[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
PUTIN'S WAR ON TRUTH: PROPAGANDA AND
CENSORSHIP IN RUSSIA
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND
COOPERATION IN EUROPE
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
March 29, 2022
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Printed for the use of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in
Europe
[CSCE117-12]
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via www.csce.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
61-194 WASHINGTON : 2025
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COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION
U.S. SENATE U.S. HOUSE
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland STEVE COHEN, Tennessee Co-Chairman
Chairman JOE WILSON, South Carolina Ranking
Member
ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
Ranking Member EMANUEL CLEAVER II, Missouri
RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania
JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona
TIM SCOTT, South Carolina RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin
TINA SMITH, Minnesota MARC A. VEASEY, Texas
THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island
EXECUTIVE BRANCH
Department of State - to be appointed
Department of Defense - to be appointed
Department of Commerce - to be appointed
C O N T E N T S
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Page
COMMISSIONERS
Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin, Chairman, from Maryland................. 1
Hon. Richard Blumenthal, from Connecticut........................ 2
Hon. Steve Cohen, Co-Chairman, from Tennessee.................... 4
Hon. Joe Wilson, from South Carolina............................. 6
Hon. Richard Hudson, from North Carolina......................... 14
Hon. Marc A. Veasey, from Texas.................................. 17
Hon. Sheldon Whitehouse, from Rhode Island....................... 22
Hon. Ruben Gallego, from Arizona................................. 28
OSCE PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY MEMBERS PRESENT
Margareta Cederfelt [Sweden], President, OSCE PA................. 29
Pascal Allizard [France], Vice President, OSCE PA................ 31
Irene Charalambides [Cyprus], Vice President, OSCE PA............ 32
WITNESSES
Fatima Tlis, Journalist, Voice of America........................ 8
Peter Pomerantsev, Senior Fellow, Agora Institute, Johns Hopkins
University..................................................... 9
Vladimir Kara-Murza, Russian Journalist and Author, and Former
Host, Echo of Moscow Radio..................................... 12
PUTIN'S WAR ON TRUTH: PROPAGANDA AND CENSORSHIP IN RUSSIA
----------
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN
EUROPE,
U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Tuesday, March 29, 2022.
The hearing was held from 2:04 p.m. to 3:59 p.m., Room
2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC,
Representative Steve Cohen [D-TN], Co-Chairman, Commission for
Security and Cooperation in Europe, presiding.
Commission Members Present: Senator Benjamin L. Cardin [D-
MD], Chairman; Representative Steve Cohen [D-TN], Co-Chairman;
Representative Joe Wilson [R-SC], Ranking Member; Senator
Richard Blumenthal [D-CT]; Representative Richard Hudson [R-
NC]; Representative Marc A. Veasey [D-TX]; Senator Sheldon
Whitehouse [D-RI]; Representative Ruben Gallego [D-AZ].
OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Members Present: Margareta
Cederfelt [Sweden], President, OSCE PA; Pascal Allizard
[France], Vice President, OSCE PA; Irene Charalambides
[Cyprus], Vice President, OSCE PA.
Witnesses: Fatima Tlis, Journalist, Voice of America; Peter
Pomerantsev, Senior Fellow, Agora Institute, Johns Hopkins
University; Vladimir Kara-Murza, Russian Journalist and Author,
and Former Host, Echo of Moscow Radio.
OPENING STATEMENT OF BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, CHAIRMAN, U.S. SENATE,
FROM MARYLAND
Chairman Cardin: The Helsinki Commission will come to
order. Let me point out for those that are here that
Representative Cohen has been delegated to chair this hearing.
He is on his way over--[audio break]--that he might make--
[audio break]--Russia's incursions into Ukraine.
What Mr. Putin has done, this unprovoked attack on Ukraine,
we are at day 34. We have seen him targeting civilians. We have
seen him use weapons that are clearly aimed at destroying
property and people. We have seen no regard whatsoever to the
sovereignty of Ukraine. We have seen him use every weapon in
his asymmetric arsenal in order to achieve his objective to
bring down a sovereign, peaceful State of Ukraine. He has done
that in a manner that has crossed many acceptable lines, and he
should be held accountable for his war crimes. I think all of
us feel pretty passionately about that.
Mr. Putin has used an asymmetric arsenal to maintain his
power and his influence. A few years ago, I authored, on behalf
of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a report on Mr.
Putin titled ``His Asymmetric Arsenal to Interfere with
Democratic States.'' At that time, we observed that he used
energy as a weapon, he used his soldiers, he used
misinformation, he used propaganda, he weaponized energy, and
the list goes on and on and on. The Helsinki Commission, there
is no higher priority that we have right now than to deal with
what Russia has done in violating every single principle of the
Helsinki Final Act--every single principle.
This hearing will concentrate on propaganda and censorship
within Russia. I do intend to hold additional hearings,
including dealing with Mr. Bill Browder, who will be at our
next hearing, I think, remotely. Mr. Browder was, of course, a
victim of Mr. Putin in Russia. He fell out of favor, and his
lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, was representing him. As we all know,
Sergei Magnitsky discovered widespread corruption within
Russia. That is how Mr. Putin supports his enterprises. As a
result of him doing what is required of a lawyer--and that is
to notify the local authorities--Mr. Magnitsky was imprisoned,
tortured, and killed.
It resulted in the passage, in the United States, of the
Sergei Magnitsky Accountability Act for those who were
responsible for his death. I was proud to author that statute,
along with my former colleague and friend Senator John McCain.
We then took that legislation and made it into a Global
Magnitsky, so it applied to all human rights violators,
whatever country they may be in. My partner in that has been
Senator Wicker, the Senate Republican chair of the Helsinki
Commission.
I mention that because on the floor later today we are
going to attempt one more time to get the Global Magnitsky
statute broadened and made permanent. We hope to have that done
by the end of this week. We will be holding future hearings to
deal with the refugee crisis and the vulnerability of
individuals being trafficked, children being trafficked. We
will also deal with the OSCE, and how it can use its mechanisms
in order to deal with the challenges created by Mr. Putin. We
will look at the weaponization of energy and all those issues.
I see that our guests have arrived. Before I turn the gavel
back to Mr. Cohen, let me first recognize Senator Blumenthal.
STATEMENT OF RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, U.S. SENATE, FROM CONNECTICUT
Senator Blumenthal: Thank you so much, Senator Cardin.
Thank you to Congressman Cohen, Chairman Cohen, for hosting us
here in the House of Representatives, where we have rights of
speech and assembly and worship, and other essential guarantees
and safeguards that literally people are dying to uphold and
achieve in Ukraine and elsewhere around the world. That is why
the Helsinki Commission is so very important, especially now
when Vladimir Putin has literally launched two wars.
Vladimir Putin launched a war against Ukraine. It is a
brutal, barbaric assault on human rights and freedoms, as well
as literally the lives of Ukrainians who are boldly and
fiercely resisting him. It is also a war on the truth in
Russia.
The topic that brings us here today is Vladimir Putin's war
on speech and truth in his own country. The two are linked,
irretrievably intertwined, because he could not be at war in
Ukraine, with the criminal, barbaric means that he is using,
and with the loss of life among his own troops, if he could not
suppress the truth in his own country.
Even in a world of the internet and social media, and
technology, he has the means to silence people who want to
speak truth to his power. I want to salute the witnesses who
will talk to us today, Fatima Tlis, Peter Pomerantsev, and we
will hear remotely, I understand, from Vladimir Kara-Murza. Mr.
Kara-Murza invokes Orwell and ``1984'' in his testimony, and it
is very appropriate that he does, because Putin is trying to
create, very crudely and purposefully, a world that matches the
truth even less than George Orwell's ``1984.''
We need to fortify and buttress the efforts of truth
tellers in Russia, just as we are providing the military means
and tools to the brave, courageous freedom fighters. We need to
do more, especially for aerial defense; the S-300's, the SA-3s,
the other kinds of means for them to resist the reign of terror
from the skies that Putin has launched, as well as economic
sanctions that need to be tougher and humanitarian aid.
We also need to aid the truth tellers in Russia through
Radio Free Europe and the BBC and all of the other means, and
many more, that have been used in the past. The resources
necessary to do so ought to be provided.
Part of the reason we are here is to mobilize public
understanding in the United States for how threatened and
undermined Putin's war on truth is succeeding in putting the
truth in Russia. The people of Russia deserve better. I hope
that we can provide them the truth so that they will, in turn,
help stop this absolutely unnecessary war of choice that is
killing so many, injuring countless people, destroying the
roads and bridges and hospitals and schools and other kinds of
civilian targets in Ukraine, and how they can help us stop this
war.
Thank you, Senator Cardin, as well as Chairman Cohen, for
this meeting.
Chairman Cardin: Let me thank Senator Blumenthal for his
leadership on this issue and so many other issues.
Before turning it over to Congressman Cohen, as you know,
we have a House chairman, a Senate chairman. We rotate every
two years. This is the year in which the Senate acts as the
chair, but then the House acts as the head of our delegation to
the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. This really is a bicameral
institution, very much bicameral, and bipartisan. As you know,
Senator Wickerand Congressman Wilson, participate fully with
all of us in regards to the work of the commission.
We are so honored to have the president of the OSCE
Parliamentary Assembly with us today. Madam President, you
honor us with your presence, and two of your vice presidents.
We are very pleased to have such a distinguished group, and the
Secretary General of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. All are
present today, so we thank you for your visit.
As I explained to you a little bit earlier, you came at a
very busy week because of the Ukraine crisis, but also because
we have in the Senate, anticipating the confirmation process on
the Supreme Court justice that we will be taking up as early as
next week, so we apologize. There is a vote on the floor of the
U.S. Senate. We will--the two of us are going to need to leave.
I want to compliment Congressman Cohen for arranging this
hearing. The importance of propaganda, of misinformation, is
one of the major tools used by Mr. Putin in his war against
democratic states.
With that, let me turn it over to Chairman Cohen.
STATEMENT OF STEVE COHEN, CO-CHAIR, U.S. HOUSE, FROM TENNESSEE
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you, Senator Cardin and Senator
Blumenthal. We appreciate your attendance.
The commission has come to order. We do have special guests
here, the president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, Ms.
Cederfelt of Sweden. We also have the vice president from
Cyprus, Vice President Charalambides.
Ms. Charalambides: Yes.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Yes. Thank you. The vice president, who
also--Senator Pascal Allizard of France, who is an OSCE PA vice
president from Normandy--thank you--where you did not have to
be a member of NATO for America to come help.
We are joined in the audience by the OSCE parliamentary
secretary general, the man who does the work and gets
everything done, Roberto Montella.
Thank you.
Thanks to Gregory Meeks for allowing us to use this room.
He is the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Today's hearing will focus on propaganda and censorship in
Putin's Russia, both of which we have seen disturbing
escalations since the outset of Putin's unprovoked war on
Ukraine. Of course, it started--it was very easy to see his
propaganda. He constantly said we are not going to go to war.
This is a training exercise. We have no plans to go to war. We
are not going to go to war, we are not going to go to war,
absurdum, and then he went to war.
These practices, which he is engaged in, are reminiscent of
the Stalin era, an aim to cut Russia off from the rest of the
world and from reality itself, by not allowing the truth to be
broadcast. Putin is building a new iron curtain and attempts to
justify his indefensible war and continued attacks against the
Ukrainian people.
Putin's Kremlin manufactured lies as a pretext for his
invasion and only ramped up propaganda since. He claimed he was
there to de-Nazify Ukraine. There are no Nazis there, and
President Zelensky is of Jewish heritage. The idea of him being
a Nazi is absurd, but he can say what he thinks. He creates the
truth, and he tells the Russian people, and they accept it.
This has happened even in America. Certain people have new
facts, and they claim what the truth is, and they continue to
say it.
Putin's narrative that the U.S. is helping Ukraine develop
biological weapons on its territory is absurd. That is
something he does, and he sometimes tells you what he is going
to do, but he projects. Some individuals do that.
He did the same thing in Syria before he and Assad used
chemical weapons on civilian populations there. Putin claims
Ukrainian forces are firing upon and bombing its own people,
including women and children hiding in shelters. Of course,
that is baseless as well.
His assertion that Ukrainians who are covered in blood and
running for their lives are crisis actors is another lie. I
mean, it is just lie after lie after lie. That, of course, is
an insult to the dead and the nearly 6.5 million people
displaced inside Ukraine and neighboring countries by Putin's
activities.
The fact that some Russian citizens believe that a war in
Ukraine, a country on its borders, is not even happening is
evidence of Putin's ability to manipulate the truth. It is a
special military operation, whatever in the hell that is. It is
a war. If you say it is a war, you get thrown in possibly 15
years in jail. It is absurd. There are great people like
Navalny who will say it, and a couple of ladies who were on
television in Russia who said it. Hopefully they will not
suffer that 15-year penalty.
Those fabrications that he is used inside Russia and other
countries where the Kremlin is trying to make falsehoods stick
through lies and lies and lies, much like Goebbels, the
propagandist of the Hitler regime, and ironically it was that
Nazi type of propaganda against Jewish people that Putin is
using, and yet he claims he is going to de-Nazify a country,
just like he is got a siege of cities in Ukraine similar to
what Hitler had in Leningrad--where his parents were. I think
his oldest brother died, and his father was injured, and his
mother may have been injured. They told stories, and that had a
great deal in shaping his consciousness, but not his
conscience, because if he had a conscience, he would not do
that. He is now Hitler.
To make his propaganda machine work, Putin's Kremlin is
censoring independent media and forcing all remaining outlets
to peddle his message. If not, they are in big trouble. After
the first week of his invasion, he blocked Russian access to
Facebook and Twitter, as well as international news sites still
operating there. Now, Facebook and Instagram have been
permanently banned after a Russian court declared Meta
platforms as extremist organizations.
Independent Russian media outlets have been removed from
the air and ultimately shut down. I think the last one just
closed down a couple of days ago. They could not take it
anymore.
They have run off Radio Free Europe to the best they can,
Radio Liberty, Voice of America, although they have been
getting a lot of hits on certain sites, in spite of the fact
that they have been banned. I think they tried to sue for a lot
of money as well.
We have seen independent outlets leave and news people
leave for fear of being arrested. Putin does not want his
Russian people to see the truth about the war. It is his war,
unprovoked aggression on a peaceful democratic neighbor.
We have a panel of distinguished witnesses who will help us
understand Putin's propaganda machine, the rapidly shrinking
information space in Russia, and what the U.S. and our allies
can consider as we look at ways to push back against Putin's
disinformation.
Particularly we welcome our witnesses in person. We will
hear from Fatima Tlis, a Russian journalist for Voice of
America who is an expert on Russian disinformation; I think a
former Russian citizen--is that true?--and exiled here.
Following Ms. Tlis, we will hear from Peter Pomerantsev,
who is a journalist, author, and senior fellow at the Agora
Institute at Johns Hopkins University, whom I saw on MSNBC or
CNN and realized that is the guy we need. He is the pro from
Dover.
Then we will hear, through the magic of the internet or
cable or some kind of Zoom, from Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian
journalist, author, former host at Echo of Moscow Radio, and
one of the great heroes of our time, who has twice been
poisoned by the Russians yet returns to Russia because that is
his home. He is a Russian politician, as he tells me. That is
his home. He will not leave. He will stay there to bring about
change. I consider him a hero. I wish he would listen to me and
stay in Virginia, but he is going to join us by video today.
With that, I want to turn it over to, I guess, my ranking
member, who is pushing the button.
STATEMENT OF JOE WILSON, U.S. HOUSE, FROM SOUTH CAROLINA
Representative Wilson: Thank you, Mr. Co-Chairman. I was
grateful to be with the chairman, Senator Ben Cardin, just a
moment ago in the hallway.
I am going to be repetitious, Madam President, and that is,
I want to remind everybody that Putin unintentionally has
unified Republicans and Democrats to be universally supportive
of the people of Ukraine, universally supportive of democracy
against autocracy, supporting the rule of law, not the rule of
gun.
Then it is ironic what a historian we have with Congressman
Cohen, and that is to mention the siege of Leningrad. Indeed,
the reason that Vladimir Putin's family survived is because of
the United States. I had the opportunity to go to St.
Petersburg to place a wreath at the cemetery, the world's
largest open cemetery, tragically. It was the victims of the
siege of Leningrad.
While I was there, as we were placing a wreath in the shape
of the United States' red, white, and blue, showing the love
and affection that we have for the people of Russia, while I
was there I found out that the reason that they survived is
because of American Lend-Lease. The equipment that was provided
to the people of Leningrad saved that city of ultimate
destruction. History is now being repeated, and that is--I am
grateful to be working with Congressman Cohen--we have a bill
for Lend-Lease now for the people of Ukraine to receive
equipment by Lend-Lease to--for the siege of Kyiv, and to stop
Putin's aggression, so history keeps repeating itself.
It is sad that Mr. Putin does not recognize that the
American people have such appreciation of the great culture of
Russia, and we have done our part to try to save that country,
and ironically, even his family. It is tragic for Ukrainians
and Russians that Putin's war on truth and decency has
escalated to this murderous point. We have all seen the
terrifying images coming out of Ukraine, the exhausted families
leaving their entire lives behind to flee to safety in
neighboring countries, children underground in metro stations
to avoid bombings, and the absolute carnage at Mariupol, with
5,000 persons already murdered, where civilians are cutoff from
the rest of the world and subject to the terror of arbitrary
attacks from Putin forces.
For those whose only source of information is Russian State
media, this violence is obscured or justified by those
controlling the narrative. Many years of cultivating distrust
in the independent media and creating an environment of State
censorship have left ordinary Russians with limited options and
the threat of imprisonment, not only if they speak out against
the war, but for even calling it a war.
Putin's propaganda machine has turned the unjust and brutal
war into a vehicle for rallying support behind Putin's twisted
version of history, one of--where a citizen has loyalty to him
alone. Anyone who refuses to toe the line is branded as a
traitor in this Stalinist self-cleansing.
We know not only because the atrocities Putin has
authorized in Ukraine, but by his past behavior, the murders,
the physical attacks on journalists and dissidents, that Putin
will do anything and sacrifice anyone in betraying the people
of Russia. The fact that Russian soldiers are being killed and
wounded by the thousands means nothing to him. It is his
obsession for oil, money, and power, as President Biden has
correctly identified.
To those Russians who cannot or refuse to see the truth
that Putin is a war criminal who does not care about them or
their country outside of how he can use them to further his
power, we are in a long-time worldwide conflict between
democracy with the rule of law versus autocracy by rule of gun.
Even between friends and family members, we see the disconnect
between the experiences and Putin's lies.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about
what Putin's sinister information war entails and the extent to
which it is possible to overcome the barriers of censorship and
propaganda. As a former daily newspaper reporter myself and
former editor of my high-school, college, and law-school
newspaper, I am particularly grateful to the brave Russians who
are armed only with truth, who have spoken out at great risk to
their personal safety. It is unthinkable that mass murder would
be occurring in the year 2022. Thank you to our witnesses for
their time and expertise.
With that, I yield back.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you, Mr. Wilson, my ranking
member.
I am going to proceed to the witnesses. Then, the members
who have joined us, Mr. Veasey and Mr. Hudson, I will recognize
you all first for questions. I do want to recognize the fact
that Senator Blumenthal is still here, which, except for Mr.
Cardin, has the most continuous time that a senator has spent.
Just joking.
Ms. Tlis, I would like to--Ms. Tlis, I recognize you.
Senator Blumenthal: We have a vote ongoing, Mr. Chairman,
so I hope you will excuse me when I do have to leave.
Thank you. Thanks for your--
Co-Chairman Cohen: Tell Mr. Rubio hello.
Ms. Tlis, you are recognized.
TESTIMONY OF FATIMA TLIS, JOURNALIST, VOICE OF AMERICA
Ms. Tlis: Chairman Cohen, honorable members, guests,
senators, I am humbled to speak today before you alongside such
distinguished witnesses. I testify in my personal capacity as a
journalist whose work during the last 8 years focused on
identifying, verifying, and debunking Russian disinformation,
misinformation, and propaganda.
Today, we see horrific and heroic stories from Ukraine, and
I am experiencing deja vu. In fact, I have seen all of this
before in the North Caucasus, which is Russia's testing ground
for all types of weaponry, including propaganda. I am
Circassian, one of many oppressed and dying-off ethnic
minorities in Russia. My people fought against Russia longer
than any other world nation. Russia won by killing and
deporting more than 90 percent of the Circassians and
destroying our homeland--exactly what the Kremlin is trying to
do today in Ukraine.
For non-Russian citizens, the hypocrisy is obvious. The
Kremlin's information justifies war against another country by
accusing it of the same policies Russia has practiced for
centuries. In the face of terrible violence committed in
Ukraine by the Russian government and military, very few in
Russian society are brave enough to protest, while the majority
either support the Kremlin or remain lethargic.
We also see that the last few independent voices have been
silenced, while most of the Russian media are indoctrinated to
censorship, choosing to play the role of an obedient servant
eager to please the political power. The Kremlin regime
subjects the people of Russia to a life petrified in state-
infused fear and beliefs based on falsehoods. What I have seen
in fact-checking Russia is a propaganda leviathan born of the
symbiosis of modern technology with the inherited techniques
and strategy of the Soviet Union.
The Kremlin's disinformation operations are coordinated.
They use traditional media outlets, social media platforms, and
cyberattacks to bombard people inside and outside Russia with
specific messages, each designed for certain audiences. In
targeting domestic Russian audiences, the Kremlin deploys
disinformation and propaganda designed as entertainment.
Watching Russian TV commentators is like following a soap
opera. It is full of intrigues, with superheroes and
supervillains, labeled for whatever purposes the Kremlin wants
them to serve. Russian domestic propaganda does not shy off
fabrications. It tells pure lies robustly and convincingly,
conscripting every single foreign voice of support for the
regime with translation in manipulated contexts, then
delivering it to every single household.
In targeting foreign countries, Russia employs well-
sourced, smartly designed, and precisely targeted
disinformation. A few years ago, we saw that the Kremlin's
strategy was to promote complementary views of Russia and the
regime. Not anymore. Today, the primary approach is the
destruction of beliefs, ideas, and values that the regime sees
as an impediment or danger to its existence. In Russian
propaganda, the United States is forever the supervillain and
chief target. When aiming at the American people, the Kremlin
targets different sociopolitical, racial, and ethnic groups
with specifically designed disinformation. The ultimate goal is
to destroy the U.S. from within.
When selecting other foreign countries, the Kremlin seeks
to plant mistrust and hatred toward everything American. In too
many places around the world, the Russian propaganda and
disinformation keep achieving its goals. We saw it during the
2016 U.S. Presidential election, and in the instigation of
entire American sentiment on the African continent, the Middle
East, and countries in Europe. We also witnessed the
effectiveness of the Russian propaganda during the weeks
leading to the full-scale invasion in Ukraine. Instead of
believing facts on the ground, most of the world bought what
the Kremlin wanted it to believe, that the U.S. warnings were
hysterical nonsense, and Russia would never attack. Until it
did.
Moscow's success comes from many factors, but the most
important probably is that its propaganda is made to appeal
simultaneously to the reasoning and to emotions, tapping both
hearts and minds. A testimony to the power of such propaganda
is the story of my great-grandmother, who was born into a
noble, wealthy family. Her family, two brothers, and husband
died in the concentration camp in Solovki, where they were sent
as enemies of the people by the Stalin regime. She had six
children. Only one, the youngest, my grandfather, survived an
artificial famine, similar to Holodomor in Ukraine, while the
other five died of starvation.
When Joseph Stalin died, she told me``I felt like the world
was ending and some evil forces were about to attack us, and
nobody was there anymore to protect us. Everybody in the
village came out to the streets, and you could hear the sound
of thousands of people crying in pure grief and great fear''.
The Kremlin has mastered the propaganda machine it inherited
from the USSR. Its full force has been deployed against society
for decades. It will take an intelligent strategy to free the
Russian people from the Kremlin-inflicted alternate reality.
Thank you for your attention.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you very much for your testimony
and your family's history. Appreciate it very much.
Next, we will hear from Peter Pomerantsev. He is a star
from Johns Hopkins. Appreciate your testimony.
TESTIMONY OF PETER POMERANTSEV, SENIOR FELLOW, AGORA INSTITUTE,
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Mr. Pomerantsev: Thank you very much. I am, indeed, at
Johns Hopkins. Currently, as you probably tell, I am British,
but I was born in Kyiv. Even though my parents left in the late
1970's, I still have many ties there. Over spring break, I
headed down to Ukraine. I was in Lviv and then in Kyiv. Came
back on Sunday. I was very moved and worried by what I saw.
I very much hope that all the words that you say, these
very noble words, can be turned into action and have meaning.
Because if there is an essence to Vladimir Putin's propaganda,
it is to claim that big words about democracy and the rule of
law and the world order are empty. He wishes to prove that they
are empty. I spent 10 years between 2001 and 2010 working as a
journalist and a documentary-maker in Russia. My book about the
country was called ``Nothing is True and Everything is
Possible,'' which is an attempt to really capture the mind-
bending and reality-undermining pseudo-ideology that Kremlin
propaganda pushes.
I think we need to--before we get into the question that I
want to answer, which is what we are going to do to penetrate
the information iron curtain that Fatima and all you have
described so well--we have to really understand why is public
opinion important in Russia in the first place. There are no
elections in Russia, yes? It is a dictatorship. However, for
Vladimir Putin to continue along his destructive path in
Ukraine, as he did in Syria, to remake the world order, as he
openly wants to do, he needs to take the country along with
him. Whether through fear or persuasion, he needs to make sure
that the Russian system can keep on functioning. That involves
lots and lots and lots of people, whose motivation, loyalty,
and conformity he depends on.
He depends on their feeling that, in the words of his own
spin doctors, there is no alternative to Putin. That is why he
is doing so much to control the information environment,
emotions, and perceptions at home. That is why breaking through
this new information iron curtain, which is a challenge that is
as much psychological as it is technical, is so important. Now,
a lot of people are trying different things. Over the last two
weeks, I have spoken to Lithuanian activists who are trying to
call Russians at home and tell them about the war in Ukraine. I
have spoken to European foundations that are trying to keep
exiled Russian independent media going. I have talked to
academics who are trying to analyze the language of Russian
propaganda and understand how it works on the psyche.
Such diversity is great. It is part of what makes democracy
so exciting. Frankly, it is not enough. We cannot have a
scattergun approach in the face of a focused, concerted, and
coordinated enemy. It is simply not enough to hope that we can
plant some benevolent seeds and watch them slowly grow. That is
not the world that we are in. We are, like it or not, in a war
with Vladimir Putin. A kinetic war in Ukraine, a political,
economic, and information war with the rest of us. In order to
reach Russian audiences, we are going to need a sort of version
of--the information version, I suppose, of a Berlin airlift.
What would it entail? I think it will entail cooperation
between governments, between tech companies, between media and
academia.
Let us start right at the top with the government. Back in
the cold war, as many of you will remember, our leaders were
very good at talking directly to the Russian people. Margaret
Thatcher, Ronald Reagan went on Soviet TV and talked directly
to them. I have seen President Biden starting to address the
Russian people in some of his speeches. That is a great start.
It is not enough. It has to be happening all the time. That
outreach has to be consistent. It is not just the president. We
need a whole--you know, a whole flotilla of spokespeople that
the Russian people trust who can now address them, engage with
them, get into a dialog with them, show the Russian people that
the paranoia and fortress mentality that Putin is trying to
push on them is false.
There is already been one good example of this. Arnold
Schwarzenegger made this amazing video--I do not know who was
behind it, but well done to him--reaching out to the Russian
people. It was huge in Russia. Again, that is one video. It
should be happening every day. Sports people, scientists, and
actually Army people. Russians really respect American
soldiers, in a strange way. They need to be engaging with the
Russian people all the time, getting feedback, and starting a
conversation with them, not just about the war but about all
the things they care about. About education, about health,
about technology, and about the future of Russia in the world.
Now, Mr. Schwarzenegger's video is very popular on
Telegram. That is one of the social media platforms that has
not been restricted in Russia yet. Other ones, as you
mentioned, have been. Both Facebook and Instagram. Currently,
the Russian sort of firewall is pretty leaky. We can get
through pretty easily. We know that is going to get worse day
by day by day. We need the expertise, the power, and the
intentionality of the great tech companies, largely American
tech companies, to help break through that firewall as it gets
higher and higher and higher. That means a sea change, yes, in
their approach to this. They need to take a stand.
What do I mean by that? Not take a stand politically or
geopolitically, but in line with the very values that the tech
companies say they have, yes? They believe, they say, in human
rights. They have all said they want to regulate their
companies in line with human rights. They believe in universal
access, yes? We need the help of Silicon Valley to make sure
that Russians have access to the global internet through VPNs;
through, you know, secure messaging groups; through various
other types of technology that will emerge as the new
challenges emerge.
That will guarantee, if we have their cooperation, that
will guarantee the Russians can continue to access the media
that are being turfed out of the country. Independent media--
and of course, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, USAGM, who have
also been expelled from Russia. Now, at the moment we are
actually seeing a spike, I think you mentioned, toward those
media. It shows that there are Russians who do want to know the
truth. However, we have a bigger challenge. How do we reach the
other Russians? Not just the 15 percent who we know are against
the war. How do we reach this much bigger audience? We need to
understand their motivations, the sort of information they
demand.
It may not be immediately political. It may have more to do
with sports. I think the great crunch moment for Putin's
propaganda will come when Russians realize Russia is not at the
soccer World Cup and they cannot watch the World Cup. Now, we
need to understand those audiences. We have to understand why
they believe in conspiracy theories that the Kremlin spreads.
What are the underlying anxieties that they feel? For that, we
are going to have to enlist where I work in, media, social
psychology, academia--that space of communications studies.
We really--it is not enough to simply support media that is
already preaching to the converted. We need to unite the
research that, for example, my colleagues and I do at Johns
Hopkins Annenberg and really apply that in engaging audiences
in very innovative ways to really find the place where they
start caring about the facts again. You cannot simply throw the
facts at people who are resistant to it. It will take a lot of
experimentation and a lot of academic thinking in order to
achieve that.
Somebody's going to need to coordinate all this, this
flotilla of public diplomacy, technology, media, activists,
academia. We need some sort of new structure that has access to
the highest levels of government, which has White House access,
but which has the credibility and the knowledge to exchange
with fiercely independent stakeholders like media or academia.
We will not be told what to do by the government, but we are
ready--because we understand a common existential threat--to
work together.
We have to. We know that dictatorships have information war
machines. They use troll farms. They use corrupt allies. They
use completely distorted State media. We need our own
democratic communications infrastructure. Where they have troll
farms, we will have online town halls. Where they use
disinformation to manipulate people, we will use communication
to engage with them as citizens. Russia is only the start of
the challenge. China is applying the same methodology as Russia
does, so has Saudi Arabia and every dictatorship out there. We
have to compete.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you very much. I have got quite a
few questions, but I am going to save them, because I promised
Mr. Hudson and Mr. Veasey they go first.
Now, through the power and the mystery of Zoom, Mr.
Vladimir Kara-Murza, one of the great patriots and heroes of
the 21st century, you are recognized.
TESTIMONY OF VLADIMIR KARA-MURZA, RUSSIAN JOURNALIST AND
AUTHOR, AND FORMER HOST, ECHO OF MOSCOW RADIO
Mr. Kara-Murza: Thank you so much. Co-Chairman Cohen,
Ranking Member Wilson, members of the Commission, thank you for
holding this important hearing and for the opportunity to
testify before you. I want to add also that I am honored by the
presence at this hearing of Margareta Cederfelt, the president
of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, and one of the world's
strongest and clearest voices in support of the accountability
of the rule of law, and of keeping countries to their
commitments under the Helsinki principles. Thank you so much
for your participation. I wish I could be with you all in
person, but this week finds me for meetings at the British
Parliament in London. As Co-Chairman Cohen said, thanks to the
mystery of modern technology, I am able to join remotely.
On February 24, 2022, Vladimir Putin launched two wars. One
that continues to this day was his unprovoked and unlawful
aggression against Ukraine. The other, which was concluded
effectively and swiftly, was his blitzkrieg against what
remained of independent media in Russia. I say ``what
remained'' because, of course, Putin's drive against media
freedom has been going on for decades. In fact, independent
television became the first target of his regime when he came
to power in the year 2000.
We have a saying in Russian--[speaks in Russian]--``those
who offend us will not survive three days.'' Almost in the
exact keeping with this saying, on the fourth day of his
inauguration as president of Russia in May 2000, Putin sent out
operatives from the tax police and the prosecution service to
raid the offices of Russia's largest private media holding.
Within one year, its flagship network, NTV, Russia's most
popular television channel known for its professional news
coverage, honest political analysis, and hard-hitting satire--
was seized by the state-run energy giant Gazprom in an early
dawn raid in Moscow's Ostankino Television Center.
By the summer of 2003, the remaining independent networks,
TV-6 and TVS, were taken down as well. Just as in Soviet times,
the State established a complete monopoly on television, by far
the leading source of information for Russian citizens. The
fact that so many Russians have been brainwashed by the
Kremlin's propaganda is the direct result of this monopoly.
Until the beginning of this month, there were still pockets of
independent media in Russia that gave our citizens access to
the truth.
The most prominent among them were Echo of Moscow Radio,
where I had the honor of hosting a weekly program, and TV Rain,
an online television network. Both were closed in the first
days of Putin's war on Ukraine. So many other news outlets,
both national and regional, including the highly respected TV2
in Tomsk. At the same time, the Russian government censorship
agency, Roskomnadzor, blocked access to social media networks
used by millions of Russians, including Twitter, Facebook, and
Instagram. All of this happened within days.
I also want to add, as Co-Chairman Cohen referenced at the
beginning of this hearing, this week Novaya Gazeta, which was
the last independent print newspaper in Russia and whose
editor-in-chief was a 2021 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Dmitry
Muratov, has ceased publication because of the military
censorship imposed by Putin's government. I have been involved
in Russian journalism and politics for more than 20 years, but
it still shocked me just how quickly this new information iron
curtain has descended.
Today, most Russians live in an Orwellian parallel reality
created by the Kremlin's propaganda machine. I mean Orwellian
in the literal sense. What's being said on Russian State
television might as well come out of George Orwell's ``1984.''
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. Most
Russians, as mindboggling as it sounds, are not even aware of
the horrendous war crimes committed to Putin in Ukraine.
Those who speak out against this war are now liable for
criminal prosecution, so are those who simply call it a war. Up
to 15 years in prison, according to a new law hurriedly passed
by a so-called parliament, and just as hurriedly signed by
Putin, all in 1 day. These new penalties target not only
journalists or opposition activists. A Russian Orthodox priest
in Kostroma, Father Ioann Burdin, was charged, convicted, and
fined for speaking out against war in his Sunday sermon. This
is the reality of Russia under Putin.
Needless to say, only Russians can and should change the
political situation in our country. That change is coming, and
I think faster than many thought before February 24. The
world's democracies have an important role to play, not only in
standing in solidarity with Ukraine--which goes without
saying--but also in helping to provide truth to the Russian
people, helping to open the eyes of Russian society to the
unspeakable crimes being committed supposedly on its behalf.
This has been done before. In communist times, broadcasters
such as Radio Free Europe, the BBC, and Deutsche Welle beamed
radio signals, literally, across the Iron Curtain to reach
millions of people in their own languages inside the Soviet
bloc.
In the USSR itself, according to expert estimates, these
radio broadcasts were listened to by some 30 million people, 15
percent of the adult population. Nothing beats totalitarian
propaganda better than the truth, and when the Soviet system
collapsed, it was, in my view, primarily because it had been
discredited and delegitimized in the eyes of its own people,
who were able to see its true nature. If this were done with
the technologies of the 1970's, it can certainly be done today.
It is only a question of having the will and of dedicating the
right resources.
I want to thank you, once again, for holding this hearing
and for showing your commitment to doing both, and I stand
ready to answer any questions that you might have.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you. I hope you can stay with us
for the questioning because I am sure people have questions.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Absolutely.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you, sir.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Absolutely.
Co-Chairman Cohen: First, I would like to recognize Mr.
Hudson, who is--you tell him who you are. He is my friend and
he is a good guy.
STATEMENT OF RICHARD HUDSON, U.S. HOUSE, FROM NORTH CAROLINA
Representative Hudson: Richard Hudson, a Congressman from
North Carolina. I am chair of the First Committee of the OSCE
PA, and it is really an honor to be with you today. I
appreciate the testimony from all of our witnesses.
I also appreciate the--our special guests who are here from
OSCE PA, Madam Cederfelt and the others. This is a really
important hearing that we are having today, and I really
appreciate the examples you brought to us.
I guess my question kind of builds on--you know, you talked
about the fact that Putin calls anyone who opposes him a
traitor or a foreign agent, you know, all to indicate, in my
opinion, that personal loyalty, not true patriotism, is what
counts in Russia. It is up to Russians to decide who governs
them.
As Mr. Kara-Murza just said, you know, we have got to be--
Putin's got to be delegitimized in the eyes of his own people.
The playing field for doing that seems to be nonexistent, based
on your testimony.
How do we support those Russians who want to see political
change in their country? How does the fact that many opposition
leaders have now fled Russia change the calculus for this? I
would ask each witness if you could share with me, sort of,
what is the best thing we can do to support dissidents who want
to speak out?
Ms. Tlis: Thank you for your question. There are several
ways. First of all, I think the West--and I mean Europe and the
United States--should be unified in their very strict message
that this government is criminal. There is no--[speaks in a
foreign language]--
Mr. Pomerantsev: Conditional tense?
Ms. Tlis: There is no conditional tense. You cannot say
something and then back it up or say half of the truth. That is
what the Russians are doing. That is what Putin is doing. Most
of their disinformation is half-truth, maybe 60 percent truth,
and then 40 percent, the most important, is a lie, and that is
how they make people believe them. First of all, a very clear
message, and this is not going to pass. Enough is enough.
Second, I think there is one element missing in all the
policies regarding Russian propaganda, which is young voices.
We need to ask young people in Europe at the universities, here
in the United States, what they think, and how they think they
can connect with the young Russian population.
There is TikTok. Everybody is--communicates through--you
know, is communicating through TikTok, and the message does not
have to be as long as Schwarzenegger's, which went on for 10
minutes, I believe. It has to be very short, and it should
address young people.
Third, what Putin is afraid of most of all, and I have seen
this--I am saying this because I have seen it, I have witnessed
it when I was working in Russia--is satire and humor. Create
special programs, short ones. There was a program called
Puppets--Kukly--on NTV. That was the very first program to fall
after Putin came to power. It was closed down nearly
immediately after he came to power.
He is afraid of being laughed at because, you know, the
great czar cannot be laughed at. He loses his power. People are
not afraid of him anymore if they can laugh at him.
The--a fourth measure and, I think, for the more, like,
universal approaches--Peter is going to talk--but I am just,
you know, a practitioner, so I am talking about practice. There
are a lot of stars, former Russian stars--actors, singers--
who--even, you know, TV hosts who the Russian people, you know,
saw for years on their TV screens and they got to trust them
and love them.
Those people, a lot of them are now abroad. Let them talk
to the people. Every single Russian has a cell phone. Sending a
message to a cell phone is not a problem with this technology
today. As Peter said, the technological--you know, the--Silicon
Valley needs to be here, too.
Thank you.
Representative Hudson: Mr. Pomerantsev or Kara-Murza wants
to answer this at all?
Mr. Pomerantsev: Peter's fine, but I will pass to Volodya,
who is, literally, the Russian opposition politician who can
tell you how to help him.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Thank you so much, Congressman Hudson.
First of all, I just want to make a small remark. You
mentioned that Putin is describing all of us, all of those
Russians who are against his regime, as traitors. I want to
just sort of add to this that the latest term that Mr. Putin is
using, which he used just last week in his televised address
from the Kremlin, was national traitors. It is not--that is
just not any other term. That is a term lifted directly from
Adolf Hitler's book ``Mein Kampf,'' ``nationaler verrater'' in
German.
You know, the Soviet term for this will be ``vrag naroda,''
``enemy of the people,'' meaning the same in substance. I think
it is quite remarkable that the Putin regime and Putin himself
are actually for this one choosing to use the term from Nazi
Germany rather than Stalin's Soviet Union. This, I think, goes
to what Co-Chairman Cohen was saying about just the sheer
hypocrisy of everything that the Putin regime is doing, now in
relation to Ukraine, but also in relation to Russian civil
society.
On your question, I think some of the practical things
might include--actually, it is very important what Fatima Tlis
just mentioned, and that is, of course, the support for
independent journalists in Russia, independent journalists who
work in the Russian language.
There are dozens, perhaps hundreds now, of professional,
high-quality, honest, independent Russian journalists with
reputation, with authority, with name recognition, people who
used to work for TV Rain, people who used to work for Echo of
Moscow Radio and many others who are out of work, in many
cases, out of the country. I think it is very important that
the world's democracies find a way of supporting their work
because nobody better than them can produce that journalistic
content and deliver that truth to the people of Russia.
The second part of this, the other side of this coin, is to
help provide the tools to deliver that message, because as we
have all been referencing since the start of Putin's attack on
Ukraine, the Russian government and its censorship agency,
Roskomnadzor, have blocked all the main social media, blocked
hundreds of news websites. In fact, the latest figure I just
checked was that since February 24, Roskomnadzor blocked more
than 800 news and information online outlets for access to the
Russian people.
One of the problems here is that there are, of course, many
technologies that exist to go around these internet blockades,
and VPN is, of course, the most prominent among them. You know,
one morning in early March when I woke up at my apartment in
Moscow and I had no Twitter, no Facebook--again, this was
shocking how sudden and how quick this all was--and I managed
to--I am not very competent technologically but I asked friends
who are--it took me a few minutes to install a good VPN app,
which allow us to bypass all of these blockages. The problem
was that, you know, I was still able to download and pay for
that VPN app and the best VPN services, and the ones that
government censors cannot block are usually paid services.
The price is not the question. The one I downloaded cost
something like $50 a year, so the price is not prohibitive. The
problem is that the day after I was able to do that, the
banking sanctions came in, and Russian-backed cards became
worthless pieces of plastic. You cannot use them anymore
because these are MasterCard and SWIFT and all of that has been
switched off.
I think one of the most important public services, frankly,
that tech companies, including and, actually, primarily
American tech companies, could engage in would be to provide
free of charge high-quality VPN services for Russian territory.
I am sure that is possible technologically. If, you know, the
technologies of the 1960's and 1970's and 1980's were possible
to get that truth to the people inside the Soviet Union I am
sure there are ways to go around these blockades today, and
making these VPN services free on the territory of the Russian
Federation, I think, is paramount among this, because if that
does not happen this would essentially mean that Western
companies are going along and helping along Putin's censorship.
Actually, just before we began this hearing, literally, in
the last few hours, there was very important news that came on,
you know, Russian--what remains of Russian language media space
and that is that three leading VPN providers have actually
announced exactly what I have just been describing, that they
are making their services free for the territory of Russia.
There are many more specific things that could be done. I
just want to say one general but most important thing, and that
is, of course--and again, just to reiterate because, of course,
the Kremlin propaganda loves to sort of allege that those of us
who are in opposition to Putin are somehow advocating for
regime change from abroad. Of course, that has nothing to do
with reality. Only Russians in Russia can change the political
situation in our country.
We do hope that the free world, that Western democracies,
will stand on principle and will finally end the enabling and
the appeasement of Vladimir Putin's regime, which has been
going on for years, for decades, and which has brought us a
large-scale war in the middle of Europe.
We hope that Western democracies finally start practicing
what they preach and that those principles to which they
rightly adhere to domestically, such notions as the rule of
law, democracy, and respect for human rights, will also be
applied to their international relations, that the world's
democracies do not cave in, do not compromise on questions of
principle.
Stop enabling and appeasing Vladimir Putin's regime and,
finally, hold that line that we have seen them hold for the
past four weeks.
Representative Hudson: Very well said. Mr. Chairman, I
yield back.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you, Mr. Hudson. Thank you for
your questions.
Mr. Veasey, 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF MARC A. VEASEY, U.S. HOUSE, FROM TEXAS
Representative Veasey: Mr. Chairman, thank you very much,
and thank you to the witnesses for being here, and I would like
to welcome our friends who are also a part of the Commission
from Europe. Good to see everybody.
One of the things that I am really worried about is that
with so much attention, and rightfully so, being placed on
airplanes, tanks, and the destruction that is happening in the
Ukraine that we are not talking enough about the fact that
Putin is trying to build this great firewall.
He is always called the internet a CIA project and he, you
know, seeks to subjugate the IT sector so he can build this
digital sovereign State, and I believe he wants to use it as a
model for other strongmen and other autocratic governments so
they can sort of form a confederation and be dependent on one
another and be able to isolate or insulate themselves from
things like sanctions and other things that would check their
bad behavior.
I wanted to ask you, with this invasion--and this might be
a good question for Mr. Kara-Murza, but anybody can jump in and
ask--with the invasion that is happening right now we know that
Putin does not have all the capabilities needed in order to
build this stack or this digital sovereign State. How has this
unlawful invasion slowed him down?
You know, one of the reasons why people in the IT sector
say he has not been able to build this sovereign State is
because he just has not put the resources needed in order to be
able to get to that level.
Mr. Kara-Murza, if you could just kind of touch on that. Do
you think that this has slowed him down from being able to
build a digital State, or do you think that he is still
actively working on it and has not been slowed down one bit?
Mr. Kara-Murza: Thank you so much for the question.
Thank you, Congressman.
Well, Putin's regime has been working on sort of internet
censorship and internet blockages for quite a while and sort of
the first major attempt that they engaged in for this was back
in 2018 when they tried to block Telegram that Peter
Pomerantsev referenced, the sort of the messenger but also now,
increasingly, the space for free media because that is,
basically, the last real conduit where independent media can
still exist in Russia.
When the Russian government did that 4 years ago, they
became a complete laughingstock because they showed an
astonishing incompetence in this. You know, when this
government agency that I referred to several times,
Roskomnadzor, the main censorship agency in the Russian
government, when it announced that Telegram will be blocked and
they started blocking sort of various websites and portals--
which is, I suppose, they thought were associated with
Telegram--they ended up blocking parts of Google. They ended up
blocking parts of Amazon. They ended up blocking sites that had
nothing to do with any of this, and they actually ended that
week--and this is not a joke; this is a statement of where we
are--they ended up that week by blocking the site of the
censorship agency itself, Roskomnadzor. Telegram continued
working fine, and this was a source of many jokes and much
laughter about the sheer incompetence of Putin's censors.
Unfortunately, since then in those ensuing 4 years, the
Putin regime really benefited from the expertise--forgive the
expression--if we can use that term, from the communist
dictatorship in China and those, you know, representatives of
Beijing who have long mastered this art of digital censorship--
the Great Firewall. They have really been helping the Kremlin
with the technologies, with the know-how, with the expertise,
and so on, and we are seeing, unfortunately, in these last few
weeks that this expertise has not come in vain. It is being
used, and the Russian government censors are functioning much
more effectively.
I would say that this sort of digital blockade has actually
proven more successful than many people had imagined it could
be, based on this laughable experience of Telegram in 2018. I
think what it should mean, above all, is that the friends of
democracy, the friends of freedom, the democratic nations of
this world, should sort of counteract this totalitarian
international, if you will, and just as effectively as Putin
and the communist leaders in China are cooperating on
installing this censorship, installing this new information
Iron Curtain, I think so the democracies of the world with the
same effectiveness should learn to cooperate with each other to
try to breach it.
Ms. Tlis: Yes. I just want to add that there have been
systematic steps Putin and his government have been taking
toward this direction. In 2001, 2002, and 2003, the Russian
tech systems invented SORM. That is a special system that is
required for every internet provider and communication provider
in Russia to be installed.
The SORM, first, was under the authority of the FSB,
Russian Federal Security Service. Then, Putin took it to his
administration. Right now, there is this FAPSI. It was--used to
be called FAPSI. It is the Federal Communication Services. They
totally control this SORM. What SORM does is it allows remote
control and monitoring of every internet access in Russia, also
the mobile phones.
That was the--you know, one first major step. In 2011, I
believe, ICANN, the international domain and internet
certification company, granted Russia a license to create a
Cyrillic-based internet segment. That has been forgotten, but
that was the second step.
Right now, Russia has an ability to, you know, operate
separately on its own Cyrillic-based Russianet, I guess,
because if you type Kremlin.ru in Latin you are probably going
to get error because there are a lot of hacktivists right now
hacking, you know, independently or coordinated on the Russian
websites. If you go for Cyrillic and type it in the, you know,
HTTP address in Cyrillic, you are going to see that it is still
operational.
What I am saying is that there have been major steps taken
toward creating an autonomous Russian internet, and I think it
was yesterday or last--on Friday, Putin signed a special
executive order giving certain benefits to the IT specialists.
It was specifically aimed at the IT specialists. It gives them
immunity from being drafted into the army. It gives them tax
relief and it gives them--promises, at least, a salary, which
is much, much higher than the average Russian salary.
This, to me, is a signal that Putin is not stopping in his,
you know, cyber efforts. There is something going on. I think
it should be analyzed and taken into account.
Thank you.
Representative Veasey: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you, Mr. Veasey.
Let me ask a question, I guess, of Mr. Kara-Murza. He might
have the best knowledge of this. I do not know. Is there a
person in Russia who is like Goebbels was to Hitler, who is to
Putin, that comes up with the propaganda in Russia, or is it a
collection of different independent minds?
Mr. Kara-Murza: Thank you so much, Co-Chairman Cohen.
That is an important question because let us not forget
that these crimes that are being committed, they are not just
faceless crimes. They have very specific perpetrators, and we
also know from history--and you mentioned Goebbels, sort of the
allusion to Nazi Germany--let us not forget that leading Nazi
propagandists, including Julius Streicher, were tried. He was
tried at Nuremberg after the war. He did not kill anybody with
his own hands. You can also kill with words, and you can also
kill with incitement, and this is exactly what these Putin
propaganda masterminds are doing.
It is not a single individual. There is a sort of group of
people who have been in charge of his propaganda. There are not
that many of them, and those leading perpetrators of this
campaign of hatred and incitement that has been going on
Russian State television for years have very specific names.
One such name--this person is not alive anymore. He
actually died in Washington, DC. You might have heard the story
from a few years ago. His name was Mikhail Lesin. He was the
press minister in Putin's government. He was really the
mastermind of the closure of all the independent television
channels in the early years of Putin's rule in the early
2000's--you know, NTV, TV6, and TVS.
As I mentioned earlier, all of these channels were closed
very much with Mr. Lesin's personal involvement. You know, as I
mentioned, he has not been around for a few years, but--and
even before then, he was sort of sidelined from the regime
leadership.
The people who are today both the masters and the faces of
the Kremlin propaganda would be people such as Konstantin
Ernst, the director general of Channel One, the main State
television channel in Russia, Oleg Dobrodeev, the director
general of VGTRK, the Russian State Television and Radio
Corporation. Of course, the faces of this Kremlin propaganda
would be people like Dmitry Kiselyov, Vladimir Solovyov,
Yevgeny Popov, Olga Skabeeva, and all these other merchants of
hate, as I would call them, because these are the people--very
talented, very intelligent, very creative--who have mastered
this horrible diabolic art of propaganda to which Russian
citizens have been subjected for such a long time now--
Co-Chairman Cohen: Do you know, by chance--
Mr. Kara-Murza:--and many of them have also ended up on the
sanctions list these past four weeks, and rightly so.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Do you know, by chance, if any of these
individuals are on the sanction list? They should be.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Yes. I was just about to--leading into
this, in the past 4 weeks, many of them have been placed on
sanctions lists. Just as with so many other things that
characterize Western policies toward Putin, this is happening
unbelievably late. I can give you a specific example.
Back in 2015, after Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov
was murdered in plain sight of the Kremlin--we recently marked
the seventh anniversary of his assassination, the most brazen,
the most high-profile political assassination in the long
history of Russia, and I would add, because OSCE PA President
Margareta Cederfelt is with us at this hearing, she authored
and published in 2020 a landmark international oversight report
under the auspices of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly into the
assassination of Boris Nemtsov and the subsequent so-called
investigation by the Russian authorities, and this remains to
this day the most definitive international legal document of
the Nemtsov case, and for this I want to just, once again, to
express my gratitude.
After Boris Nemtsov was murdered, I, along with former
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov, came to Washington to
meet with Members of Congress to suggest the specific names of
the employees of Putin's State propaganda who have been
engaging in incitement--that is the only word I can use--
against Boris Nemtsov, you know, calling him a traitor, calling
him an American agent, calling him all these things on State
television day after day, week after week, month after month,
and those people helped create the atmosphere in which it
became possible for Putin to assassinate his main political
opponent in front of the Kremlin.
We proposed back then--this was 7 years ago--that these
State propagandists were put on sanctions lists. Unfortunately,
back then it did not happen. It took a war in the middle of
Europe--it took war crimes being committed in the middle of
Europe--for the Western democracies to actually move in that
direction.
Yes, Mr. Co-Chairman, in the past 4 weeks, more now, since
the start of Putin's attack on Ukraine, most if not all of
these propagandists that work for Vladimir Putin have been
placed on the Western sanctions list, and I hope that they
remain there for good.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you. That is good to hear.
Mr. Pomerantsev, you mentioned that the athletes, like,
were popular in Russia. I guess the irony is probably--
Klitschko is probably one of the most popular athletes. Do you
know if Klitschko has tried to get some type of messages? It
seems like they would listen to him and his brother--I mean,
Vitali, Wladimir, whatever, they were, too, great. I used to
think of them as--almost Russian. I mean, they were over there,
and that is where they fought their fights.
Mr. Pomerantsev: Sure. Not only them. There is the sort of
various sort of--you know, I am not a huge expert; I believe
cage fighters is the term--who are--who are Ukrainian, and some
of them have taken up arms, who are huge in Russia. Yes. I
mean, that is one way in.
I mean, they are--you know, because they are Ukrainian in
some ways that that might be harder. It is been hard for
Ukrainian influencers, not just sports people but television
presenters. They have all tried to reach out to their Russian
audiences. They all talk about how hard it is, you know. They
have a very sort of strong personal--you know, they are very
personally affected by what is happening.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Well, could not the American tech
companies--and I think it was an excellent recommendation. I
hope that your recommendation and your thoughts are not simply
yours and that others have them or you have communicated them
to certain authorities here because it seems like something we
should be doing.
The tech companies could take Mayor Klitschko's statements
and find a way to get them into Russia. I think they would
listen to--and if he said, my city is being destroyed, people
are dying, et cetera, they are shooting bombs at me, I think
that would be most effective.
Mr. Pomerantsev: Well, there are two elements here. One of
them is, you know, we need to bring the tech companies into
this conversation. My sense is from the initial sort of, you
know, sensing of what they are doing, is that they will have a
problem with seeding actual information.
Mykhailo Fedorov, the digital minister of Ukraine, a very
tech-savvy young man, actually said, look, Google, Apple,
people in Russia use your phones. You could right now download
evidence of war crimes so every Russian knows about it. I fear
that the tech companies will be hard to push to seed content.
However, access--making sure that every Russian has access
to the internet through the delivery of VPNs through many, many
other technologies, I think that is more likely. We have to
bring them into the conversation. Most importantly, they have
to take a stance. Again, I am saying not a stance
geopolitically but a stance around humanitarian norms, human
rights, the sort of thing that the Helsinki Committee is all
about.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you. I am going to hold my
questions for a few minutes.
Senator Whitehouse only has 7 minutes left that he can be
with us, and he is on the power of Zoom. I recognize one of the
great senators from Newport, Rhode Island, Senator Sheldon
Whitehouse.
STATEMENT OF SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, U.S. SENATE, FROM RHODE ISLAND
Senator Whitehouse: Thank you, Chairman. Great to be with
you. This is a great panel, and I appreciate it.
For those of you who have been studying propaganda
techniques for a while, one of the things that the Putin regime
seems to utilize is the propaganda technique of accusing your
adversary--in this case, Ukraine--of doing the exact thing that
you yourself are actually doing.
Putin accuses the United States of making Ukraine a pawn in
a great power showdown. Putin accuses Ukraine of numerous war
crimes committed daily. Moscow has said that Western powers are
goading it into attacking Ukraine.
Is that a technique of propaganda that has a particular
name that is--I do not know if there is, like, an expertise in
propaganda where things are given a name, a taxonomy, of
propaganda and, if so, what is this accusing somebody else of
doing what you yourself are doing technique?
Co-Chairman Cohen: I think you need to find a psychiatrist
to answer that, but I will let Mr. Pomerantsev try.
Mr. Pomerantsev: Well, there is a--you are quite right. You
are referring to projection there, and there might be some of
that, but no, it is also a strategy. I have heard it referred
to as mirroring. Essentially, the aim is very cynical.
Senator Whitehouse: Mirroring--[inaudible].
Mr. Pomerantsev: The aim is to take something that you know
people are hearing about. You know, people in Russia are
hearing about war crimes committed by the Russian army. You
sort of give the absolute opposite reality to push people into
a kind of--into a feeling of doubt.
You know, I would be very careful with the polls that we
are seeing in Russia. Be very careful about polling in
dictatorships. From conversations I have with sociologists and
people in Russia, that is a very, very common sense, you know,
that people go, like, well, we just do not know who is telling
the truth. I mean, our government, obviously, does not always
tell the truth, but the other side might be doing it as well. I
just do not know.
We have to really understand why people look for that sort
of excuse. People also run away from the truth. Simply
providing the truth is not enough. It is unpleasant to think
that your own country is murderous. It is unpleasant to think
that you might have to do something about it. It is dangerous.
You are really giving people all these kinds of motivations
to doubt in the way that actually they want to doubt. Now, what
I am trying to get to is that, look, we have talked a little
bit about technological firewalls that are blocking Russians
from accessing the truth.
Even in China, which is much more effective, people can
still get to information if they want it. The problem is they
do not always want it. We really need to understand far more
about why people seek information and how we can help foster
their desire to find out the truth in the first place. You
know, in academia we are actually in a very, very early stage
of understanding these things.
Senator Whitehouse: If any of the three witnesses have any
vectors of communication into Russia that you think we should
be using more effectively--I have heard of everything from, you
know, Airbnb, all sorts of unusual channels being used--if you
have any ideas for ways that you think the West could increase
the flow of actual information into the Russian people. You do
not have to answer me right now. It may be better if we just do
that in writing. I would be glad to know what your thoughts are
on that.
I will close with Mr. Kara-Murza, and I know you worked
very closely with Minister Nemtsov and I noted that Bellingcat
has shown that the same individual who has been involved in
other attacks on people who have objected to Putin's rule
appeared to be stalking Boris Nemtsov in the time leading up to
his assassination.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Yes. Thank you so much for the question,
Senator.
Just yesterday there was this new investigation published
by the Bellingcat Media Group in cooperation with the Insider
and the BBC that revealed evidence--concrete specific
evidence--that for several months leading up to his
assassination in February 2015 Boris Nemtsov had been shadowed,
tailed all around the country, by a member of the FSB
assassination squad. This is a man named Valery Sukharev. He
was also involved in two poisoning attacks against me. He was
also involved in a poisoning attack against Alexei Navalny. We
all--we know all these names of these FSB murderers because of
this brilliant investigative journalism by Bellingcat, which
sort of really goes into the central point of our conversation
today about how important the truth and how important
independent journalism really is.
I had absolutely no doubt from the very beginning that
there was only one man who could--in this system, in his
dictatorial vertical system of power that Putin has created
there is only one man who could order the assassination of such
a top opposition leader as Boris Nemtsov and that man's name is
Vladimir Putin.
If anybody had any doubts, all these doubts should have
disappeared when this investigation came out because, of
course, we know that Boris Nemtsov was murdered by subordinates
of Ramzan Kadyrov, the Kremlin-appointed head of the Chechen
Republic, and it seems now we know from this investigation that
two parallel tracks were preparing for this murder.
One was the FSB track, and they usually use poison, as they
did with Navalny and myself and Dmitry Bykov and others, and
the other track was the Kadyrov track, the Chechen track, and
they use bullets, and this is what was used. One of the main
revelations from that investigation yesterday was that on
February 17, so exactly 10 days before Boris Nemtsov was
assassinated by a Kadyrov subordinate on that bridge, the FSB
assassination squad stopped following him, which can only mean
one thing.
There is only one man who can order both the FSB and the
Kadyrovites. Again, that man's name is Vladimir Putin. It
seemed that in that time, in the middle of February, the
final--
Senator Whitehouse: Thank you.
Mr. Kara-murza: --choice was made in favor of the
Kadyrovites. By the way, something that's really relevant to
what we are talking about today, one of the key organizers of
the assassination of Boris Nemtsov, another senior Kadyrovite
officer by the name of Ruslan Geremeev who was, by the way,
sanctioned by the U.S. Government in 2019 under the Magnitsky
Act for his role in taking part in the assassination of Boris
Nemtsov, he is this week commanding--is among the commanders of
Putin's assault on the Ukrainian city of Mariupol. This,
really, is a regime both led and staffed by murderers. I cannot
put it any other way.
To your previous question, Senator, I would just say--there
are many things that we are discussing as part of this hearing
but I would just say it is very important, and especially I can
tell you how important that is from inside Russia, that Western
leaders--not just political leaders but also sort of public
figures--are very careful about messaging.
Too often, we hear people in the West confuse Putin's
regime and Russia. Put that sign of--you know, the equal sign
between the Putin regime and Russia, sort of mixing together a
country, a nation, and an unelected autocratic regime that is
misruling that nation. Needless to say, I do not need to tell
you those are different things, and I think it would be very
important just from a messaging standpoint, as Peter
Pomerantsev was referencing this video by Arnold
Schwarzenegger, it was astonishingly effective because one of
the things that Mr. Schwarzenegger did was he addressed
directly the people of Russia and he made sure that he makes a
difference, makes a distinction, between the dictator in the
Kremlin and the Russian people and Russian society.
We need more of this from Western leaders because the
Kremlin propaganda is very skillful about portraying the West
not as anti-Putin but as anti-Russian, and sometimes Western
leaders are too careless with the language to make that
distinction. When you are speaking--this may seem like a really
trivial point but it is a very important one--when you speak
about the crimes and the abuses and the aggression perpetrated
by Vladimir Putin and his regime, please make it clear that you
are talking about Vladimir Putin and his regime and that you
are able to communicate directly with the people of Russia in
preparation for that day when there is a Russia without Putin,
when there is a Russia after Putin, hopefully, a democratic
Russia which can build new bridges with the democratic world,
including the United States.
Senator Whitehouse: Thank you, Chairman Cohen, and thank
you to the witnesses.
Co-Chairman Cohen: You are welcome, Senator Whitehouse. Any
time for the Duke of the Corner Cafe.
Mr. Wilson, you are recognized.
Representative Wilson: Thank you, Mr. Co-Chairman. Indeed,
it is wonderful to hear from Senator Whitehouse, and the
perception, I believe, is correct that Putin is doing what he
accuses others and I am really hoping that this hearing as we
are conducting is an inspiration to the people of Ukraine, that
they can see the unity of Republicans and Democrats, and also I
hope it is an inspiration to people of Russia that they should
really learn and find out what is going on and, particularly,
Ms. Tlis, I am going to ask you a question about that.
It is an indication of, indeed, the unity of democracies
worldwide. How incredible to be here with Margareta Cederfelt,
president of the Organization of Security and Cooperation in
Europe Parliamentary Assembly, and then to have our vice
presidents. Of course, the president is from Sweden, but our
vice president is from Cyprus, beautiful Cyprus, and then my
home heritage country, France, and then--and how wonderful to
have the secretary general here from the remarkable country of
Italy.
Over and over, you can see there is such unity on behalf of
the people who want freedom and democracy in Ukraine, and we
want freedom and democracy. I thought it was going to happen in
Russia. My visits across Russia over the years, I just misread
the incredible people I met, the incredible culture that I saw,
and it should be known that much of us in America have adopted
the music, the literature, and the architecture of Russia. We
are not against them at all. That is a great part of American
civilization now.
With that in mind, indeed, with democracies, what can we do
to reach the people of Russia? Ms. Tlis, I was really
intrigued, the universal availability of cell phones in Russia.
Goodness gracious, some of us remember the Soviet Union. There
was not any contact at all except by radio. What an opportunity
we have, and are there any other means of being able--for the
democracies to contact people in the Russian Federation to let
them know that we are not against them? We want them to
succeed, too.
Ms. Tlis: Thank you. As Peter mentioned, there is still
Telegram, which is still working. Telegram could be used to
deliver messages. It is a very effective tool, and there are a
lot of Russians on Telegram. There is--the Russians never
closed the Odnoklassniki and contacted those two social media
platforms, somewhat similar to Facebook.
They are under the control of Russian security forces. It
could still be used to deliver specific messages and also, of
course, TikTok. As I said, TikTok is very popular in Russia and
a lot of people there--young people, not too young people--use
TikTok. That could be another vehicle to deliver the message.
Those are--and as I said, the--of course, the cell phones.
That is if you want to reach really, you know, every Russian
citizen. Of course, we have seen a lot of hacking recently, and
the messages that appeared on Russian TV channels were not
really strategically or tactically designed to reach, as I said
in my testimony, the hearts and minds of all the Russian
people.
When something like that happens, maybe it would be a good
idea to have a template, something that, you know, could be
shown on Russian TV. Also, if you address the Russians,
especially the part of the population that is actually pro-
Putin, pro-regime, or maybe afraid to speak up or just, you
know, in a State of denial, maybe, to reach those people. You
really cannot, you know, offer them good-faith messages from
American senators or the American president. They would not
believe it. They would not listen to it.
They need voices that are familiar with them. They need
somebody who speaks their own language and whom they, you know,
already know and trust. Peter mentioned the sport. I mean, MMA
is extremely popular in Russia--martial arts--and the MMA
fighters, Russians, there are a lot of them here in the United
States, and they oppose this--you know, Putin. They oppose this
war. Let them speak.
Representative Wilson: That is encouraging, and Mr.
Pomerantsev--
Mr. Pomerantsev: Peter is fine.
Representative Wilson: --and also Kara-Murza, each of you,
hacktivists--have they been successful as individuals around
the world?
Mr. Pomerantsev: I think that is a very important point
that Fatima made, which relates to what you are asking.
Messaging about what? There is two ways of looking at the sort
of, I do not know, opinion dynamic in Russia. One of the ways
is to frame it around the question of you are for or against
the war. Yes. There, the numbers are not very good for us. You
know, we should be skeptical of polling, but let us say it is
just, you know, the usual, you know, pro-liberal bloc in Russia
is 15 [percent], 20 percent, if you are being very optimistic,
is against the war, most people are for it because they are
patriotic and feel Russia is under attack, and then others are
just scared.
That is not a very good, you know, dynamic for us to really
be that hopeful around. If you listen to Vladimir Putin's
speeches, however, he is actually going for something else. It
is not about the war.
He is saying that the new ideological divide in Russia is
between isolationism, yes--Russia alone--which, if you decode
it means Russia alone and subservient to China, and we do not
need this idea of Russia integrated with the West. Yes. The
people who want to be integrated with the West, he has called
having a slavish mentality.
That is the polarization he is betting on. He is betting
wrong. There are way more Russians who want to be integrated
with the West than the ones who are passionate about the war.
That is why maybe the message from Klitschko is going to be
hard because Klitschko will be, there is a war on. That will
appeal to the 15 percent, maybe the others who feel that way
but are scared to talk.
We need to think much broader. We need to be--to do
messaging--or, I do not like this term ``messaging''--
communication/engagement around this idea about the future of
Russia. Do you really want to be this isolated island of bad
luck, which is subservient to China? Or do you want to be part
of the West and the world? Because for most Russians, the West
is the world. There, I think you will find that the figures do
not look good for Mr. Putin at all. That is what we need to be
stressing. I am not saying we should forget about the war. Of
course, we should communicate information about the war. That
is critical. We need to think much bigger than that.
Representative Wilson: Thank you.
Mr. Kara-Murza: Thank you so much. Thank you, Ranking
Member Wilson, for the very important question. First, I think
it is important to mention that it is absolutely true what
Peter was just saying. You know, the 20-plus years of Putin's
propaganda have not gone in vain. There is a significant part
of the Russian population that has been, well, for lack of a
better word, brainwashed, because that is what it is, by the
propaganda. Let us not also discount the fact that there are
many people in Russia who want to know the truth about what is
happening.
I think one of the--one of the sort of most illustrative
episodes in that was that earlier this month, as I was
mentioning earlier, Echo of Moscow Radio, which was until a few
weeks ago the largest independent media outlet in Russia, was
closed and I was there at the last meeting of the journalists.
Very emotional, very sad affair, as you could imagine. Just a
few days after this happened, just a few days after Echo of
Moscow was officially liquidated, the ratings agencies
published the figures for the audience, for the listenership in
Russia's two largest cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg, for the
month of February of this year, 2022.
For the first time ever Echo of Moscow Radio was in the
number-one spot for the number of listeners, both in Moscow and
St. Petersburg. Not just among the talk radio stations or news
radio stations, among all radio stations. Which is remarkable,
I think not just for Russia, but probably for the United States
and many other countries, because, of course, most people, when
they listen to the radio, usually in their car, sitting in
traffic, they listen to music rather than news. Yet, for the
month of February--so when Putin's war in Ukraine had already
begun--Echo of Moscow was the number-one top spot in two of
Russia's largest cities.
This just goes to show again why the Putin regime is so
afraid of the truth, why they are so afraid of the people in
Russia learning about the reality--the horrendous, criminal
reality that is now happening in Ukraine. I think it was a very
important message that Peter Pomerantsev just articulated
about--and this sort of goes to our whole conversation--about
communicating, about maintaining those direct people-to-people
contacts between Western countries and Russia. That is the
centrality of the message about the prospect for a future post-
Putin, democratic Russia as part of Europe, as part of what we
call the civilized world, as part of the global north, if you
will.
Because Russia is a European country. There are centuries
of culture, tradition, and mentality behind this. Nothing that
Mr. Putin does will be able to overturn that. I think it is
very important to maintain that message, that all of these
restrictions, of all these sanctions, all of these policies
that we have seen come about in the last four weeks, all these
boycotts by companies and so on, thatis all directed against
the criminal and murderous regime of Vladimir Putin. Not
against the people of Russia, and that there will be a rightful
and dignified place for a post-Putin democratic Russia in the
global democratic community. I think that is a very important
message to be articulating to the Russian people today, in
order to be able to counter those false narratives by the
Russian propaganda.
Representative Wilson: As I conclude, indeed, I want to
back you up. That when I was asked by the media what I want for
the people of Russia at home, I said, it is easy. I want them
to do well economically, to buy more McDonald's, to buy more
Kentucky Fried Chicken, to buy more Starbucks. We want the
people of Russia to integrate with the rest of the world and
not become, as you indicated, the little brother or servant, or
whatever you want to call it, to the Chinese Communist Party.
I yield back.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you.
A thought came to me during that discussion. Both Peter and
Vladimir remind me of my good friend, the late Christopher
Hitchens. The first time I met Hitch we were in Miami Beach,
and he told me that the Iron Curtain would come down in a major
way because of rock and roll music. That all Russians, and in
the Middle East the folks that wanted to put together a
caliphate, which Hitch was much against, liked American jeans
and they liked American music. Maybe Mick Jagger is the right
guy to make the message.
Mr. Pomerantsev: Without a doubt. Paul McCartney's still
huge there. Weirdly, like now I used to work in Russian media,
Dr. House--you know, Dr. House? Hugh Laurie? Huge in Russia.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Dr. House?
Mr. Pomerantsev: It is about--it is an American TV show
about a doctor. He is kind of, like--
Co-Chairman Cohen: It sounds like an X-rated show. I--
Mr. Pomerantsev: No, the opposite. It is about a doctor, he
is kind of--like, he drinks too much, and he is sort of
cynical, but deep down he is a good guy. That is the archetypal
Russian hero. Like, that is the way a lot of Russians want to
perceive themselves, as good guys in a tough world. We really
have to understand these deep cultural tropes and where they
come from historically, if we want to engage.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thanks. I would like to recognize
Representative Gallego, and then I want to recognize Madam
President Cederfelt.
Representative Gallego: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
STATEMENT OF RUBEN GALLEGO, U.S. HOUSE, FROM ARIZONA
Ms. Tlis, thank you for being here today and for sharing
your perspective on this important topic. You mentioned in your
written testimony that Russia used the North Caucasus as a
testing ground for propaganda. What lessons do you see Russia
applying from that experience to spread disinformation today?
Has Russia made changes to its propaganda playbook as a result?
Ms. Tlis: I am sorry--[laughs]--I am probably going to ask
you to repeat the question a little bit slower.
Representative Gallego: Sure. That is not a problem. When
you--in your written testimony you said that Russia used the
northern Caucasus in terms--to test out their propaganda, their
misinformation, and their disinformation. What did we learn
from that? Has Russia--what did Russia learn from that? Has
Russia adjusted since their experiences in the northern
Caucasus from what we are seeing today?
Ms. Tlis: When Putin came to power in the early 2000's, his
methods on propaganda and especially censorship were not this
advanced as they are right now. They were more physical, I
would say, because many of my friends got killed. I myself was
arrested and detained many times--tortured, kidnapped,
everything. That is only because I was working for Associated
Press. That was, you know, an American media that Russia did
not want to be present in the north Caucasus.
In terms of propaganda, what Russia learned in the North
Caucasus, I think, and then it is applying now all over the
country, is the methodology of indoctrination. In the Caucasus,
I actually started in a school in my home village in the town.
Our student books were very different from those that, you
know, the rest of Russia was learning from. The history books
we used were different, the literature books were different.
Now everything that they used to apply to the Caucasus,
beginning from kindergarten, they now apply in the schools.
It was similar in the Stalin times. I remember that
actually Secretary Albright compared, you know, Putin
methodology and propaganda with Stalin's. I agree completely
with that comparison. Yes, that is what Putin learned. Right
now it is a smarter propaganda. It begins from the
kindergarten. It goes all the way to the top. I think that is
the main lesson they learned.
Representative Gallego: Thank you. I yield back.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you. Thank you for your
attendance.
Now I would like to recognize the president of the OSCE PA,
President Margareta Cederfelt.
TESTIMONY OF MARGARETA CEDERFELT [SWEDEN], PRESIDENT, OSCE PA
Ms. Cederfelt: Thank you very much, Congressman Steve
Cohen, as well as the head of the OSCE, the U.S. delegation to
the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. It is a pleasure for me and
the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly to be invited here to this
debate, discussion, hearing today, held by the Helsinki
Commission on the Russian disinformation and ``Putin's War on
the Truth: Propaganda and Censorship in Russia,'' and to listen
to the witnesses, to your reports and also to your thoughts on
what to do to defend Ukraine, but also to defend the truth and
the open society. Because I see that all goes together,
democracy, the fundamental freedoms, rule of law. The recent
important issue for us who lives in a democracy, it is to
defend the media, to defend journalism, but also the civil
society.
If I should say a few words about the OSCE, I believe that
the OSCE, with the Helsinki Final Act as a base document, is a
very useful organization for peace, for freedom, for democracy.
Let me mention that there is inside the OSCE a special
representative on media--on freedom of the media. Now for this
period, it is Ms. Teresa Ribeiro from Portugal. It is not
inside PA. It is from OSCE, the government outside. I think she
do a fantastic job, because what the special representative on
media freedom do, it is document and report and make public
when there is violence against the media. If we should have the
truth, if we should really want to have the truth, we need to
have the freedom of the media.
I am also a strong believer of the truth. I am sure it will
always be there. I think about all those dictators or people
who try to get the power too long. They do always try to stop
the freedom of the media, the freedom of speech. They might
succeed for a short while, but the truth will be there. It is
always recognized at the end. There are a lot of examples of
it. It is important also to collect the information. This is
what is done in Ukraine today, because there is war crimes
going on. I think to collect this information, it will also
make a possibility to make Putin responsible for what he does.
When it comes to Russia, yes, it is a very sad situation.
It is a difficult situation. Memorial, the civil society
organization who was collecting information about history and
what had happened during the Communist time, is closed down by
Putin, but he cannot get--be free from history. Let me also
mention in Berlin the Checkpoint Charlie, which is the museum
over where the West collected information. It is there. There
is information about what has happened during this--during the
war, the Second World War, what has happened during the
Communist time. I think this is the proof that we need to have.
It is not that we, from the West, are against the Russian
people. We have not been it before and we are not it today. We
are in favor of the Russian people. We support them, and we
support that they also should have the same fundamental
freedoms as we have. Then I would like to say one short thing.
It is easy to say, for us who live in the free world, to speak
about freedom and say that we defend it. There also are the
real heroes, those who pay with their lives, who sacrifice, who
take huge risks to support the fundamental freedoms--like you
have done. I think that is what we should recognize as well.
Because if there is not such brave people, there would be no
documentation, and that is needed.
Thank you very much, again, Congressman Steve Cohen, for
inviting us. It has been a true honor to be here today.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Cohen: You are very welcome. We are fortunate
to have you.
I would now like to recognize one of the vice presidents of
the OSCE PA, Mr. Allizard. He will be translated, his French to
English.
TESTIMONY OF PASCAL ALLIZARD [FRANCE], VICE PRESIDENT, OSCE PA
Mr. Allizard: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to have
allowed us to assist to this very interesting hearing.
Lie or de-lie, believe or not believe the lying, I think it
is an eternal question, but even so a weapon--a very dangerous
weapon. I have just one question. What in your opinion would be
the most urgent, the most important step to take to counter the
Russian propaganda narrative? Just a question.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Cohen: The question is posed, I guess, to Mr.
Pomerantsev. I thought he was going to speak--he has been
speaking in French the whole day, and he shocked me there.
[Laughs.]
Mr. Pomerantsev: That was good. The Russian propaganda
narrative. That is such a great question. I would like to
connect it with what the president was saying. Putin's war in
Ukraine follows the methodology of war that the Soviet Union
followed in Ukraine and that it has been using in Syria. Its
aim is to wipe out memory. Its aim is to say it has command of
reality. Its aim is to say that it can murder with impunity. It
is not just challenging fundamental rights like freedom of
expression, the rights of people and children to safety. It is
challenging the right to exist and our rights to a share in
reality.
How do we counteract that? Simply documenting when
something happens to the ICC, that is not enough. We have to
think very, very deeply. I think it means answering with hard
power that backs up humanitarian norms and lofty words. I think
it means ensuring that memory--for example, the memory of the
life of Mariupol, which has now been destroyed, continues to
exist. I think we have to ask ourselves a lot of very, very
fundamental questions. Putin attacks the right to exist. How do
we answer that?
Co-Chairman Cohen: Madam President.
Ms. Cederfelt: Thank you. Yes, I agree. It is, of course,
not enough to collect information and documentation. There is
the unity, and I think this is the strength. The word is
``united.'' Look at United Nations, look inside OSCE where it
is Russia and Belarus are standing alone. We have had our
meetings, and we stand collected and unified. Look at the
European Union. I am from Europe, from Sweden, And the EU is
united. We are sending, just like the U.S., like others do, we
are sending weapons, ammunition, humanitarian aid, just to
support Ukraine and Ukraine's right to exist.
I think we need to work on a very, very--on all levels.
From OSCE side, from the parliamentarian side, we are also
ready for the time when it is possible to have a dialog, to
rebuild and stabilize the situation. When the war is ended, we
need to have the parliamentary diplomacy to really secure that
it will be a stable peace, that the people's right in Ukraine
will be recognized for a long time forward. Right now, the
important issue is to stop the war, to get an end to it. I just
want to be very, very clear on this. I really appreciate what
is done here from United States, because I think that U.S.
activities is important, but just as well as all the other--the
unity we have today in support of Ukraine.
Thank you.
Co-Chairman Cohen: I want to thank all of--yes, please, Mr.
Pomerantsev.
Mr. Pomerantsev: I just want to finish on a quote from a
great Ukrainian contemporary writer, which I just remembered as
you were talking, Oksana Zabuzhko, in her 1996 masterpiece. She
said: The Ukrainian choice is between a non-existence or an
existence that kills you. I very much hope that we can move
beyond that paradox.
Co-Chairman Cohen: I believe our parliamentarian from
Cyprus, Ms.--
Ms. Charalambides: Charalambides.
Co-Chairman Cohen: --and I should know that perfectly--is
recognized.
TESTIMONY OF IRENE CHARALAMBIDES [CYPRUS], VICE PRESIDENT, OSCE
PA
Ms. Charalambides: Thank you. Thank you.
Allow me first to say that I am a journalist myself, and
after that I was a--I am a parliamentarian now. My thought is
always with the journalists that lost their lives in Kyiv,
Americans and others, in their effort to speak the truth, to
let us know what really is happening there. We have to remember
them. I had a question. Tech companies have, in some cases,
flagged misinformation as being state-sponsored or potentially
false rather than removing it. Or they have banned individual
accounts rather than enacting more sweeping measures against
misinformation and disinformation. YouTube has done too little
for that. For example, it took action on Friday against state-
sponsored disinformation following weeks of pressure from human
rights advocates, but not before that. They conduct was widely
shared. What do you have to say about that? We all know that
these media are based mostly in the USA.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Who wants to take a shot at that?
London, are you listening? Johns Hopkins is on.
Mr. Pomerantsev: Yes, look, this is something that my
colleagues and I have been working on a huge amount, really,
over the last 6 years. Of course, we cannot have the tech
companies marking their own homework. That is the most
important thing. We are dependent on their word for what they
are doing. I do think there are steps taken in the DSA, in the
various other new proposals for EU regulations are actually the
right ones. They would give more oversight of tech companies,
so we can actually see what they are doing. Without that kind
of access, it is very hard for us to judge whether any of these
steps are effective and whether they are policing their
platforms in line just with what they promised to do. That is
really the fundamental issue. It can be one tactic, another
tactic. Until we have that oversight, we just do not know
whether that is a good tactic.
There is actually--you know, actually, tech companies have
been quite strong about demonetizing some Kremlin propaganda.
We actually need a lot more granularity in how this is being
approached. There is sort of negative side effects. Good
Russian media, independent Russian media is struggling to
monetize its content in various platforms. We need kind of cut-
outs for good media, which do exist--of course, they exist,
largely abroad now--that allow them to keep on operating on
YouTube, especially, which is really important. We have got to
be a bit cleverer about some of these sanctions.
Also, I do not know, there is research coming in from, I do
not know, the Middle East, for example, and from South Asia,
where there is much less monitoring of state-sponsored
disinformation, there is much less monitoring of how various
sort of online advertising is continuing to support it. That is
another issue. We are very fixated on Europe, on America.
Actually, a lot of the Russian campaign is now focused on the
Middle East, on Latin America, and on South Asia, where they
seem to be having a lot of success.
Co-Chairman Cohen: Thank you very much.
I want to thank all of our panelists, our international and
our bipartisan, bicameral panelists, and particularly our
guests. You all have been wonderful. I suspect it is beyond
bedtime in London. If Vladimir is not here with us, sleep well,
and to each of you all, fabulous. This meeting is adjourned.
[Sounds gavel.]
[Whereupon, at 3:59 p.m., the hearing ended.]
[all]
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