BRUSSELS, Belgium: France, Germany and Poland have become “permanent” targets for Russian disinformation attacks in the run-up to European Parliament elections this week, a senior EU official said Tuesday.
The European Union has repeatedly warned heading toward the June 6-9 vote that Russia would ramp up disinformation campaigns in the 27-country bloc.
“There are three big countries under permanent attack (from Russia). And it’s France, it’s Germany, and it’s Poland,” said EU commissioner Vera Jourova, pointing to work by the European Digital Media Observatory, of which AFP is part.
There are “more massive disinformation attacks on specific topics,” said Jourova, the commissioner for values and transparency. For example, in France they are focused on this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris.
In Germany, she said, they exploit concerns over migration and security, while in Poland, a narrative has appeared online that Ukrainian refugees are a “burden.”
She pointed to a false story on the Polish state news agency last week stating that Poles would be mobilized to fight in Ukraine, which authorities said was likely a Russian cyberattack.
“Russian propaganda is done with... very good knowledge of which country has some sensitivities, which country can absorb better the narratives,” Jourova said.
The propaganda was also spread through the Telegram messaging app in countries such as Slovakia, Bulgaria and the Baltic states, she said.
Telegram does not have to comply with the strictest rules for “very large” platforms with at least 45 million monthly active users under the EU’s landmark content moderation law, known as the Digital Services Act (DSA).
“Telegram is not under our competence yet, but we are now counting the users of Telegram because they announced to us that (they) have 42 million users,” she said.
Jourova was speaking to journalists in Brussels after a visit to the United States to meet with executives of the world’s biggest tech companies, including X and YouTube.
She said she urged “maximum vigilance in these last days,” warning the risk remained.
She said she also reminded the companies of their stringent obligations under the DSA.
Jourova’s comments come a day after similar findings by Microsoft in a new report.
The US tech giant’s Threat Analysis Center said Russia was waging an intense disinformation campaign aimed at tarnishing the reputation of the International Olympic Committee and stoking fears of violence at the Games.
Microsoft President Brad Smith, who was in Brussels to meet EU officials including Jourova, echoed her concerns about Russian influence operations.
“The number one abusive AI case that people are worried about is the risk of deepfakes influencing elections, especially deepfakes that come from foreign governments,” Smith said,
“And we’ve definitely seen the Russian government investing in that capability.”
France, Germany, Poland facing ‘permanent’ Russian disinformation attacks: EU
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France, Germany, Poland facing ‘permanent’ Russian disinformation attacks: EU
- The European Union has repeatedly warned heading toward the June 6-9 vote that Russia would ramp up disinformation campaigns in the 27-country bloc
One dead, five injured as car slams into crowd in France: prosecutors
ROUEN, France: A car slammed into a crowd in the town of Evreux in northern France early Saturday, killing one person and injuring five others, prosecutors told AFP.
After an altercation at a wine bar, “a person allegedly went to fetch a vehicle” and “deliberately reversed at high speed into a crowd outside the establishment,” prosecutor Remi Coutin said, adding that two people were in critical condition.
EU top diplomat ‘not optimistic’ on sanctioning Israel
COPENHAGEN: EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Saturday she was “not optimistic” the bloc would take action against Israel over the war in Gaza due to splits between member states.
Foreign ministers meeting in Denmark will discuss a proposal to suspend EU funding to Israeli start-ups as initial punishment for the situation in Gaza.
But the bloc has so far failed to garner the majority needed to take that step — let alone move ahead with more forceful measures against Israel.
“I’m not very optimistic, and today we are definitely not going to adopt decisions,” Kallas told journalists at the start of the Denmark meeting.
“It sends a signal that we are divided.”
Splits within the European Union between countries backing Israel and those favoring the Palestinians have seen the 27-nation bloc often left hamstrung in the face of the dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
A string of EU countries are pushing for more far-reaching punishment for Israel, but have been frustrated.
Denmark’s foreign minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, whose country holds the EU’s rotating presidency, insisted the bloc “must change words into action.”
He said Copenhagen backed suspending trade cooperation with Israel, sanctioning far-right Israeli ministers, and banning imports from illegal settlements.
Israel is facing pressure at home and abroad to end its offensive in Gaza, where the vast majority of the population has been displaced at least once and the United Nations has declared a famine.
The war in Gaza began after Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 63,025 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Gaza that the UN considers reliable.
Floods, landslides kill at least 11 in India’s Jammu region
- An intense monsoon rainstorm in the Indian-administered territory since Tuesday has caused widespread chaos
- Floods and landslides are common during the June-September monsoon season
SRINAGAR, India: Floods and landslides triggered by record-breaking rain killed at least 11 people, including four children, in India’s Jammu and Kashmir, officials said Saturday.
An intense monsoon rainstorm in the Indian-administered territory since Tuesday has caused widespread chaos, with raging water smashing into bridges and swamping homes.
A local disaster official said that Ramban and Reasi districts were hit by heavy rainfall and landslides on Friday night, killing 11 people.
One child aged five was trapped in the debris and still missing, he added.
On Wednesday, a landslide slammed the pilgrimage route to the Hindu shrine of Vaishno Devi in Jammu, killing 41 people.
India’s Meteorological Department said the torrential rain had smashed records at two locations in the region.
Jammu and Udhampur recorded their highest 24-hour rainfall on Wednesday, with 296 millimeters (11.6 inches) in Jammu, nine percent higher than the 1973 record, and 629.4 mm (24.8 inches) in Udhampur – a staggering 84 percent surge over the 2019 mark.
Floods and landslides are common during the June-September monsoon season, but experts say climate change, coupled with poorly planned development, is increasing their frequency, severity and impact.
Climate experts from the Himalayan-focused International Center for Integrated Mountain Development warn that a spate of disasters illustrates the dangers when extreme rain combines with mountain slopes weakened by melting permafrost, as well as building developments in flood-prone valleys.
Powerful torrents driven by intense rain smashed into Chisoti village in Indian-administered Kashmir on August 14, killing at least 65 people and leaving another 33 missing.
Floods on August 5 overwhelmed the Himalayan town of Dharali in India’s Uttarakhand state and buried it in mud. The likely death toll from that disaster is more than 70 but has not been confirmed.
Thailand power vacuum will ‘not affect’ border security: defense ministry
- Constitutional Court sacked prime minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra over her handling of a border row with Cambodia
BANGKOK: Thailand’s lack of a formal government will not affect border security with Cambodia, the defense ministry said Saturday, as the kingdom scrambles to fill a power vacuum following the dismissal of the prime minister by the Constitutional Court.
The Southeast Asian nation was thrown into political turmoil on Friday when the court sacked prime minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra over her handling of a border row with Cambodia, saying she had “not upheld the ethical code of conduct.”
The ruling has left Thailand with an acting prime minister, Phumtham Wechayachai, and a caretaker cabinet which will stay on until a new government is formed as early as next week.
On Saturday morning the acting cabinet held a special meeting confirming the arrangement, with no new major announcements.
Deputy Defense Minister Natthapon Nakpanich said having an acting government would “not affect” the country’s ability to safeguard its sovereignty amid a fragile ceasefire at the border with Cambodia.
“It’s not a problem. The army chief has already assigned responsibilities to handle specific situations,” he told reporters.
Paetongtarn, daughter of billionaire ex-prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, was suspended from office last month after being accused of failing to stand up for Thailand in a June call with powerful former Cambodian leader Hun Sen, which was leaked online.
In July, tensions between Thailand and Cambodia spiralled into the two sides’ deadliest military clashes in decades, with more than 40 people killed and 300,000 forced to flee their homes along the border.
Thailand and Cambodia’s leaders agreed to an “unconditional” ceasefire at the end of July, after five days of combat along their jungle-clad frontier.
A nine-judge panel in the Constitutional Court ruled by six to three on Friday that Paetongtarn had not upheld the ethical standards required of a prime minister and removed her from office.
The ruling, which also dissolved her cabinet, came a year after the same court ousted her predecessor as prime minister, Srettha Thavisin, in an unrelated ethics case.
Paetongtarn was the sixth prime minister from the political movement founded by her father to face judgment by the Constitutional Court.
Parliament will vote on a new prime minister perhaps as early as next week, but there is no obvious replacement for Paetongtarn waiting to take over.
Parties have been eager to meet and strategise ways to secure a majority vote in parliament for their own candidates.
Under the constitution, only candidates nominated for prime minister at the last general election in 2023 are eligible.
Four of those names are out of the running, three of whom are banned by court order and one whose party failed to get enough MPs elected to qualify.
The remaining four include Prayut Chan-O-Cha, an ex-general who led a 2014 coup and served as prime minister until 2023, and Anutin Charnvirakul, leader of the Bhumjaithai party which was a former partner in Paetongtarn’s coalition government.
EU’s Kallas says Russia won’t get frozen assets back without paying reparations
- Some $245.85 billion of Russian assets are frozen in the bloc under sanctions imposed on Moscow
- Members have called for the EU to confiscate the assets and use them to support Kyiv
COPENHAGEN: European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Saturday it was not possible to imagine giving back Russian assets frozen inside the bloc due to the war in Ukraine unless Moscow has paid reparations.
“We can’t possibly imagine that ... if ... there is a ceasefire or peace deal that these assets are given back to Russia if they haven’t paid for the reparations,” she told reporters before a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Copenhagen.
The EU says some 210 billion euros ($245.85 billion) of Russian assets are frozen in the bloc under sanctions imposed on Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine and some EU countries, including Poland and the Baltic states, have called for the EU to confiscate the assets and use them to support Kyiv.
But EU heavyweights France and Germany – along with Belgium, which holds most of the assets – have rebuffed such calls.
They have pointed out that the EU has earmarked future profits from the assets to repay support for Ukraine and questioned whether there is a legal basis to confiscate them.
Diplomats say the debate is now turning to how the funds might be used, after the war in Ukraine comes to a halt.
