Rally to be held outside Russian Embassy today against Russia’s media propaganda campaign

The Ukrainian Congress of Latvia will hold a rally outside the Russian Embassy in Riga today at 5:00 p.m. against ''Russia's untruthful media propaganda campaign'', LETA was informed by the association's member Tatjana Lazda, adding that all like-minded persons are invited to attend the rally.

The Ukrainian Congress of Latvia points out that due to the recent events in Ukraine, the Russian government is using all means in an attempt to justify its military invasion of the Crimea, while at the same time discrediting the Ukrainian government and its allies, inciting ethnic hatred between Ukrainians and Russians, as well as sowing panic and fear amongst its citizens from an ''unknown enemy in Ukraine'', thus gaining support from resident for the Kremlin's aggressive policies.

''The mass media in Russia is a government controlled and a strong weapon to influence public opinion. The current situation just shows that the situation within Russian mass media has only deteriorated. Instead of offering its citizens objective information and an analysis of the situation, these media outlets only misinform their own people and are tasked by the government to create a perception of foreign enemies, using the most common forms of lying, making up facts and creating false news report,'' the association points out in its statement.

''Remember, it has always been convenient for the Russian government to find foreign enemies at a time when the country itself is going through domestic economic and political problems. The ultimate aim is always war, which with relatively little human casualties allows the current regime to present themselves as ''heroes'' to their voters. We saw this in Chechnya, Georgia, and now it is Ukraine's turn. In order to obtain public support for a military offensive, careful groundwork is implemented by the mass media, which systematically circulates extremely biased and false news reports,'' the Ukrainian Congress of Latvia goes on to say in its statement.

The association wishes to attract the public's attention, as well as the attention of politicians on this matter, and urges the Latvian government to review possibilities to counter this damaging, false and hateful information which is being circulated by the Russian mass media. ''Latvia, just like in Ukraine, has a larger population of Russian speakers and Russian citizens, who are the direct audience of the Kremlin's false propaganda machine,'' the association goes on to say.