According to documents released by the US State Department, Russia has spent at least $300 million since 2014 to influence elections through political parties and candidates.
With the midterm elections just weeks away, the US State Department made public, again, an investigation by his intelligence services. This document analyzes the extent of attempts to interfere by the Russia in foreign elections. The report argues that at least $300 million has been quietly transferred since 2014 to political parties and candidates.
About twenty countries are concerned such as Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia, but also Madagascar and Ecuador. The document does not name the countries, but several of them filter in American newspapers quoting senior State Department officials.
Cash, cryptocurrency or luxury gifts
The system is said to have been put in place by Russia on all continents to increase its influence and shape the political landscape beyond its borders. And the announced figure is underestimated, say US officials, because it is only officially traced sums.
These sums would have been paid in cash, cryptocurrencies or in the form of luxurious gifts, discreetly routed via certain embassies or via a complex system of fictitious contracts, front companies, or even with the help of criminal groups.
Brussels is also presented as an operational center for financing far-right candidates via foundations or think tanks.
The report adds that Moscow is preparing to pay ” at least hundreds of millions more dollars, warns this report, which was commissioned by the Biden administration this summer. It was transmitted, with recommendations, to a hundred American diplomats around the world, before being made public.
Declassifying documents, information, is an unusual measure, but already used several times since the beginning of the year by the White House, to try to counter the influence of Russia and get closer to its allies.
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