Media Figures Were Historically Prosecuted for Genocide Incitement and Russian Propagandists Should be No Exception

When international tribunals took place after the Rwandan Genocide, the media figures were tried for complicity, and further back in WWII, Josef Goebbels would’ve been as well. Russian propagandists have played a key role in causing the war and continue to justify massacres and forced deportations. These acts international tribunals should try these as well.

Helping to Ignite a War

Russia, throughout its history, has been an authoritarian state with strict control over media consumption. This has been seen with the Soviet Union and now the Russian Federation. The Kremlin owns all networks that broadcast to the general public, and nothing is approved with the state’s review of the media material.

The Kremlin directly dictates state-controlled agencies such as Russia Today (RT), Tass, Sputnik, and RIA Novosti. They work in tandem to promote their influence and war-like behavior throughout Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Russia Today’s current chief, Margarita Simonyan, is a close associate of Putin and has used the network akin to the Ministry of Propaganda George Orwell described in his book Nineteen Eighty-Four (1948). RT’s blatant collaboration with the Kremlin became so appalling that the EU has a media block, with many of its offices now closed in the West.

The Voice of the Kremlin

In the aftermath of the Salisbury chemical weapons attacks in the United Kingdom, Russia Today would help cover the suspects as “tourists.” Both suspects were revealed to be GRU (military intelligence) agents. RT’s broadcasts on the events only heightened geopolitical tensions with Britain.

Along with Margarita Simonyan, other media personalities such as Vladimir Solovyov have become the voice of the Kremlin, often threatening to nuke other countries on Moscow’s behalf. In January, Kremlin figures called for the Bundestag to be nuked for sending Leopard tanks to Ukraine. In March, Simonyan threatened Georgia with a nuclear strike for their country-wide protests against the foreign agent’s law.

In the summer of 2022. at the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum, Simonyan, a cohost of the event, suggested that Russian Forces continue starving the world under the Black Sea blockade. “All our hope is in the famine,” said Simonyan, as the naval blockade on Ukraine was a way to get concessions in the war and sanctions relief until Turkey and the United Nations intervened.

Margarita Simonyan and Vladimir Solovyov are under international sanctions, with the former declared persona non-grata and barred from entering her home country of Armenia. This is a significant statement from the government with a military alliance with Russia (CTSO,) which has become fed up with the chauvinistic rhetoric coming from Russian-Armenian media figures.

Calling for Annihilation

Russian ethnic nationalists and ultranationalists have significantly promoted genocidal rhetoric toward Ukraine and the rest of Europe. Alexander Dugin’s manifestos have influenced tens of millions of Russians and his far-right Western supporters. Dugin has been a critical figure that influenced factions in Russia to act brutally toward the Ukrainian population, such as the Orthodox Church, intelligence operatives, and military bloggers.

Dugin would suffer the consequences of his genocidal rhetoric when his ultranationalist daughter, Darya Dugina, died in a car bomb meant for him. Darya was a prominent blogger who encouraged massacres against the Ukrainian population and visited the ruins of Mariupol after Russia carpet-bombed the city along with untold numbers of civilians with it. Though Ukraine denied the assassination, the US would link the operation to Kyiv’s military intelligence bureau.

Prominent military bloggers have also amplified genocidal rhetoric on their telegrams channels, filled with hundreds of thousands of followers. Vladlen Tatarsky, a self-proclaimed “journalist,” had fought in the Donbas region, helping Russian Forces with drone warfare during the Siege of Mariupol.

Tatarsky, invited to Putin’s “annexations” ceremony, called Ukraine a terrorist haven and proclaimed, “We’ll defeat everyone, we’ll kill everyone, we’ll rob everyone we need to. Everything will be the way we like it.” He was another prominent blogger killed in a bomb attack in a café in Saint Petersburg on April 2nd, 2023.

Arguably the most disgusting rhetoric came from Russian “journalist” Anton Krasovsky, who called for Ukrainian children to be burned and drowned on a live RT broadcast. Though suspended, Krasovsky remains a media figure with public broadcasts throughout the federation.

Propagandists have Been Complicit in War and Genocide Throughout History.

In World War Two, Nazi Germany had its own Ministry of Propaganda that called for “undesirables” to be expelled from their new worldview. Nazi propagandists and media figures would be convicted in the Nuremberg Trials. Two of them were Julius Streicher and Hans Fritzsche.

Julius Streicher had published and edited various antisemitic pieces which called for violence against Jews. His paper, Der Stürmer, was read frequently by the SS. Hans Fritzsche was the chief of broadcasting for the Nazi Ministry of Propaganda.

During the Rwanda Genocide, Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines, an offshoot of Radio Rwanda, actively played a role in the genocide. They ultimately gave the call sign of “cutting the tall trees,” which was the green light for the Hutu military and their extremist allies to begin the mass butchering. RTLM’s rhetoric had become so genocidal US Forces had drafted up plans to jam their radio frequencies until the operation was scrapped.

Ultimately the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda convicted RTLM’s public broadcasting leaders of incitement of genocide and is considering phase of it. Four prominent editors and broadcasters of RTLM received lengthy prison sentences as their influence towards the genocide and scorched earth military tactics of the army correlated with their genocidal rhetoric.

With ongoing indictments against crucial figures of the Russian government, one cannot forget the role media figures, public broadcasters, and military bloggers played in heightening genocidal rhetoric during the invasion of Ukraine. Like the international tribunals for propagandists in Nazi Germany and the then Hutu-led government of Rwanda, Russian media figures who play a significant role in Russian intelligence operations and influence should be no exception on the roads of conviction.