From the Telegraph / Yahoo!News:
"Putin’s army of influencers selling pipe dreams of a Russian Mariupol
Elizaveta Chervyakova poses in front of a high-rise building in occupied Mariupol that is being rebuilt into a block of luxury apartments.
She ignores the fact that the building was once home to hundreds of Ukrainians before it was obliterated by Russian bombs during Moscow’s three-month siege in 2022.
In videos that garner thousands of views, the 21-year-old blogger paints a rosy picture of the coastal city returning to life as part of a Putin-era mega project of “magical” new apartment complexes, shopping centres and neighbourhoods.
In an interview, Ms Chervyakova insists that the Russian-occupied city is not a “ghost town” and that she wants to “dispel any myths” that it is not a good place to live.
But a Telegraph investigation has found she is one of a growing number of social media influencers who are becoming increasingly key to a co-ordinated Kremlin-led propaganda campaign to promote the Russification of the city and of life flourishing under Russian rule.
Moscow’s 85-day offensive against the city on the Sea of Azov killed between 20,000 and 88,000 civilians and damaged or destroyed 90 per cent of the city’s residential buildings. Hundreds of thousands of people fled, leaving just 100,000 of its original residents.
Since then, Moscow has poured billions of roubles into remaking the city in a Russian mould by 2025, a plan significantly behind schedule as a result of the scale of devastation its military inflicted. The local influencers are key to pumping out positive updates and pro-Kremlin narratives.
Four influencers living in Mariupol explained how their aim was to show Vladimir Putin’s “amazing” development of the city and dismissed accusations of them being propagandists, instead presenting themselves as truth tellers.
It is unclear if all the influencers receive direct funding or guidance from Russian authorities. None of those interviewed would discuss such a link.
One blogger, Kirill Sazonov, is accused of selling properties that belong to Ukrainians who fled the war, a claim that he strongly denies. The houses he tries to sell are often older and found in poorer, run-down districts, clearly distinct from the new developments.
Mr Sazonov, 37, originally from Donetsk, said the real estate business was “good, growing gradually”. Shrugging off the criticism he receives online, he said: “If I’m making videos, if I’m popular, of course there’s hate.”
The influencers fail to mention why the city needs to be rebuilt or the dire conditions the residents living under Russian occupation face. The remaining Ukrainians suffer from a chronic housing shortage, a collapsed medical system, a persistent water crisis and the absence of critical workers.
In her videos, Ms Chervyakova is determinedly upbeat and admiring of the changes the new city administration is making.
“The city is developing,” she said. “It has its challenges, but so does every city…Yes, there are still some buildings that are still destroyed that spoil the view.”
As part of his mega project in Mariupol, Putin signed a decree in late November instructing officials to use “media and internet resources, including social networks, video hosting sites, instant messengers and blogs” to disseminate content aimed at “strengthening civil unity” in the occupied territories.
The new “blogging schools”, opening across occupied territories that have the clear patronage of Russian-installed administrations, appear to be a result of this.
The Donbass Media Center (DMC) opened a blogging school in Mariupol in September 2024, following similar schemes in the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk and later Melitopol. It offers free two-week courses for those aged 16-25 on how to build an audience on Russian platforms. Ms Chervyakova is a graduate.
One of its instructors is Pavel Karbovsky, 24, who is known as “Donbas Cosmonaut” online. He has racked up millions of views online encouraging people to visit the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic, portraying Mariupol as a beach, food and clubbing destination.
Mr Karbovsky, who grew up in Donetsk region, said his aim was to show the city’s “amazing” development. He unequivocally states in his videos that Mariupol and Donetsk are part of Russia.
Through his work at the DMC, “a lot of talented kids have emerged thanks to us… we taught them how to film, how to create great content”, he told The Telegraph.
Mr Karbovsky said he did not know whether it was funded by the Russian government – but it would be “cool” if it was. His name appears on Ukraine’s unofficial database of “enemies” of the state accused of colluding with Moscow.
The organisation that runs the DMC is partnered with “Russia – Land of Opportunities”, a Kremlin-funded presidential programme that invests in bloggers throughout Russia and the “new regions”.
Its 2025 winner was Irina Mishina, a pro-Russia blogger from occupied Luhansk, who said her goal was to “show real life of our republic: not through politics or conflicts, but through people’s stories, through the revival of our cities, and through the eyes of our youth”.
Mr Sazonov, who also has ties to the DMC, has tens of thousands of followers and posts about reconstruction efforts in Mariupol and encourages Russians to invest in real estate.
He posted videos from inside and outside a property believed to have belonged to Ukrainians who fled during their siege. Their belongings, including paintings on the walls and furniture, remain.
The United Nations estimates that out of 38,000 homes identified as abandoned in the occupied territories, nearly 12,800 are in Mariupol. Experts argue that the overall goal is to seize the homes in order to facilitate the transfer of Russian citizens to the captured cities and towns.
But behind the Potemkin facade, exiled city officials and human rights groups argue that just like the fake villages once built to impress Catherine the Great, it is little more than a propaganda exercise.
Elina Beketova, a fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), whose research focuses on occupied territories, said: “All the bloggers appear to have been given the same task – to emphasise the redevelopment work Russia is doing.
“The same information circulates on social media channels and it looks like the same co-ordinated effort to show how much better it is to live under Russian control than Ukrainian.”
Petro Andriushchenko, a former adviser to the Ukrainian mayor of Mariupol and the head of the Centre for the Study of the Occupation, said the overwhelming “culture of surveillance” in the occupied territories meant “it is impossible to tell the truth in public”.
“People think they are seeing independent opinions from bloggers on social media channels, but it’s impossible to be independent,” he told The Telegraph.
“Every single person making content, blogs, vlogs, from the occupied territories is somebody under Russian control,” he added, arguing that if they were not, they would be quickly detained or brought to heel.
According to Yulia Gorbunova, a senior Ukraine researcher at Human Rights Watch, the social media campaign “is part-and-parcel of Russian propaganda efforts to erase Ukraine’s history, replace its art, language and historical landmarks, and influence the young”.
Streets have been renamed, monuments removed, the tricolour flag drapes from buildings, only Russian-speaking television is shown, number plates have been changed and the Russian curriculum imposed on schools.
On top of that, there is a “whole range of occupation-related abuses”, Ms Gorbunova said, including illegal home seizures, unlawful conscription of civilians into the Russian military, coercing remaining residents to obtain a Russian passport and the indoctrination, militarisation and deportation of children.
Several months after capturing the city, Moscow produced a “master plan” for the city, which was widely discovered to be plagiarised from an outdated Ukrainian plan for 2016 and ignored the city-wide destruction caused by the Russian bombardment.
Critics argued that it focused on just regeneration in the historic city centre and the Azovstal steelworks, instead of the levelled residential districts, where most lost their homes.
“Literally everything in the city is being updated – from the master plan to the dog shelter, from transportation to bus stops, from the theatre to city parks and beaches,” the statement said.
“Literally everything in the city is being updated – from the master plan to the dog shelter, from transportation to bus stops, from the theatre to city parks and beaches,” the statement said.
Analysts have argued that this is not a long-term development plan but something more sinister: an attempt to pave over essential evidence of alleged war crimes.
In 2024, a Human Rights Watch report said Russia’s refusal to allow independent investigators into the city before demolishing large swaths of it “effectively erased the physical evidence at hundreds of potential crime scenes across the city”.
‘Dancing on the bones of murdered people’
But there are other long-term goals at play, indicated by the endless billboards advertising the city as a relocation destination and the incentives of cheap mortgage rates and higher salaries for Russian citizens.
So far, analysts believe more than 50,000 Russians have relocated there, with the aim of pushing out Ukrainian residents.
As Christmas approaches, many of the social media influencers have been showing redeveloped parts of the city lit up by festive displays. A 14-metre tree, drenched in lights, stands outside the new Mariupol Drama Theatre.
They do not mention that it was rebuilt after being destroyed by two Russian bombs in 2022, killing an estimated 600 sheltering civilians. It remains one of – if not the worst – single atrocity of the entire war.
Mariupol’s exiled city council said Russia was trying to “restore the imaginary ‘normality’ of life through attention to the holidays”.
It accused the occupying authorities of “dancing and singing on the bones of the murdered people of Mariupol” in a statement on Telegram.
“However, local Mariupol residents remember the truth,” it added.
Additional reporting by Lily Shanagher"
No comments:
Post a Comment