On Arte: “diplomatic opacity provides a favourable breeding ground for the diffusion of fake news”

Eurocrats’ wages, loss of purchasing power linked to the euro, Europe sieve: Europe is not spared by fake news. Who are the entities behind this false information? How do they circulate? That’s what the 28-minute guests on Arte tried to explain. Alongside Nicolas Arpagian, cyber security expert and Christine Dugoin-Clément, researcher at the CAPE Europe think tank, Yves Bertoncini, President of the European Movement – France, carried out an exercise to decode infox on Europe.  

Yves Bertoncini explains that the development of fake news is the result of a lack of trust in the media: “There is a problem of credibility given to traditional information providers, national and European institutions and the media”. However, he stresses that this is not a new phenomenon.

As far as Europe is concerned, he points out that the concealment of certain information favours the development of the imagination: “diplomatic opacity provides a breeding ground for the spread of fake news”. He takes as an example the Treaty of Aachen, which had been accused of selling Alsace and Lorraine to Germany: “There was an announcement effect, the President of the Republic and the German Chancellor wanted to create an event which raised doubts about how the Treaty had been manufactured and why it was being hidden from us”.

Are fake-news made by Russia?

Faced with this widespread idea that Russia is flooding Europe with fake news, the President of the European Movement – France recalls that this is information that has been documented: “When the European External Action Service set up a small task force to try to challenge some fake news, 80% of them concerned the Crimea, Ukraine and Russia and were geographically identified”. However, Russia is not the only culprit and Yves Bertoncini points it out: “It does not have a monopoly on fake news, even we, the political parties secret it”.

For the President of the European Movement – France this stems from the complexity of the institutions and decision-making: “the European Union is complicated, there is a dispersion of powers, meetings behind closed doors, norms that are decided in committees”. However, Yves Bertoncini points out that politicians do not always do what is necessary to dispel the doubts that this raises: “political after-sales service is not there and our politicians are having a great time”.

However, Yves Bertoncini points out that more and more organisations are trying to fight against this false information: “In the European Movement we try to correct, the media do the same, but there are some in all parties, it’s compulsive”. The President of the European Movement – France cites as an example Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer who, in her reply to Emmanuel Macron’s Tribune, criticises the Eurocrats for not paying taxes, which is false information.