only five accounts are followed by the “Chechnya forces” account on Twitter which are: “Russian media figure”, “Kassandra Kozlov” (now suspended), “Strategic”, “Russia Today” and “Political Events”. All of these accounts, except for the account “Political Events” and “Kassandra Kozlov”, were created after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and they are all connected to Russia.
The “Strategic” account, which was created last April and is followed by over 28K people, is specifically active in Tunisian affairs, but it mostly embraces the Russian narrative about the war in Ukraine.
In another example, an account known as “The Russian Events” – and there are many accounts with a matching name – was created in February 2022. It posted its first tweet on the 24th of February 2022, in which it claimed the fall of the Ukrainian city Kharkiv in the hands of the Russian forces succeeding the Russian invasion of Ukraine. On that day, the account also posted dozens of tweets advocating for Russia, and most of the tweets contain misleading information.
The same account also posted on the 25th of February 2022, an image of a contract containing a comparison between two refugees, Syrian and Ukrainian, with the following comment: “The same situation but not the same sympathy. Oh God, grant victory to Islam, Muslims and Muslim countries,” although Russia is involved in the Syrian war, in which hundreds of thousands were massacred.
Among the accounts that promote the Russian war on Ukraine is an account in the name of Chechen President “Ramzan Kadyrov” (now suspended) who is loyal to Moscow. It was created in February 2022, coinciding with the beginning of the war, and has more than 76K followers, where in the account he called through a tweet on the 6th of June 2022, for the continuation of the war “until the United States and the West lift all sanctions against Russia and apologize for that”.
An account in the name of “The Chechen Forces” retweeted the tweet of “Ramzan Kadyrov”. And on the 6th of June 2022, an account under the name “Elena Kosogrove” – with more than 94K followers and also created in February 2022 – posted a tweet in which she said, “Russia declares a state of high alertness and readiness for hypersonic intercontinental ballistic missile.” The owner of the account claims that she works as a journalist for the Russian agency Sputnik.
There is also an account named “Caricature” (now suspended) that was established last March and has about 5K followers. The account used to post caricatures from official Russian press agencies promoting the war against Ukraine, such as the Russian agency Sputnik.
The number of Arabic accounts that take on the Russian narrative may not be possibly counted. Among these accounts is an account under the name “Savinova Yakushina” (now suspended) – created last March and followed by over 3K people – who claims that she is a Russian diplomat. The account is active in sharing news of the Russia-Ukrainian war, and posts news that it ascribes to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs or any other government in the world.
It is obvious from the general content of these unlimited accounts, as well as their association with each other, in retweeting tweets or commenting, and the establishment of most of them in concurrence with the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, that they work within a single network functioning to promote the Russian narrative concerning the war against Ukraine in an attempt to influence millions of Arabic speakers on Twitter, especially after Twitter constrained Russian official and media accounts with the beginning of its invasion of Ukraine, on the 24th of February 2022.
What reinforces the belief that these accounts operate within a Russian network that is targeted at manipulating the public opinion of Arabic speakers on Twitter, is the preceding and documented Russian actions in such matters, including the well-known incident in 2016 when Russian networks attempted to influence the course of the US elections, which elicited a huge controversy among the public opinion there.
And with the progress of Russian leverage on African countries in the past years, Facebook (Meta later) announced in the last three years the dismantling of several networks that were working to spread misleading news in a number of countries, including Sudan.
In 2019, Facebook announced that a Russian disinformation network targeted Sudan and encompassed 20 different accounts and 18 pages, some of which were impersonating news organizations.
And later in October 2021, Facebook announced the suspension of 116 pages, 666 accounts, and 69 groups, along with 92 accounts on Instagram operating within a network directed at influencing and manipulating the public opinion in Sudan.