Such messages appeared in the Georgian segment of social networks. The reports said that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi compared the events in Georgia to the events in Ukraine nearly a decade ago during the Euromaidan period. The authors of the post assured that Zelenskyi made such a statement during one of his video messages and added that he “wishes the Georgians would achieve the same success as the Ukrainians did”. However, this is manipulation. In fact, as analysts of the MythDetector project found out that neither in the video fragment added to the message, nor in the full version of the appeal, the President of Ukraine made an identical or similar statement. He only expressed support for the Georgian people and thanked them for playing the Ukrainian anthem and for waving Ukrainian flags at the protests. On March 9, Volodymyr Zelenskyi indeed published a video message on his official Facebook page. The first part of the video deals with current events in Ukraine. In the second part, Zelenskyi reacted to the protests in Georgia against the bill on “transparency of foreign influence”. However, in the video message, Zelenskyi did not mention Euromaidan. He thanked the Georgian people for supporting the Ukrainians and noted that there is no Ukrainian who would not wish Georgia's success. That is, the authors of messages distorted the words of the Ukrainian president on social networks. 

This thesis is broadcast by Russian propaganda in the media and telegram channels. The bill on replacing the Moldovan language with Romanian in official office work was adopted in the first reading by the ruling party of Moldova “Action and Solidarity”. The reports also claim that the team of Moldovan President Maia Sandu is trying to divert public attention from pressing problems. That is why she raises the “historically difficult” question of language.

The case attracted the attention of analysts from the EU vs Disinfo project, who are convinced that this message is intended to nourish the Kremlin propaganda narrative about “the loss of sovereignty by Moldova” and “the installation of external control by Western curators”.

In fact, in the declaration of independence of Moldova, adopted in 1991, the official language of the country is Romanian. In December 2013, the Constitutional Court of Moldova recognized that this document has a higher legal force than the constitution, so the state language should be called “Romanian”. It is considered native by 82.2% of Moldovan citizens. In addition, the International organization for standardization has officially recognized the Romanian language of Moldova.

As for the history of the “Moldavian” language, in 1940 the USSR annexed Bessarabia, introducing not only a new political regime, but also a new language and Cyrillic alphabet. The local population of Moldova was declared as a “Moldovan people”, allegedly different from the Romanian. Subsequently, the Soviet authorities made attempts to justify the existence of a separate “Moldovan language and nation”, resorting even to pseudo-scientific interpretations of their Slavic origin.

Now Russia is using such manipulations to create the appearance that Moldova is a puppet of the so-called collective West. Propagandists are trying to show that the President of Moldova makes all decisions only under the dictation of Western curators. The Russian propaganda machine is spreading similar messages in relation to other sovereign states. Particularly in Georgia. A similar narrative regarding Ukraine has also been circulating in the information space over the past nine years.

Such information appeared in the Russian propaganda media. In particular, the reports said that The Times allegedly published information about the losses in the Armed Forces of Ukraine that shocked the public. Like, the losses are so great that they shock not only the public, but also NATO instructors. It seems that the Alliance has not encountered this before. The authors of the reports also add that the British publication allegedly claims that the nature of the injuries is severe, and doctors need to constantly choose “who would live and who would die”. However, this is fake. The publication did not publish materials of this kind.

The fact-checkers of The Insider drew attention to the case. In fact, The Times published an article entitled “Putin’s forces will face a dead end in Donbas, Kyiv vows”. The article says Zelenskiy said his soldiers kill hundreds of Wagner fighters every day as they try to outflank the city in a frontal attack. “In less than a week, starting on March 6, in the Bakhmut direction alone, we managed to destroy more than 1,100 enemy soldiers, an irretrievable loss of Russia right there, near Bakhmut”, Zelensky said. The article also said that Ukrainian forces would also suffer losses, in particular, the Russians reported that more than 220 Ukrainian soldiers were killed in 24 hours. “But none of these figures can be independently verified”, the article said.

That is, The Times did not write about excessive and shocking losses in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The journalists only described that Ukraine and Russia report enemy losses. However, Russia needs such fakes to create the appearance that the situation at the front is constantly deteriorating, and the Ukrainian army is weak and incapable of combat.

This thesis is spread by propaganda media and on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Russian rhetoric. They say that Western countries have found a new puppet for themselves - Georgia - and provoked protests there. They also add in the reports that protests against the Georgian authorities are beneficial for Western states, because they do not want Georgia to be independent of them.

Analysts of the EU vs Disinfo project drew attention to the case. They note that there is indeed no evidence that the recent protests in Georgia were orchestrated by Western states as an attempt at a violent change of power.

In fact, the protests in Tbilisi arose after the Georgian parliament passed in the first reading a bill requiring some organizations that receive foreign funding to register as “foreign agents”. As Detector Media has already written, the law is considered analogous to the notorious ban on “foreign agents” in Russia, which actually suppressed the already weak voices of the opposition and made it impossible for international monitoring missions to be present inside the country. The law, adopted by the Georgian Parliament on March 7, 2023, provides for the creation of a register of “agents of foreign influence”. That is, the authorities must create a special open database of organizations and individuals if the share of foreign investments in their activities is at least 20%.

During the protests, Georgian law enforcement officers used tear gas, pepper spray and water cannons. However, as a result of massive protests, the Georgian parliament rejected the “foreign agents” bill after the incumbent party withdrew its support.

Russian propagandists reacted to the protest in the first days. In particular, they claimed that the protests in Georgia were orchestrated by the United States. By spreading such messages, propagandists seek to nourish the narrative of so-called Western governance. Allegedly, Georgia is really controlled by Western curators. The same narrative has been circulating in the information space regarding Ukraine for about nine years now. So, Russian propaganda seeks to neutralize the subjectivity of other states; to show that they themselves really do not decide anything.

Journalists from a group of international publications exposed the Russian strategy of political and economic takeover of Moldova. They are talking about the document “Strategic goals of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Moldova”. According to Dossier journalists, it was developed by the presidential administration for cross-border cooperation of the Presidential administration and coordinated with the Russian special services.

The authors divided the goals in the document into several groups: military-political, trade-economic and humanitarian. However, it is precisely the realistic goals for the next ten years that the authors of the strategy consider:

• opposition to the influence of NATO and the EU in Moldova;

• forcing Moldova to participate in the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization, which includes Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan), the Eurasian Economic Union and other Russian international projects;

• settlement of the Transnistrian conflict on the basis of the special status of Transnistria (of course, with the participation of Russia);

• building up pro-Russian sentiment in society through propaganda and educational programs.

The journalists add that, according to the exposed document, by 2022 the Russian Presidential administration planned to prevent the Moldovan authorities from excluding Russia from the settlement of the Transnistrian conflict and wanted to maintain the Russian military presence in the unrecognized territory. It is reported that the tasks of the Presidential administration also included the support of Moldovan pro-Russian politicians.

The document also refers to Russia's plans to exploit Moldova's dependence on Russian imports in order to neutralize the republic's policy, which is contrary to the interests of the Kremlin.

Earlier, Dossier journalists published a similar document on Belarus. It is known that both “strategies” were developed in the same department.

A group of publications worked on exposing the document: Dossier (Russia), RISE (Moldova), Delfi (Estonia), Kyiv Independent (Ukraine), Belarusian Investigative Center (Belarus), Yahoo News (USA), Süddeutsche Zeitung (Germany), West Rundfunk (Germany), Norddeutscher Rundfunk (Germany), Expressen (Sweden), Frontstory (Poland) and VSquare (Visegrad Group (V4)).

Such information appeared in the Russian propaganda media. Reports say that the fact that Ukraine will not receive planes from abroad was allegedly announced by Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. Like, Ukraine is already desperate and there is no optimism that fighters from partners will still arrive. However, this is manipulation.

As StopFake analysts found out, propagandists distorted Dmytro Kuleba's commentary to the German publication Bild am Sonntag.

In fact, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said that Ukraine, on the contrary, has no doubt that it will receive fighter jets from allied countries. However, he added that the acquisition process could take a long time despite the work being done.

Propagandists use such manipulation to reassure the audience that Ukraine will not receive weapons from Western partners to fight Russia. They say that even Ukrainian officials do not believe in new deliveries, so there will definitely not be weapons. Thus, Russia creates the appearance that Ukraine is allegedly losing the support of the West and will soon be left without any help.

This thesis appeared in Russian propaganda media and telegram channels broadcasting pro-Russian rhetoric. Reports say that Ukraine has allegedly brought the defense of the EU countries to a “terrible state”. The authors of the messages refer to the publication of columnists for the American edition of Foreign Affairs Max Bragman and Sophia Bash. However, this is manipulation.

This media really published a publication with the title “Why European Defense Still Depends on America” dated March 7, 2023. However, as StopFake analysts note, the Foreign Affairs publication does not at all state that Ukraine allegedly “brought the EU defense capability to a terrible state”. In fact, the authors of the publication write that Russia's military aggression against Ukraine revealed already existing problems in the defense of European countries, and that these problems also remain unresolved even after a year of war.

However, such messages are beneficial to Russian propaganda. Thus, propagandists create the appearance that due to the fact that the EU countries send weapons to Ukraine, they themselves are weakening.

Such messages are spread by Russian propaganda media and telegram channels broadcasting pro-Russian rhetoric. As proof of their words, the authors of the messages add an audio recording that they tried to pass off as a “leak” from a meeting of US President Joseph Biden with American congressmen that was closed to the press. Allegedly, Biden officially admitted at this meeting that Putin and Russia cannot be defeated. However, this is fake.

The StopFake fact-checkers drew attention to the case. As it turned out, the propagandists are referring to the audio, which they call “the leak of a conversation between the President of the United States and American congressmen to the network”, however, a male voice that has only a slight resemblance to Biden’s voice sounds on the 15-second recording.

However, the audio recording, according to fact-checkers, does not sound like the voice of President Biden, but his imitation. “StopFake offered to listen to the audio to several Americans, and they all said with confidence that English is not native to the person they are trying to pass off as Biden's words. The audio, allegedly proving the revelation of President Biden, does not sound at all like the voice of the American president, but a clumsy fake with gross phonetic errors”, the fact-checkers write.

However, the dissemination of such fakes is beneficial for Russian propagandists in order to once again show that no one supposedly believes in the victory of Ukraine including its devoted partners. They say that everyone has long understood that there is no point in fighting against Russia, because it is not victorious. Thus, propagandists seek to convince the audience that victory is definitely for Russia.