MApN dismantles Russia’s misinformation campaign
Russian publications have included Romania in a new misinformation campaign regarding the war in Ukraine and that prompted Bucharest’s quick response
Sorin Iordan, 23.01.2025, 13:50
Romania’s Ministry of National Defence has denounced a new misinformation campaign concerning Romania. Russian journalists have this time tackled the drone attack on the night between January 16th and 17th the Russian forces launched against the civil infrastructure of Ukraine’s ports, close to its border with Romania.
According to them, the attack was launched a day later, in the night between January 17th and 18th, allegedly against a convoy of Romanian troops or mercenaries trying to cross the Danube from Romania to Ukraine in their dinghies.
According to the aforementioned Russian sources, ground military installations belonging to Romania’s armed forces would have opened fire against the flying drones. The same propaganda material says that the drone attack, which has been ordered by high-ranking Russian army officers, would have caused significant casualties among the Romanian troops.
The Kremlin scenario also includes helicopter gunships belonging to the Romanian Air Force, involved in medevac operations and also supporting with fire the operation of the Ukrainian forces on the other bank of the river.
The aforementioned propaganda material has triggered a prompt response from Bucharest.
The Defence Ministry in Bucharest, also known as MApN, has described those presented by the Russian press as ‘absurdities without any real support’. The Ministry says that in the night between January 16th and 17th, the Romanian army’s monitoring and surveillance installations signaled a series of violations of Romania’s airspace, which imposed alerts issued for the residents of the Tulcea county and the activation of two F-16 jet fighters of the country’s air force.
Later, experts with the MApN, the Romanian Intelligence Service and the Interior Ministry, have identified two areas in which parts of the Russian drones fell to the ground.
The Romanian Defence Ministry says that although absurd and false, the information invented by Kremlin’s propaganda laboratories is in line with the pattern of the Russian operations aimed at influencing and manipulating the Romanian and allied public space.
According to MApN, their objective is to create a false perception that NATO would try to join the war against Russia and that Romania is being pushed into this conflict. The Romanian side says that this propaganda narrative is also targeting the Russians who are being manipulated into believing the myth of the besieged city, that Russia is in danger of being attacked by NATO, and that in Ukraine, the Russian invading troops are actually fighting NATO in the so-called ‘special military operation’
According to Bucharest, the reality, which the Kremlin propaganda is trying to cover up, is that Russia, which completely disdains international norms, has militarized the Black Sea, invaded Ukraine and illegally annexed Crimea in 2024, and since 2022 has been engaged in an illegal aggression war against a neighbouring sovereign country. Last, but not least, the Ministry says that it expects the false information presented in the aforementioned material to be taken over by the vectors of the Russian propaganda operating inside the Romanian public space and get hyped up mainly on digital platforms.
(bill)
