James Rubin: Serbia is Russian propaganda entry point in Western Balkans

Rubin said this at an online media conference where he presented a report entitled “Like China seeks to reform the global information environment”.

Asked by Radio Free Europe how he appreciates China's influence in the Western Balkans, Rubin said that during a visit to the region earlier this year, it <x0ve wined China's growing desire to play a role by taking ownership of media organisations”. But that currently “the biggest problem is that Serbia is a portal to Russia in the Western Balkans”.

Serbia is the only country in the region that has not closed Ras Tudej and Sputnik programmes. In a way, they think they can do it and still enter the European Union, which confuses me, Ruby said.

He recalled that all EU countries closed RT and Sputnik after the invasion began, considering those propagandistic weapons of the Russian occupation.

They even have RT and Sputnik in Serbian, which means they are understandable even to neighboring countries. This is currently the biggest information problem, Rubin said.

Immediately after the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union suspended the distribution of Russian media RT and Sputnik because it considers them to be the Kremlin's means for deinformation and information manipulation.