The Germs of “Russian World” online project, created by the Texty Ukrainian publication, allows checking the names of prominent individuals, media, public figures, and politicians in 19 European countries for links to Russian influence.
The project was published last December. “The study offered a comprehensive insight into the people and organizations that support Russia and its policy in various forms in 19 countries of Europe. We managed to identify over 1,300 individuals and some 900 organizations that met the following criteria: voting for pro-Russian decisions and issuing statements in support of the war or calling to drop the sanctions, taking part in pro-Russian propagandist shows, partnering with the institutions which facilitate Russia’s cultural expansion etc.” journalists wrote.
In February 2024, the project began to be actively used in the Baltic countries and the Czech Republic to identify pro-Russian figures. Over the last week, journalists recorded a significant increase in traffic to the English-language version of the initiative.
Popular Estonian blogger Thomas Ilves shared a recent investigation by Baltic publications Re:Baltica, Delfi.ee, and the Russian outlet The Insider on social media platform X (Twitter). The investigation revealed that a European Parliament member from Latvia, Tatjana Ždanoka, had been collaborating with FSB (Federal Security Service) personnel since 2005.
There are more Russian spies in EU Parliament, Latvian lawmakers say.
Latvians aren’t the only one to say it.https://t.co/LEfxctwxJd
— toomas ilves, ex-verif (@IlvesToomas) January 31, 2024
“Under his post, in the comments, we dropped a link to our project. Like, take a look, there are many such characters all over Europe. We posted and forgot. But it was just the beginning. Our reply tweet went viral; as of preparing this text, it was seen by 105,000 Twitter users and had over 50 retweets. It gained particular traction in the Czech Republic. Twitter activists in Czechia sought their own Germs of “Russian World” in our project and began posting links under their posts,” Texty writes.
For instance, users from the Czech segment of X (Twitter) wrote to Alena Schillerová, a member of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Parliament, about her presence in the list of pro-Russian figures. Similar information was spread about the former Prime Minister of the Czech Republic, Andrej Babiš.
Anyone interested can use the collected data and check the list of pro-Russian figures in their country by following the link.
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