On 23 June 2022, the European Council granted candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova and expressed readiness to do the same for Georgia once the priorities specified in the Commission’s opinion on Georgia’s membership application have been addressed.
The Russian state-controlled disinformation outlets and their amplifiers seized the truly historic moment to spin their deceitful claims about the EU’s enlargement. While the initial reaction of the pro-Kremlin disinformation ecosystem was somewhat reserved, it quickly turned to recycling some of the well-established pro-Kremlin narratives it had used to discredit the Eastern Partnership in the past. It was not long until the claims of the EU allegedly enslaving neighbouring countries, using Ukraine and Moldova as political tools, and making false promises to scam the candidates started pouring in. Among the more prominent disinformation narratives were also attempts to delegitimise the EU accession process, by claiming the decisions of the Council are destructive and rushed , and comparing this decision with the time it took the EU to grant candidacy status to other countries to “prove” these claims.
Some of the more far-out disinformation claims also included false allegations that the candidate status to Moldova was given in exchange for joining EU sanctions against Russia or unfounded claims that Romania sought to incorporate Moldova into its territory through the EU accession process.
Targeting the EU’s...
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