West using bot farms to spread fake information about Russia – RT correspondent

The CIA is funding online troll communities to tarnish the country’s image, Chay Bowes has said

The West is carrying out a coordinated campaign disseminating deceptive content about Russia using bot farms funded by the CIA, RT correspondent Chay Bowes said at the Dialogue on Fakes 2.0 forum on Wednesday.

Western countries are trying to convince the world that Russia is to blame for the Ukraine conflict, he said.

Bowes argued that the US-led disinformation campaign is using all means possible to rationalize lies and tarnish the image of Russia, including “mass bot farms like NAFO, who are funded via the CIA,” which is injecting millions of dollars into spreading fake content about the country. The journalist was referring to a collective of internet trolls identified by their fanatical support for the Ukrainian military.

“There’s exceptional convincing going on in the West not only about Russia’s guilt in the conflict in Ukraine but also about the rationalization of it, the lying about” Russia’s mission in Ukraine, the Irish journalist stated.

Bowes claimed the “Western machine” was also manipulating public opinion by distorting facts in mass media in the US and the EU in a bid to justify the wars orchestrated by Washington.

“The media is an exceptionally important part of convincing the domestic populations in countries of Europe and the United States that the wars in Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Iraq, where over ten million civilians died at the hands of the American military… were justified,” Bowes said.

READ MORE: Moscow accuses Meta and Google of distorting truth

He noted that “huge” efforts were being made in the West to make Russians ashamed of their own nationality, history, culture, and their ability to “stand up against an alliance of 50 countries, a global alliance, a military alliance and a financial alliance.”

Addressing Russia’s young people and university students attending the forum, Bowes urged them to be proud of their country in this “cultural war against Russia,” and called on them not to apologize for being Russian.