Pro-Kremlin bots announce "execution" of Moldovan president on social media within smear campaign
Matryoshka, a pro-Kremlin bot network, has launched a campaign on Twitter and BlueSky against Moldovan President Maia Sandu.
Source: The Insider, a Russian news outlet, as reported by European Pravda
Details: Since 16 April, bots have been posting fake graffiti depicting Sandu's "execution" – by hanging, shooting or electric chair – and promising to "end" her on 1 June. It was not clear from the numerous posts what exactly was supposed to happen on that day.
On 30 May, the website of the Fund for Combating Repression, founded by the late Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, published a fake investigation about Sandu's alleged involvement in the trafficking of Ukrainian children, supposedly to the West and for paedophile networks.
The fake story claimed that Sandu, through the mediation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's wife, was supposedly organising the sale of Ukrainian refugee children. The authors cited an anonymous Polish activist and an article from the website Life.ru.
A disinformation researcher and founder of the X-account Bot Blocker (antibot4navalny) noticed the fake campaign. They compared its scale to the information operation carried out by the Storm-1516 group before the 2025 Bundestag elections, in which more than a hundred pseudo-news sites took part.
Analysts have no direct evidence that Storm-1516 is behind the attack on Sandu, but they note similarities in the tools used: fake sources, "witnesses", disinformation via English-language resources, the use of AI, and the Fund for Combating Repression platform.
According to The Insider, the fund has no legal status, and its head, Mira Terada, is linked to other pro-Kremlin structures.
Background:
Earlier, AFP, citing data collected by antibot4navalny, reported on the Matryoshka bot network, which spreads anti-Ukrainian propaganda on social media: they not only spread disinformation, like other pro-Kremlin bots, but also directly contacted Western journalists asking them to verify some of these fakes.
French services believed that Russia was behind the operation.
Recently, the administration of the President of Moldova had to refute a fake news story about expensive clothes from Sandu's wardrobe that was spread on Telegram channels.
Also in Moldova, unknown individuals sent out a mass mailing purportedly on behalf of the tax service, urging recipients to support President Sandu's party and donate 2% of their income tax to it.
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