22 Apr, 2015 10:58

How mainstream propaganda works

In 2005, at 25 years old, Margarita was named Editor-in-Chief of RT, the first Russian round-the-clock English-language news channel. Later on, after the launch of RT in Arabic (Rusiya Al-Yaum) and RT in Spanish, she became Editor-in-Chief of the whole multilingual television news network. Margarita Simonyan is also the first Vice-President of Russia’s National Association of TV and Radio Broadcasters (NAT).

The Western media’s starkly different reactions to the murders of two opposition figures – Russian politician Nemtsov and Ukrainian journalist Buzina – is a case study in biased reporting.

Following the killing of a well-known Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov, US media outlets released over 100 articles, stories, live broadcasts and reports concerning Nemtsov’s relationship with the Kremlin, the progress of the investigation, as well as statements by Russian and foreign public officials – all in the space of just four days. The rate at which the stories were published only increased with each day that passed. Nemtsov’s funeral procession was extensively covered by CNN, Fox News, CBS News and ABC.

Following the killing of a well-known Ukrainian opposition figure Oles Buzina, leaders within the US media published about 20 articles in four days, the majority of which were short newswire notes. There were a handful of opinion pieces, too. Only Radio Liberty decided to report Buzina’s funeral on April 19 and even this was miniscule in content: a one-minute video and a few words about Kiev suspecting Russia being behind his death!

It’s all quite simple and highly effective.

May they both rest in peace. Senseless victims of a mad world.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

Opinion