Re:Baltica - The Baltic Center for Investigative Journalism
  • Home
  • Archive
    • Important
    • Baltic Drug Couriers
    • Dirty Money
    • China’s influence
    • Energetics
    • Fake News
    • Health in Latvia
    • I Spy
    • Imprisoned in the Baltics
    • Latvia’s ageing dilemma
    • Latvia’s Golden Visas
    • Money from Russia
    • Press Intimidation in the Baltic States
    • Russia and Family Values
    • Small Wages
    • The Baltic Media After the Crisis
    • The Other Side of Latvia’s ‘Success’ Story
    • Unequal Education
    • Uzbeks in Latvia
    • #Vēlēšanas2018
  • About us
  • Support us
Home
Archive
    Important
    Baltic Drug Couriers
    Dirty Money
    China's influence
    Energetics
    Fake News
    Health in Latvia
    I Spy
    Imprisoned in the Baltics
    Latvia's ageing dilemma
    Latvia's Golden Visas
    Money from Russia
    Press Intimidation in the Baltic States
    Russia and Family Values
    Small Wages
    The Baltic Media After the Crisis
    The Other Side of Latvia’s ‘Success’ Story
    Unequal Education
    Uzbeks in Latvia
    #Vēlēšanas2018
About us
Support us
Re:Baltica - The Baltic Center for Investigative Journalism
  • Home
  • Archive
    • Important
    • Baltic Drug Couriers
    • Dirty Money
    • China’s influence
    • Energetics
    • Fake News
    • Health in Latvia
    • I Spy
    • Imprisoned in the Baltics
    • Latvia’s ageing dilemma
    • Latvia’s Golden Visas
    • Money from Russia
    • Press Intimidation in the Baltic States
    • Russia and Family Values
    • Small Wages
    • The Baltic Media After the Crisis
    • The Other Side of Latvia’s ‘Success’ Story
    • Unequal Education
    • Uzbeks in Latvia
    • #Vēlēšanas2018
  • About us
  • Support us
en_GBlvru_RU
Important

Inside the Kremlin Propaganda Factory and other news from Re:Baltica

30. August, 2018Re:Baltica

This is a copy of Re:Baltica’s English newsletter, sent on Aug 30, 2018. If you want to receive newsletters like this via e-mail, sign up!


Good Thursday morning!

One big thing…

Inside the Kremlin Propaganda Factory

In recent years there has been much talk of Russian propaganda media in Eastern Europe. We can offer a unique insight into how this works day-to-day.
Together with colleagues from Serbia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Estonia and the US, we have done research all summer on a study showing how Moscow has for years been financing and dictating the content of “independent” Russian-language news sites in the Baltic countries – Baltnews. The English-language version of the study was done together with our partner Buzzfeed. You can read it in English here and in Russian here.

2. August voter polls are out, with no big surprises

  • August voter polls show that the populist KPVLV party (7.5%) has maintained its high rating, placing it among the long-term political “heavyweights” such as the “social democratic” Harmony (21.5%) and the Greens and Farmers’ Alliance (11.5%)
  • Still on top is pro-Russian Harmony which has always remained in opposition despite having the single largest voter support.
  • The re-branded centrist-liberal New Unity (the old Unity and a few regional parties) passed the 5% barrier for seating in the Saeima for the first time.
  • Read more here.

3. Party campaign spending quickly burning up legal limits

The anti-corruption agency KNAB, which oversees the financing of political party campaigns, has published an infographic in Latvian of how much parties have spent of their legally allowed election campaign limits so far. The red shows how much has been spent, the green, what is still remaining.

  • The ceiling for this election is EUR 533 347 and is being rapidly approached by Harmony and the Greens and Farmers’ Alliance.
  • Our observations through our social media monitoring project show that Harmony uses advertising on social media the most, publishing around 80 ads per week, with the other parties averaging around 15.
  • We gather political advertisements on Facebook by using the ProPublica tool Ad Collector. Every week we summarize and publish the results in a PowerPoint presentation. Check here.

4. Police arrest youths for spreading fake news

Last week something a bit unbelievable happened – the Latvian police detained two youths on suspicion of publishing fake news, some of it of a very disturbing nature – the crash of a Latvian airliner and the collapse of a shopping center building.

  • We have previously researched and reported that there are three main fake news distribution networks in Latvia. One was run by a 22-year old rap musician, the other by his minor (underage) fan Arturs. Read about it in Russian here.
  • Off the record information I obtained by a source reveals that the police asked the youths to delete their fake news pages in their presence in order to mitigate their punishment.
  • The Re:Baltica team is pleased that the police acted. Meantime, we think that the youths should get an “educational/rehabilitative” punishment, like raking leaves in the park. On the other hand, some would say, lock them up for shock effect.

Thank you for reading!
Inga (journalist and co-founder of Re:Baltica)

Sign up a friend for Re:Baltica’s newsletter!


Donate with PayPal

INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM NEEDS INDEPENDENT FINANCING
If you like our work, support us!

INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM NEEDS INDEPENDENT FINANCING

Investigative journalism is not an expensive hobby. It is a trade: often lonely, sometimes brave, full-time job which requires both time and money. It is expensive and thus become the first victim when traditional media face crisis. But without it we cannot understand the world around us and held the powers responsible.

We do it as a non-profit organisation which raises money itself and gives investigations to traditional media and publishes them online for free access.

We as editors are the only ones who decide what we are going to investigate because we - and not the advertisers or owners - think it is important topic for the Baltic societies. Thus we can investigate social inequality, corruption, abuses of power or money laundering.

We look for grants and earn ourselves via teaching, moderating events and researching scripts for films. But it takes away time we need for doing journalism.
Therefore we need you to donate and become part of Re:Baltica's community!

Now you can also donate through Mobilly!

VIDEO


SUBSCRIBE

Close
Read our English newsletters here.
Language*


Grupa



Mailigen Email Marketing
* Required fields

INVESTIGATIONS

#Vēlēšanas2018 Baltic Drug Couriers Belarus sanctions China's influence Covid-19 Dirty Money Disinformation Domestic Violence Energetics Fake News Health in Latvia Important Imprisoned in the Baltics I Spy Latvia's ageing dilemma Latvia's Golden Visas Money from Russia Press Intimidation in the Baltic States Re:Check Russia and Family Values Sanctions Small Wages The Baltic Media After the Crisis The Other Side of Latvia’s ‘Success’ Story Unequal Education Uzbeks in Latvia

TWITTER

CONTACTS

Strēlnieku street 4a, Riga, Latvia, LV-1010


rebaltica(at)rebaltica.com

OUR FRIENDS

***

© 2023 The Baltic Center for Investigative Journalism Re:Baltica
Webly by Premiumcoding

We are using cookies to give you the best experience on our website.

Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.