Russian information-psychological operation targeting Ukraine’s ethnic Hungarian minority with threats that call to leave Ukraine, Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation (CCD) reported.
The Hungarian minority in Zakarpattia became the subject of manipulation and ambiguous statements. Hungarian media and social media occasionally report on alleged hostility toward ethnic Hungarians, stories about “separatist movements,” and the forced conscription of Transcarpathian Hungarians for war.
According to the CCD, messages in Hungarian are coming to the phone numbers of Ukrainian ethnic Hungarians, calling on them to ‘get out of Ukraine.’ The messages allegedly come from ‘Ukrainian nationalists’ but use accounts with codes of mobile operators from Kazakhstan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kyrgyzstan, the CCD said in a statement.
The Center reported that such messages represent “another Russian IPSO aimed at creating the appearance of threats against Hungarians in Ukraine from ‘Ukrainian nationalists’ to provoke ethnic hostility between Ukrainians and Hungarians.”
According to the CCD, Russia is trying to divide Ukrainian society, as “Ukraine’s strength lies in the unity of its people.” The Center called on recipients of such messages to block the contacting account and report the incident to the Cyber Police.
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