Russian intelligence agencies are engaging in a disinformation campaign in Africa with claims that the Pentagon is using Africans as test subjects for biological research and by using social media sources to push criticism of Western public health efforts, according to U.S. officials.
"Russian intelligence services are providing material support and guidance to the African Initiative," James Rubin, who oversees the State Department's Global Engagement Center, told The Wall Street Journal.
"They are casting doubt on medical work that's being done by legitimate medical organizations and deterring Africans from trusting medical efforts that could save lives."
Russia's campaign, put in place to undermine U.S. influence in Africa, centers around an online news service, African Initiative, which was set up last year and has included a conference where participants attacked pharmaceutical companies from the West, the newspaper reported Thursday.
According to U.S. officials, African Initiative not only uses social media, but also works toward article placement in local and international publications, and recruiting local journalists and bloggers. It has established offices in Burkina Faso and Mali, West African countries that have become more allied with Russia in recent years.
Some of African Initiative's staff has been associated with the Russian paramilitary Wagner Group, which has extensive operations in Africa.
Late Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin supported Russian disinformation efforts and faced U.S. sanctions after helping to fund the Internet Research Agency, the Russian disinformation campaign formed to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Moscow is dismissing the accusations as propaganda, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov writing in an email that such claims have become "customary" while not being backed by evidence.
The efforts in Africa are part of Russia's long history of spreading disinformation about medical issues.
The Soviet Union's KGB, during the Cold War, claimed that U.S. Army laboratories at Fort Detrick, Maryland, launched the AIDs epidemic, and recently, Russian disinformation campaigns were launched to undermine confidence in Wester pharmaceutical companies' COVID vaccines.
Africa is becoming an important region for both the United States and Russia. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited four African nations last month and Russian President Vladimir Putin met with African leaders in St. Petersburg last July.
The latest disinformation campaign is being conducted openly.
Russian Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, the commander of a unit formed to protect Russian troops against biological, chemical, and nuclear attacks, claimed that the United States has been testing biological agents on Africans while referring to American work in Nigeria to fight the spread of HIV.
Public health initiatives are at a crucial point in Africa, as several countries are starting to release the world's first malaria vaccine, and as infectious diseases are growing after child vaccination rates dropped during the COVID pandemic.
Artem Kureev, the top editor of the African Initiative, did not respond to a request for comment, while Deputy Editor Anna Zamaraeva formerly served as the spokeswoman for the Wagner Center.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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