Russia’s State-backed Media Uses the Pandemic to Spin anti-Western Views. They are Not Alone. By Isabelle Khurshudyan – Washington Post
MOSCOW — After a Russian military contingent with medical equipment arrived in Rome last month, the Kremlin's English-language media outlets RT and Sputnik found video gold.
They highlighted an Italian man replacing an E.U. flag with a Russian one — deriding how Italy’s European partners “failed” to provide assistance to the coronavirus-stricken country while Russia “filled in.”
But when questions were raised about Russia’s aid, the state-funded outlets went on the defensive.
Italian newspaper La Stampa reported that roughly 80 percent of the supplies were “useless,” citing high-level political sources. RT called the story “ingratitude” and “ripping a page straight out of the U.S. media’s ‘Russiagate’ playbook.”
Another RT headline read, “How disinformation really works: Activists linked to pro-NATO think tank smear Russian covid-19 aid to Italy.”…