{"id":43195,"date":"2026-09-04T12:53:06","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T12:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/43195\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T12:53:06","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T12:53:06","slug":"russian-embassy-in-the-hague-as-a-channel-for-propaganda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/43195\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian embassy in The Hague as a channel for propaganda"},"content":{"rendered":"

For successful disruption, Russia relies on \u2018domestic amplifiers\u2019. These are local media, opinion leaders, and politicians who share Russian narratives with their own constituencies. Jan Bennink, the podcast maker for Ongehoord Nederland (NPO), frequently shares messages from the embassy. His two accounts (@superjan and @Rumpelstunzchen) have a combined total of over 70,000 followers. Over the past few months, Bennink has amplified messages from the Russian embassy more than 50 times. In the message on September 1 (see image), Bennink wrote that Russia is \u2018our friend\u2019 and, in the long run, \u2018our only savior\u2019. The embassy account also responds to Bennink regularly, revealing clear interaction.<\/p>\n

Bennink himself recently stated that he is not simply a contrarian opinion maker, but acts as a mouthpiece for the Russian embassy on Dutch public broadcasting episode 43<\/a> from June \u201826 of the NPO podcast Bergsma & Bennink. \u2018I follow the Russian embassy\u2019s account very closely\u2019, \u2018Very good tweets\u2019, \u2018otherwise I think they are very nice people\u2019. His podcast colleague Bergsma adds: \u2018Yes, but inform them too\u2019. And Bennink: \u2018Russians are actually never caught in a lie\u2019.<\/p>\n

Criticism of the war or of arms deliveries to Ukraine may well be a legitimate political stance. But criticism is different from amplifying the messages of a Russian state propaganda channel. Actors such as Bennink, who systematically adopt these narratives, function as \u2018local amplifiers\u2019 and thereby directly serve the goals of the Kremlin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For successful disruption, Russia relies on \u2018domestic amplifiers\u2019. These are local media, opinion leaders, and politicians who share…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[42],"class_list":["post-43195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-hague","tag-the-hague"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}