How Putin’s propaganda foundation sells itself across Portugal
In addition to having links to various associations that are helping to welcome refugees, the disinformation organization created by the Russian leader has bet on opening centers in universities. Russians guarantees that the Russkiy Mir Foundation has only cultural purposes, but the Ukrainians and a document of determination of European political and strategic objectives
The Russkiy Mir Foundation, which the European Parliament denounced as a means of Russian propaganda and disinformation, has set up in Portugal, over the last few years, a network with several centers of intervention, such as immigrant associations and study centers at universities. In fact, according to the internal documentation of this Russian propaganda and influence body that was created by Vladimir Putin, Portugal has been seen as a “region of interest” for years. The leader of this foundation is Vyacheslav Nikonov, one of the Russian oligarchs who was sanctioned by the US due to the war in Ukraine.
This foundation has now been discovered by being discovered to host associations from other areas, but spread to other areas, such as education liaison. In addition to the collaboration of at least five non-governmental organizations with collaboration in Lisbon, Aveiro Go, Portim and Setúbal with their own collaboration with architects), Russkiy Mir created by Vladimir Putin in 2007, Russkiy Mir Foundation, created by Vladimir Putin in 2007 , Foundation to found Russian centers at the University of Coimbra, the University of Lisbon and the University of Minho.
At the University of Coimbra there is a center for Russian studies, created by the foundation since 2012. It was, in fact, the first Russian-speaking center of its kind to open in the Iberian Peninsula.
For the inauguration, on October 22 of that year, Vasily Istratov, vice president of the foundation, close to Putin and currently ambassador to Azerbaijan, flew from Moscow to Coimbra. Arrived there, second documentation on the official page of the Russki Mir Foundation, investigated the institution’s rector, João Gabriel e Silva at that time, with the foundation making a point of including in the documentation that presents the responsible speech of Portuguese on its online page, underlining the statements by the rector who, stating, that Center “with the help of the Russkiy Mir Foundation and the Russian Embassy, the university has opened a new path of knowledge”. culture, in the social sphere and, above all, in the field of the economy” would develop.
According to a statement from the university itself in the year in which this study center was founded, Russkiy Mir chose Coimbra because of the “high number of students”.
Over the last few years, this center has organized conferences and supported students, with the aim of bringing them closer to an “millennial culture and a language spoken by millions of people around the world, which has become increasingly popular”. most important”, according to information released by the college itself.
At the head of this center is Russian Vladimir Ivanovich Plyasov, professor of Russian Language and Culture at the University of Coimbra and representative of the Russkiy Mi Frenter foundation in that city, where he has lived since the 1980s.
The last event of this Center for Russian Studies, which appears in the foundation documents, took place in 2021 and was precisely the celebration of the “Immortal Regiment” in Belgrade. In partnership with Russkiy Mir, a volunteer from Coimbra presented to the capital of Serbia a work about “an official of the allied party who participated in battles for the liberation of Crimea, Stalingrad, Donetsk and Berlin”.
In addition to the Center for Russian Studies in Coimbra, there is a document in the Russkiy Mir archive with data from June 15, 2012 that informs about the opening of the foundation’s “office” at the University of Minho. “This event involves the participation of the university’s rector”, António Cunha, as well as “the Russian Embassy and students of the Humanities course”, reads the note from Putin’s body.
This office operates today with the aim of speaking Russian at a global level “to promote the Russian language and culture worldwide” and to “offer support and clarification to Russian citizens residing abroad, as well as to foreign citizens who demonstrate in the Russia”.
In Lisbon, Putin’s foundation supported the creation of the ALOG project, implementing the creation of the Letters project at the University of Lisbon, dedicated to foreign language, teaching and learning Russian, promoting open courses and lectures with the partial support of Russian learning Foundation Russkiy Mir.
“The Russkiy Mir Foundation students for the Russian cause, with an academic level”, guarantees Pavlo Sadhoka to CNN Portugal, president of the Association of Ukrainians in Portugal, explaining that this foundation “works on two levels”. The first, he says, “has to do with disinformation and propaganda work”, the second is related “with the recruitment of agents who pass on information about the country”, “all types of information, such as the political, economic and Social”.
The foundation’s interest in the various Portuguese entities has been going on for several years. Even before the annexation of Crimea, there are internal documents from the Russkiy Mir Foundation reporting on various political and social events that have the presence of prominent Portuguese figures. In information published on the foundation’s website, there was an “event of high society at the Palace of Livadia, at the invitation of the government of Crimea, Ukraine”, on September 25, 2013, attended by the Duke of Bragança, Duarte Pio, with photographs.
According to the foundation, the invitation was addressed to several members of the noble families by the director of the Russian Imperial House, Maria Vladimirovna.
The Russian Embassy in Portugal guarantees, however, that it aims to speak the Russian language by establishing “contacts with academic assistance circles and Russian-only centers. That was the answer given to CNN Portugal following an article about links to Putin about associations that are hosting refugees in Portugal.
But for Ukrainians, the goals of this foundation are different. Its own ambassador for Ukraine in Lisbon denounced in an exclusive interview with CNN Portugal about immigrant associations and that they may be putting the safety of family members and relatives fighting this war at risk.
Pavlo Sadhoka, on the other hand, guarantees that this foundation played an important role in “preparing the current Russian invasion”.
MEP Paulo Rangel, who in 2016 voted in favor of a European Parliament resolution that encouraged the fight against these propaganda and disinformation organizations, especially this foundation, stressed to CNN Portugal that Russkiy Mir is “the long arm of the Russian secret services”, a fact that is “widely documented” by the European Parliament. On the line, Ana Gomes, a former MEP who gave the green light to the EP’s resolution, recalled that the same foundation of Putine propaganda and training EP, “also stores the same data in EP”.
On the other hand, the Ukrainian government has launched in its country, after the invasion of Russia, a counterintelligence operation against members linked to this foundation. On March 14, Kiev’s secret services detained a woman who “actively promoted the Russkiy Mir foundation”, transmitting to Russia “photos and videos with the location of military personnel and equipment of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Cherkasy region”.
This body, it is recalled, has been headed since its foundation by Vyacheslav Nikonov, of Parliament and one of the 328 political members seen Russians in the US citations to the Kremlin, decreed in April.
Before becoming a deputy, Nikonov was a member of Gorbachev’s staff., Yeltsin and Putin. He is one of the current Russian leader’s trusted men and president of the Moscow University public school of administration.