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Official position/function regarding the conflict
Editor-in-chief and director of Komsomolskaya Pravda (KP) publishing house. Sungorkin is one of the main Russian actors of information influence or propagandists. He has been working in KP since 1975. Despite the fact that the KP is a non-state publication, it stresses its closeness to the authorities in every possible way (“The current President is exactly the person who needs to be supported in all his undertakings”).
With the victory of Euromaidan, the beginning of the annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of a conflict in Donbas, the newspaper’s narrative under the leadership of Sungorkin aims at public mobilization. In 2014, he talked about it as follows:
“M. KOROLYOVA: Our listeners are asking you: “In your opinion, do our federal media objectively cover the events taking place in Ukraine?”
SUNGORKIN: Well, of course, they are on the positions of the Russian state and Russian interest, therefore … certainly you cannot speak of such complete objectivity, right? I think they are playing along with the Russian state.
KOROLYOVA: So, as the editor-in-chief of Komsomolskaya Pravda, are you ready, for example, to provide a tribune to the other side?
SUNGORKIN: I’m not ready! In this situation, I am absolutely not ready. What for? Why should I provide them with a possibility to have their say? How can I give him [Bandera] the floor, if today they are zombified by their Goebbels so that we never dreamed of?”. (From an interview with Echo of Moscow).
This position is reflected in a special, one-sided selection of news and information, coverage of events, and interpretation of facts. Unverified or knowingly falsified information often appears on the pages of the newspaper; there is no room for equilateral discussions with a neutral discussion of different positions.
Actions regarding the conflict region
Creation of fakes, misinformation, manipulation of facts. Sungorkin often gives interviews and speaks out on Ukraine. Some specific examples:
- Creation of a myth about “Captain Voloshin” who allegedly shot down a Malaysian Boeing. Sungorkin personally took part in the video interview with the “eyewitness” in the KP studio. Following the KP, this legend was disseminated as “verified information” by the Russia-1 TV channel and other propagandist media. In subsequent years, KP already said that Boeing was shot down by Ukrainian Buk.
- Propaganda of hatred against Ukraine, maintaining the myth “Ukraine is not a state” and “it will soon collapse”.
Examples: