Hearts & Minds In Africa, Pt. II

[00:00:00] The steady growth in consumption, which is recorded in Nigeria by statistics, does not have

[00:00:11] a real therapeutic effect.

[00:00:13] And Nigerian citizens are used as a free clinical base.

[00:00:18] A Russian official on Sputnik Africa spreading Moscow's claim that the United States is

[00:00:24] using citizens of Nigeria and other African nations for biological experiments.

[00:00:31] The sort of information warfare is hardly new, back in season one of this podcast series

[00:00:37] we told you how back in the 1980s, the Soviets planted a story in India claiming that

[00:00:44] the AIDS virus was linked to similar US experiments.

[00:00:48] The story was a virus itself spreading rapidly from one small pro-Soviet paper in India to

[00:00:55] circle the globe.

[00:00:57] That was four decades ago.

[00:00:59] Today the Russians understand that thanks to accelerants like social media and artificial

[00:01:05] intelligence, false claims can spread even faster, false claims also known as disinformation.

[00:01:11] I'm Paul Brandis and that's the name of this podcast series Disinformation, a co-production

[00:01:24] of Evergreen Podcasting and Emergent Risk International, a global risk advisory firm.

[00:01:30] The RIs Chief Executive Officer Meredith Wilson is away but and for the first time will

[00:01:37] hear from senior intelligence analyst Cameron Evers.

[00:01:44] Africa has long been a proxy for the geostrategic competition between the United States and the Soviet

[00:01:51] Union slash Russia.

[00:01:53] Of course, China is also a player but in this episode it's Russia's information warfare

[00:01:59] efforts in Africa that will focus on.

[00:02:03] It seems ironic that Russia can even claim that America is using biology for malicious

[00:02:09] purposes in Africa just to give one example to the contrary, a two-decade American effort

[00:02:16] to combat the AIDS virus in Africa as saved according to US estimates some 25 million

[00:02:24] lives.

[00:02:25] The program if you've never heard of it is called PEPFAR.

[00:02:29] James Rubin is special envoy of the State Department's Global Engagement Center.

[00:02:35] He says the Russians are trying to counter this with disinformation.

[00:02:40] He means there's no words about their information warfare efforts in Africa.

[00:02:45] What's really so dastardly about what the Russians are doing, normally the Russian government

[00:02:52] and the United States have geopolitical debates about the Ukraine war or about policies in

[00:02:59] Europe.

[00:03:00] But in this case, the Russian government who its intelligence services are really responsible

[00:03:06] directly for killing African think about it by deterring African citizens and government

[00:03:16] from using Western health services, African people, men, women and children might not go

[00:03:24] to the facilities where life-saving health services are available.

[00:03:31] They might not go to get their vaccines, get their health there because they've been

[00:03:37] misled into thinking that it's part of some conspiracy theory the Russians have invented.

[00:03:43] So this isn't just dangerous for US Russia relations.

[00:03:49] Russia's intelligence services by doing this, they are showing they don't care about African

[00:03:54] live because they are deterring Africans from getting urgently needed health care that

[00:04:00] everyone knows in Africa has saved lives.

[00:04:03] And instead they're making up stories about biological weapons testing and conspiracy theories

[00:04:09] that they've used in Ukraine and elsewhere.

[00:04:13] That's what's such a tragedy about this, it's not just the foreign policy consequences

[00:04:18] but it's the lives and health and welfare of individual men, women and children in Africa

[00:04:24] are being put at risk by the Russian.

[00:04:27] Speaking on the voice of America, Ruben explains Russian tactics and Moscow's overall campaign

[00:04:33] which is called the African initiative.

[00:04:36] We do know that a man named Artem Kareya is the leader of the African initiative.

[00:04:44] He's called the chief editor.

[00:04:46] This is a guy who previously worked in a lot, helping a member of parliament avoid getting

[00:04:54] kicked out of the country and stuff like that.

[00:04:56] You can imagine what his real job is and what he's doing is hiring local individuals, some

[00:05:03] of whom come from the Pregozion Enterprise which has brought such chaos to West Africa

[00:05:08] and such damage to the people of Africa.

[00:05:12] And they're collecting these nefarious characters to try to persuade Africans to not get needed

[00:05:19] health care.

[00:05:20] Think of how monstrous a disinformation campaign is, this isn't just one of these war and

[00:05:25] peace things between the United States and Russia.

[00:05:28] This is something that's costing lives for Africans and I certainly hope that everyone

[00:05:34] who is made aware of it.

[00:05:36] What we're doing this for is we're trying to inoculate the journalists, the government,

[00:05:43] the people of Africa to a Russian disinformation campaign that would prevent people from

[00:05:49] getting their needed medical service.

[00:05:52] One way of countering Russian effort, Ruben says, is by pre-bunking the tactic of sharing

[00:05:59] your information quickly and openly getting in front of the other guys narratives, if you

[00:06:05] will.

[00:06:06] Well, you can be sure that we have been working closely with our African partners throughout

[00:06:11] the region.

[00:06:13] And we know that we are operating at a very, very early stage.

[00:06:20] We got some very, very special information here that allowed us to expose Russia's intelligence

[00:06:26] services.

[00:06:27] And we are sharing that information with our partners and we're doing it very, very early

[00:06:32] because we are hoping that by coming out with this information so early that we will prevent

[00:06:39] the disinformation campaign from gaining traction that will prevent it from spreading across

[00:06:45] the region.

[00:06:47] If Russia gets its way, they're hoping that dozens of African countries will not use Western

[00:06:54] healthcare, will not benefit from these hundreds of billions of dollars in the United States

[00:06:59] and Western countries and private individuals have been spending to save African lives.

[00:07:07] And if we get this early, if we inoculate the people, the journalists and others to at

[00:07:13] least raise the question when they see these conspiracy stories, where to come from?

[00:07:18] Is this from the Russians?

[00:07:19] Does this have a maiden in the Kremlin stamp on it?

[00:07:23] We hope that it will avoid the damage that would otherwise be done.

[00:07:28] And yet the Russians have gotten not a small amount of traction in Africa, says Dan Whitman

[00:07:34] a fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

[00:07:38] He spent most of his career in the Foreign Service, including postings in some eight African

[00:07:44] countries.

[00:07:45] He says that in terms of information warfare, no matter what the United States does, it

[00:07:51] is at a disadvantage to Russia in one key respect.

[00:07:56] The United States government works at a great disadvantage because we tell the truth.

[00:08:02] When you are running a social media campaign, not only is there no obligation to tell

[00:08:08] the truth, you have no interest in doing so.

[00:08:11] So there's a big, big difference here.

[00:08:14] And we go into this battle with our arms tied behind our back because we say, and I

[00:08:20] love V-O-A for doing this.

[00:08:22] We verify, we check sources, we make sure that what we're saying is true.

[00:08:27] The other side does not do that.

[00:08:29] Russian disinformation has an enormous strategic advantage.

[00:08:33] We need to find a way which is transparent and which does not play tricks and which does

[00:08:39] not lower itself to the level of lying in disinformation.

[00:08:44] We need a way of answering this other than simply putting out a statement saying, this

[00:08:50] is untrue.

[00:08:51] These statements have no resonance at all.

[00:08:56] Let's take a short break here when we come back.

[00:08:58] We'll hear from Cameron Evers, senior analyst covering Sub-Saharan Africa for Emergent

[00:09:04] Risk International.

[00:09:08] This series on disinformation is a co-production of Evergreen podcasts and emergent risk

[00:09:13] international, a global risk advisory firm.

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[00:10:42] Welcome back for more on-russian influence efforts in Africa.

[00:10:55] Let's bring in Cameron Evers of Emergent Risk International, he's a senior intelligence

[00:11:01] analyst covering Sub-Saharan Africa.

[00:11:06] There have been a lot of reports, Cameron, that the Russians, US government says are pushing

[00:11:12] a lot of these false claims of US biological testing in Africa.

[00:11:18] They've done this for a long time, of course.

[00:11:21] What can you tell us about this?

[00:11:23] Yeah, so there are some wacky conspiracy theories going around right now about US health programs

[00:11:29] in Africa and the State Department actually put out a warning in response saying that these

[00:11:33] theories are coming from Russian disinformation, right?

[00:11:36] Through a new campaign.

[00:11:37] This is by a little-known information agency called Africa Initiative that popped up back

[00:11:41] in 2023.

[00:11:42] It looks like the State Department announcement is a response to an investigative journalism

[00:11:47] report by a Latvian based outlet called The Insider and that came out on February 8th.

[00:11:52] I don't know actually how the State Department initially discovered this campaign.

[00:11:55] These kind of announcements from them are a little bit rare.

[00:11:58] It's definitely interesting.

[00:12:00] The Insider article has this title, right?

[00:12:01] It's really catchy.

[00:12:02] It's Russian intelligence attempts to terrify Africa with tales of American mosquitoes and

[00:12:08] bio labs.

[00:12:09] They detail this in their talking about the Africa Initiative which is, again, backed by

[00:12:15] Russian intelligence and has been spreading these theories, right?

[00:12:17] These theories include Bill Gates and pharmaceutical companies are using secret biological experiments

[00:12:23] on Africans by pretending to vaccinate them, but they're actually using them as guinea pigs

[00:12:28] and Western-led health programs are causing these in Africa, such as disease from genetically

[00:12:33] modified mosquitoes.

[00:12:35] The biological experiment theory appears to be a sequel from a similar disinformation campaign

[00:12:40] that was launched during the start of the Ukraine War.

[00:12:43] They're using social media, local health conferences actually in Africa and in the recruitment

[00:12:49] and training of local journalists, even street graffiti in Africa to spread these conspiracies.

[00:12:55] The State Department is saying that this Africa Initiative, they've actually opened up

[00:12:58] offices in Brachina Faso and Mali and they've started spreading these theories last year

[00:13:04] and they're gearing up to do more of them in 2024.

[00:13:06] In the guy behind this, the Russian intelligence chief, he's a guy named Artem Kareev.

[00:13:12] He's an FSB operative and it looks like he launched something similar called Roost Afro

[00:13:18] and both of these campaigns have been translated into a lot of African languages.

[00:13:23] Now, the question is, do these first of all, what's the Russian goal here?

[00:13:29] I think that's rather obvious, but just tell us a little bit why the Russians are doing

[00:13:34] this and the important question to follow up with is, is it gaining any traction?

[00:13:40] I mean, to your knowledge, do folks in these African countries that are being exposed to

[00:13:46] this propaganda, this disinformation, is it having an impact?

[00:13:51] So the first question, why are they doing this at all?

[00:13:54] Obviously information, psychological warfare, influence operations are a huge part of

[00:14:00] Russian political strategy and that extends to an extent to Africa when they're there.

[00:14:05] But we could also ask, so why is Russia interested in Africa in the first place?

[00:14:10] And my answer here is that really Russia saw a huge opportunity to get around sanctions

[00:14:15] and Russian insiders in Moscow. They saw a way to make a lot of money and get mining resources.

[00:14:20] So Russia does not have a lot of options or allies these days.

[00:14:25] Russia, they really scaled up their diplomatic inroads dramatically after sanctions first hit them

[00:14:30] back when they annex Crimea in 2014. So ever since then we see this big pattern of

[00:14:35] Russia returning to Africa after many decades, but we're not doing a lot.

[00:14:39] That was kind of the post Cold War 90s, 2000s phase when they retreated from the region a bit.

[00:14:44] To the same year 2014, that's when Wagner got it started. So Wagner, the private military group

[00:14:49] connected to Putin's inner circle and then they first showed up to Africa in 2017.

[00:14:54] And they've never really left. They've transformed into different phases, but they've stayed there since

[00:14:58] 2017. So essentially Russia needed a lot of friends every 2014 to get around sanctions etc.

[00:15:03] And they saw us opportunity because Russia has something unique that they can offer

[00:15:08] to really any poor country or any country that needs them for war, but that's weapons and military

[00:15:12] expertise and all these countries don't have them. And then what does Africa have in return?

[00:15:16] beneficial mining arrangements and they even changed the law sometimes to help the Russians.

[00:15:20] So this situation I would say is kind of similar. Do you remember during the Syrian Civil War?

[00:15:24] Suddenly Russia was there too right in that case they wanted the warm water port

[00:15:28] and the Mediterranean in Africa. It's mineral well.

[00:15:31] Which brings us Cameron says to the disinformation angle.

[00:15:36] And then the disinformation angle is used essentially as a way to enhance this.

[00:15:39] So Russia, they're kind of weaker on the world stage than they have been in the past or

[00:15:43] the Soviet past. They don't have economic ties to Africa, the Europe, China or the US have

[00:15:49] not even by a long shot. So if Russia wants to kind of query favor it has to use other means

[00:15:55] that includes disinformation to bolster its image bigger than it actually is. Military

[00:15:59] wanks were for this is hybrid warfare right? Which in this case with these bio-rumors going around

[00:16:05] it's just them taking pot shots at the west. And then you're you know does this work right?

[00:16:11] Are these campaigns effective? Well you know the first results of this disinformation campaign

[00:16:16] that's kind of going after western you know drugs and health programs. According to the

[00:16:22] journalist who broke the story it looks like they aren't reaching that many people.

[00:16:25] You know so by that yardstick it doesn't look very effective. The Africa initiative group

[00:16:30] for all of I believe the month of January got less than 20,000 visitors for example to its

[00:16:34] publications. But I do think that the campaign you know while it's normal for Russian disinformation

[00:16:42] in terms of their history, this one does have a little bit more of a business impact because

[00:16:46] it's a problem for drug companies and health related humanitarian groups. It's a

[00:16:50] contaminated reputation and even caused them to be targeted with violence. So in that way

[00:16:56] it could be effective in stirring up a little bit of animosity on the ground. We actually saw that

[00:17:01] during the Ebola outbreak in 2015 and west Africa and Guinea. So you had angry mobs that are

[00:17:06] stirred up by conspiracy theories. There was that there was this western plot to harvest the

[00:17:11] organs of Africans. And so these angry mobs thought that the west was there. These health workers

[00:17:18] from Red Cross were there to do that instead of actually help and they actually attack them.

[00:17:23] But these impacts you know the effectiveness I think hinge on whether or not these new

[00:17:28] African initiative conspiracies can kind of gain wider traction beyond just the small audiences

[00:17:33] that they've done so far. So far it looks like they have not in your view gotten a lot of attraction.

[00:17:39] You know what's interesting here is that last summer after this I guess you could call it an

[00:17:46] attempted revolt by Guinea-Predegosian to move on Moscow. That stopped short of that of course

[00:17:54] then he died in the plane crash. The Wagner group which had a huge footprint in Africa I think it's

[00:18:01] now called the Africa core so he's long gone but the legacy of Pregosian remains in Africa. Tell me

[00:18:10] about the Africa core in general. I mean beyond this information what about the larger Russian

[00:18:17] efforts beyond the disinformation severe in Africa again. Pregosian is long gone but

[00:18:24] the Russians still remain so they still have a pretty large footprint in general it would appear

[00:18:29] right. Yeah so it looks like they've transferred ownership of the programming and the Pregosians out

[00:18:35] and now it's headed under the military the Russian military of defense,

[00:18:39] administrative defense and it looks like they've continued things kind of smoothly actually

[00:18:45] you know and the trend there you know Russian military intelligence service the GRU

[00:18:50] has taken over the day-to-day operations and like you said they've changed they just

[00:18:55] changed the name to Africa core which is kind of a ridiculous reference if it is indeed a reference

[00:19:00] to the World War II Africa core but what's interesting is that they've actually moved

[00:19:06] this was previously Wagner which was kind of a covert or at least they had plausible deniability

[00:19:10] now they're in overt territory right now it's literally the Russian Ministry of Defense

[00:19:14] that's orchestrating this. They don't have this kind of cover they used to where is it

[00:19:18] is Russia in Africa or not is it really official or not as a criminal behind it so they've kind of

[00:19:22] moved into overt territory and this information campaign recently looks like it was actually the

[00:19:30] first disinformation campaign or at least a larger push from this new outfit but to your question

[00:19:35] about like what are they doing here besides just information like what's the context

[00:19:41] they're doing a whole lot of military support to countries that are specifically fighting

[00:19:47] jihadist insurgencies across the hell region so they're propping up some of these governments

[00:19:51] that otherwise might not make it right they're kind of worried about regime survival and then

[00:19:55] another place is to like central African Republic where they've been there with hundreds of

[00:20:00] troops for many years now so they're kind of doing this regime stabilization package if they're selling

[00:20:06] they're marketing themselves as we can we can protect you you don't need to have election

[00:20:10] necessarily we can protect you as long as we get first dibs on some of these mining contracts

[00:20:17] coming back to the disinformation as we wrap up here what can be done to thwart

[00:20:24] these efforts you've indicated that the Russians are not getting a lot of traction but they're not

[00:20:29] going away what is the US doing to counter all of this the US is doing a couple of things

[00:20:38] they do help fund this is through the State Department they'll fund media and information literacy

[00:20:45] initiatives so MIL and they'll also do they also fund a lot of just journalism and in fact checking

[00:20:51] and you and funds these things too a lot in a lot of Western countries fund them and those are

[00:20:56] underway across the whole continent of Africa I've seen their work it's a lot there's a lot of

[00:21:00] other organizations teaching and training on media and information literacy and there's also a whole

[00:21:06] slew of counter disinformation groups and fact checkers look kind of in the same category these include

[00:21:12] the ones in Africa include a pay such a check Africa check and code for Africa and I've also I've met

[00:21:17] great journalists and teachers from these groups they're making a big difference in getting out

[00:21:21] kind of really the facts and truth behind some of these angles and in getting rid of these myths

[00:21:26] and rumors and conspiracies when they start to pop up but in terms of like nation state responses

[00:21:31] what can the US do or what can the West do I think we can attempt to counter program Russian

[00:21:37] disinformation by boosting the positive aspects of the West non-military role in Africa and kind

[00:21:44] of get away from our more militarized you know colonial reputation by emphasizing you know

[00:21:49] what does the West offer that's new and equal you know that means talking about cooperation

[00:21:54] partnerships African agency equal relationships and in business deals and how can we make money

[00:22:00] together and grow together and work towards renewable energy together I think if we stress these

[00:22:05] these angles and kind of the huge economic investment going on right now from the West

[00:22:10] definitely compared what Russia's doing it we're a lot bigger in terms of the money going in

[00:22:13] so I think if we emphasize that you know money talks and it'll help us and I think other

[00:22:18] advantages that we have is that you know we can keep stressing democracy don't throw that out

[00:22:22] just because they're offering dictatorship and maybe a little more stability or they'll give you

[00:22:27] security guarantees I mean we can still at the end of the day say wouldn't you rather vote for

[00:22:31] your leader rather than some guy who climbed out of the barracks you know to the top that way

[00:22:34] I mean I think I think democracy still has soft power in these places that we can do we can talk about

[00:22:42] thanks to Cameron Evers of Emergent Risk International sound from the voice of America

[00:22:49] our sound designer and editor Noah Fowles audio engineer Nathan Corson executive

[00:22:55] producers Michael DeLoeia and Gerardo Orlando and on behalf of Meredith Wilson I'm Paul Brandes

[00:23:02] thanks so much for listening

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