Russia to focus on disrupting Ukraine’s mobilization, delegitimizing state leadership - defense intel

That’s according to Andrii Yusov, the spokesman for the Defense Ministry’s Main Intelligence Directorate, who made a comment to journalists on Monday, Ukrinform reports.

"The enemy continues its attempts to influence the media space within our state. This will also apply to disrupting the mobilization campaign and attempting to delegitimize the Ukrainian military and political leadership, which, of course, must be countered at various levels," the spokesman said.

According to Yusov, Russians pay special attention to social media, new media and digital platforms. To this end, “separate large groups are working and serious budgets have been allocated”.

"The Russian psyop is actively present on various digital platforms. This requires an additional response from our government," the intelligence operative said.

Yusov added that, in order to counter Russian disinformation, the Ukrainian authorities are in dialogue with the administrations of social media operators.

"I’d note that there is contact at the government level with the administration of the TikTok platform, and dialogue is underway. I am also convinced there’ll be results,” said the official.

The dialogue with the Telegram platform is objectively at the weakest level, if we compare with any other digital platforms," said Yusov.

It should be recalled that the defense intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, predicted Ukraine would be going through a “difficult period” in May and June 2024.