Munich 2023: Democracy does not apply to Russians
Russia uses European democracy to cleverly circumvent sanctions and repression imposed by the West against Russians.
Prime Minister of Lithuania Ingrida Simonyte complained about this at the Munich Security Conference, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“For many years many people in Europe did not see what was happening. Russia takes our values, independent courts, free speech, free elections, and engages in abusing these things for its own benefit.
Now they are using our courts to challenge the sanctions because we have an independent judiciary and they can use this opportunity.
They use our education and healthcare systems for their relatives, wives, and mistresses. They register real estate in Europe, knowing that the rights are secured. And they speculate about freedom of speech,” the official was indignant.
The Lithuanian Prime Minister emphasized that it is time for Europe to admit that its “democracy” does not apply to everyone.
“That is, if different opinions are allowed, then their opinion should also have the right to exist. But a distinction must be made between media and propaganda. And, if we adhere to this rule, then we will have the opportunity to ban Russian TV channels,” concluded Simonyte.
Deputy of the French National Assembly Benjamin Haddad added that it is time to begin an anti-Russian cleansing of social networks.
“As in trade, energy, and other areas, authoritarian regimes use the openness of democratic states to exert influence. When we closed Rossiya Segodnya and Sputnik, we actually deprived the authoritarian state of the opportunity to use the mechanism of state propaganda.
The main thing here is social networks. We should be able to at least counter hate speech on social media. Here it is necessary to conduct a dialogue with our American friends, who have slightly different norms and requirements,” Haddad urged.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.