Putin’s Victory Day propaganda was most widely shared in Hungarian

According to an international comparative study, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s 9 May Victory Day propaganda broadcast was most widely shared in Hungarian. The research looked at Facebook posts written in 11 languages.

Disinformation Situation Centre

Researchers at the Disinformation Situation Centre studied Facebook posts related to Victory Day in 11 languages. In an international comparison, posts in Hungarian were the most pro-Russian. What is more, the most popular post was made by a Hungarian site, Orosz Hírek (Russian News), about Putin’s speech, Lakmusz reports.

What is Victory Day?

As Telex writes, there has never been a unified public memory of the day of victory that marked the end of the Second World War. The German surrender took place not in front of the Soviet command but at the unified headquarters of the Western Allies in Reims on 8 May 1945. However, the Soviet Union was not satisfied with the agreement, and a second document of surrender was signed with the Germans a day later.

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Now, after this year’s Victory Day, researchers found that Hungarian social media coverage stood out in the international comparison.

The languages studied were English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Hungarian, Dutch, Polish, Slovak, Czech, and Russian.

Huge numbers

Data on the distribution of pro-Kremlin Facebook posts.

Vladimir Putin’s speech, subtitled in Hungarian, has reached more than 788,000 views and more than 5,000 shares. The second-highest number of shares was reached by a Facebook page in Bolivia where Putin’s speech was broadcast with a Spanish voice-over. This video has more than 260,000 views and more than four thousand shares.

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Pro-Russian narratives

As Lakmusz reports, on Victory Day, 36 of the 110 most-shared posts contained pro-Russian narratives. According to the research methodology, these included posts that

• celebrated the Moscow parade without any criticism or commentary,
• commemorated 9 May in line with the official Kremlin position,
• repeated the Kremlin’s narratives without criticism, or
• expressed support for the invasion of Ukraine.

The data shows that the 36 pro-Kremlin posts were shared nearly 50,000 times. The most widely shared pro-Kremlin post was published by Orosz Hírek, one of Hungary’s most pro-Russian sites.

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Source: Lakmusz, Telex