PARIS — A massive disinformation campaign? That’s not us, the Russian Embassy in Paris said after media reports stated that French officials were looking into a suspected Russian involvement in a string of operations in Paris with the Olympics just a few weeks away.
In a statement released Tuesday, Russia’s diplomatic mission in France accused the French media of unleashing what it called “a new Russophobic campaign” by reporting the purported ties between a series of provocative incidents in Paris. The latest took place over the weekend, when five coffins emblazoned with the words “French soldiers of Ukraine” were left next to the Eiffel Tower.
“The Embassy declares in all responsibility that the Russian Federation has never interfered and does not interfere in the internal affairs of France — our country has other more important priorities,” it said.
Russia has been repeatedly accused of carrying out destabilization campaigns in France. Most recently, a report by Microsoft digital experts published on Sunday found that “a network of Russia-affiliated actors” had purportedly targeted the Olympics, likely in retaliation for the restrictions placed on Russian and Belarusian athletes at the Games in response to the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine.
The casket case could be in reference to statements made by French president Emmanuel Macron about the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine or reports that French military trainers could begin working in Ukraine soon.
The Paris public prosecutor’s office told POLITICO that three people were arrested in connection with the coffin incident: a 39-year-old Bulgarian man who allegedly drove the caskets to iconic Parisian landmark and two people “with whom he was connected,” one born in Germany and another in Ukraine. The three individuals were freed after being presented to a judge on Monday. The prosecutor requested that they be charged for acts of psychological violence but declined to discuss the cases any further.
The coffin incident is just one of several peculiar acts of protest and vandalism that French authorities have linked to disinformation campaigns. Speaking in the French National Assembly on Tuesday, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal tied the coffins to two other acts “designed to manipulate us” and that “bear the trademark of [foreign] interference.”
Last month, a pair of red handprints were found daubed on the Holocaust memorial in Paris. And in November, a Moldovan couple was arrested on suspicion of drawing some 250 blue Stars of David across Paris shortly after the October 7 terror attack on Israel — an operation which, French newswire AFP and daily Le Monde reported, had been “commissioned by Russian security services.”
Alleged perpetrators in both the coffin and red hand incidents were caught attempting to leave France using the same bus service. As was the case with the coffins, the suspects in the red hands incident were traced back to Bulgaria.
Those physical acts come as Russia has reportedly stepped up its efforts in cyberspace as well.
Microsoft said in its report that Russian influence actors are “ramping up malign disinformation campaigns against France, French President Emmanuel Macron, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris.”
The tech giant said the misinformation effort appears to be designed to denigrate the IOC and “create the expectation of violence breaking out in Paris at the Games,” piggybacking off of the heightened security concerns in the lead-up to the Games.
France raised its terror alert warning to its highest level in March following the concert hall shootings in Moscow where Tajik militants killed almost 140 people. Organizers also scaled back their plans for an extravagant opening ceremony on the Seine River, which appears to still be going ahead.
Microsoft cited fake news broadcasts intended on stoking fears of a terror attack during the Games and a bogus Netflix documentary castigating the IOC that featured an AI-generated voice mimicking Tom Cruise.
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