Since February 2022, Francis Scarr has played a special role in the information landscape: Watching Russian TV so no one else has to🇧🇷 The more than 1,000 hours of programming the journalist watched provided key information for understanding the Kremlin’s communication strategy – and was crucial to Western countries’ news coverage.
Since 2018, Scarr, who works on the BBC Monitoring team, has been following the main programs on Russian television. in remarks Confidential NewspaperHe had no doubt, he says: The signs pointing to the invasion were all there. “In the end, it all started with the Kremlin trying to manipulate the population into accepting something like this.”
The key point in changing Russian communications occurred in 2014 with the annexation of CrimeaAnd the consequent sanctions imposed by the West. At that time, he began to take a clear aggressive stance, hostile to the West and to Ukraine. This is the kind of language that Russian citizens have been exposed to for years in this segment,” says Skar.
The journalist mainly focuses on Talk show and political discussion programmes, where the fiery and hostile rhetoric of pro-Putin commentators is evident. However, as he himself says, this rhetoric was present in Putin’s speeches and even in channels with an international projection, such as Russia Today or Sputnik. “Russian television has exploited and agitated Russians in recent years, paving the way for what Russia is doing now to be seen as acceptable.”
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