False News in 2017

Described by Collins as the false and often sensational “ <x0.8x1>, false news has also resounded in Russian media and political landscapes there.

They have been treated with confidence by prominent media in Russia, public figures and audiences. Some of them have originated in Russia ʹthe country that Western governments have accused of making false news parts of foreign policy, some others have started in other countries.

Moscow has rejected criticism of it, including accusations that it has created false news aimed at interfering with the US presidential election in 2016.

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One of the false news that made headlines in Russia in 2017 has been about the “the withdrawal of Russia”.

In August, a confused website, similar to that of the British newspaper The Guardian, has published a false report on a plot by the West to destroy Russia.

The report quoted former British intelligence chief John Scarlett as saying that Britain and the US plan to exploit Georgia's pro-Western former president, Mikhail Saakashvili, and a “extinguishing between Ukraine and Russia” to break down the Russian state.

I have to admit that the wars in Georgia and Crime -- the most strategic plans of the United States and Britain for the collapse of Russia -- have ended with failure”, Scarlett said in the fabricated report.

The news was soon exposed, and the British newspaper The Guardian said it was fake and “was published on a fake page claiming to be The Guardian”.

However, some Russian media have broadcast it, including the national television network REN-TV.

“Hemburger for Putin”

On October 7th, on the birthday of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Russian state television and news agencies reported that a restaurant in New York is serving a special hamburger in honour of the head of the Kremlin.

The report is based on a video produced by Ruptly a TV news agency. RT, which is supported by the Russian government.

Ruptly interviewed a worker at the Lucyés Royal Cantina in New York, who has said the bar has created a 1,952 grams of reference for Putin's birth year.

There are not only foreign leaders who wish the Russian president a birthday but also ordinary citizens. Furthermore, they are doing this in very original ways”, state-owned news speaker Rossia-24 has said.

The restaurant has denied honoring Putin with a hamburger and said “responsible for the fraud were suspended, pending investigations”.

A barist at the restaurant said later that Putin's hamburger idea was hers and that she lost her job. The officer on tape in Ruptly's video was fired as well.

Ruptly later he deleted the video, saying through a statement that the “material has not fulfilled its editorial standards”.

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In May, a Twitter account claiming to be of French Culture Minister Francoise Nissen has written that the Belarusian author and Nobel Literature Prize laureate Svetlana Aleksievich has died. Nyssen, earlier, led the publishing house Actes Sud, which her father founded. This publishing house has published the writings of Aleksievich in French, which has entrusted credibility to the news of death.

Some Russian media, including the government daily Rossiinskaya Gazeta and state news agency RIA Novosti, have broadcast the report, as have Time Television, which is a Radio Free Europe project with the Voice of America. European media have also published the news, including the French newspaper Le Figaro, and the Portuguese daily Diario de Noticias.

But the news, in fact, has been false. Aleksievich, 69, has spoken from Seoul about the Belarusal service of Radio Free Europe. “Someone is impatient”, she said.

“Bin Laden at White House”

In November, Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, has said during a televised debate that the late leader of Al Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden, has visited the White House.

Zakharova made these comments during a discussion on U.S. lobby and the US investigation into Russia's alleged intervention in American elections in 2016.

Remember the fantastic photos of bin Laden at the White House”, Zakharova said among others.

bin Laden, who was killed in 2011 in Pakistan, never visited the White House. Zakharova did not specify during the programme which pictures he thought about, even though some Russian media have speculated that she was referring to an assembled photo showing the former First Lady and former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, holding hands with Al Qaeda leader.

A few days later, Zakharova wrote on Facebook that she did not say bin Laden personally visited the White House, but his <x0-cylegs, his advisor”.