FSB attempts to terrify Africa with tales of American mosquitoes and biolabs

Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB, is running a disinformation campaign in Africa, spreading, among others, the conspiracy theory that Western companies are using the continent for bio-experiments.

Source: an investigation by The Insider

Quote: "As The Insider can now disclose, following Prigozhin's demise the Kremlin initiated a substantial disinformation and propaganda campaign in Africa – one carried out under the supervision of the FSB’s Fifth Service. Augmenting the network of political operatives and propagandists that Prigozhin’s efforts on the continent left behind, the Kremlin has begun developing its own."

Details: The Insider says the head of the new disinformation campaign is Artem Kureev, an experienced employee of the FSB’s Fifth Service, which operates internationally.

Two months after Prigozhin's assassination, in October 2023, Kureev announced the founding of a news agency called African Initiative, followed a month later by the launch of RusAfro, a media portal whose output is translated into all of Africa’s major languages.

The new media outlets quickly recruited employees, focusing mainly on African students studying in Russia. 

Quote: "The rhetoric of the FSB agency's publications largely echoes that of Soviet times, albeit substituting the old favourite gripe about ‘American imperialism’ with the trendier term ‘colonialism’.

The information agency focuses on all topics of relevance to the Kremlin's agenda, extensively covering anti-American rallies in the Central African Republic while promoting stories about how ‘The United States is attempting to conquer Africa with the use of Facebook, dollars, and the LGBT movement.’ At the same time, some of the outlets under Kureev's control have fabricated legends even more outrageous than the old Soviet propaganda [...].

A recent campaign [...] promotes a conspiracy theory alleging that Western pharmaceutical companies are using Africa for biological warfare experiments and for illicit trials of various drugs. In many respects, this campaign builds upon a previous conspiracy theory – also attributable to the FSB – that ‘disclosed’ the existence of American-run bio-laboratories in Ukraine. The African campaign adds into the mix concepts of colonialism, the demonisation of Bill Gates, and horror stories about the perils of vaccination."

More details: The Insider says the FSB uses "Prigozhinʼs network of Telegram channels in Africa". The journalists note that these channels did not stop operating after Prigozhin’s death, but continued to work for their new handlers. 

Quote: "Assessing the potential success of the Fifth Service of the FSB in spreading disinformation campaigns across Africa proves challenging. On the one hand, the low level of media literacy predisposes the populace to easily accept conspiracy theories. On the other hand, there is no observable evidence that the efforts of propagandists are yielding a significant response. For instance, all publications from Kureev's agency across all languages over the past month have garnered fewer than 20,000 clicks, and RusAfro Media has yet to surpass five thousand.

But the efforts of the FSB should not be underestimated. Although the sites were created in the autumn, they were seldom updated in the first few months. The full-fledged disinformation campaign only got underway in February."

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