Pro-Russian disinformation in Bulgaria achieves its goals, experts say

Pro-Russian disinformation in Bulgaria has created a huge division in society and prevents the state from quickly making strategic foreign policy decisions, the leaders of the most influential fact-checking organisations in the country told Euractiv Bulgaria.

Euractiv Bulgaria interviewed Ralitsa Kovacheva (Factcheck.bg), Marina Tsekova (Bulgarian National Radio) and Rosen Bosev (AFP Factcheck), who stressed that disinformation in the country is so widespread that it easily influences national politics.

The latest Eurobarometer survey showed that Bulgarians are significantly less likely to admit that they have been targeted by fake news than the EU average (Bulgaria – 51%, EU27 – 68%). At the same time, only 44% of Bulgarians doubt information from social media, compared to the average for the EU (60%).

Against this backdrop, only 11% of Bulgarians support providing military aid to Ukraine, with similar results in Slovakia and Cyprus. The three countries rank last, compared to a EU27 average of 25% and the highest level of support registered in Sweden (71%) and Finland (63%).

A Globsec study showed similar results at the end of May 2023.

In the early days of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, the then-prime minister Kiril Petkov announced that he personally fully supports Kyiv but cited public opinion polls to justify Bulgaria’s official decision not to provide arms.

The country’s policy changed only in June of this year when the more pro-Western government led by Prime Minister Nikolai Denkov came to power.

“Pro-Russian disinformation created political risks in Bulgaria between 2014 and 2022 when Russia’s war against Ukraine began. Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, these political risks have fully materialised,” the editor-in-chief of the influential platform Fackcheck.bg Ralitsa Kovacheva commented.

Fackcheck.bg specialises in exposing the most popular disinformation stories on Facebook, which significantly impact Bulgarian society. The fact-check organisation was created under the umbrella of the Bulgarian office of the Association of European Journalists.

“Political messages help the spread of disinformation, and the inaction of the institutions provides the environment for the unimpeded spread of disinformation,” Kovacheva said.

Marina Tsekova, who heads the fact-checking department at Bulgarian National Radio, voiced a similar opinion.  The state radio fact-check department is the oldest in the country.

“People in the highest positions of the state instil fear, which is the best basis for fake news and propaganda“, she said.

Tsekova argued that the best way out of this situation was not to invite certain politicians for interviews or for journalists to react to every attempt at disinformation by the interviewee.

In Bulgaria, journalists usually do not react to obvious false statements by politicians.

Due to the enormous amount of disinformation on social networks, Tsekova urges the authorities to kickstart media literacy training in schools without delay.

Investigative journalist Rosev Bosev commented on the damage caused by Russian disinformation in Bulgaria. He works at the AFP’s digital investigations and fact-checking service.

“Like any large-scale disinformation, it does serious damage – blurs the lines between truth and lies. And it pushes the public to the conclusion that “everyone is bad”, which leads to the erosion of authority, of the state and the basic achievements of democracy such as the rule of law and the freedom of expression”, he said.

Where does the disinformation come from?

Various studies of the disinformation spread in Bulgaria show that many plots are imported. In many cases, the messages can be traced back to the Kremlin, Russian state media, Russian profiles, and social networks.

“Another part is directly fed by the ultra-conservative propaganda in the USA”, Ralitsa Kovacheva commented, adding that imported disinformation is being spread and used to attack the Bulgarian government.

“We could clearly see how disinformation related to the war in Ukraine disappeared when there was no regular government and immediately appeared when we had it in place. Disinformation is used to convince the public that Bulgaria should not help Ukraine and stay neutral,” Kovacheva says.

Marina Tsekova highlighted the neglect of the problem of disinformation by the institutions.

She said that each time she and her colleagues approached the institutions after having spotted fake narratives, the reaction had been, “Don’t waste our time with nonsense“.

Tsekova stressed that often disinformation plays with the patriotic feelings of Bulgarians, the narrative being that the EU acts to the detriment of Bulgarian interests. She said that fake news about the EU seeking to ban Bulgarian agricultural products is very often used.

While Bossev highlighted that the disinformation specific to Bulgaria conveys that Bulgarians lived better before 1989 when the Soviet bloc collapsed.

“Treading on the nostalgia of a part of the population, it is irradiated with false information about how well the economy, agriculture, health care, defence, etc. have been doing during communism,” he says, adding that such narrative lays the ground for anti-EU and anti-NATO propaganda.

Similarities with Slovakia

Kovacheva drew attention to similarities between Bulgaria and Slovakia, the countries whose citizens least support military aid to Ukraine.

“In both countries, there are influential political parties that have been spreading pro-Russian disinformation for a long time,” Kovacheva says.

She reminds us that during the last elections in Slovakia, won by the party of Robert Fico, the slogan “no more bullets“ was very popular. It was part of a campaign against sending arms to Ukraine.

“Absolutely the same motto is used in Bulgaria. Bulgaria and Slovakia have a common disinformation source,” Kovacheva says.

[Edited by Alice Taylor]

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