True colors of biased Russian media When the Benjamins are more convincing than truth

American writer Mark Twain once shared a remarkable thought about the media: "Who said that the American press is corrupt? No, it is not; it is simply sold out once and for all". But if the American press is sold out once and for all, the buying and selling out of the Russian media is still going on.

The Russian media and their "talking heads" have more than once "surprised" Azerbaijani society with their bias and unprofessionalism. Some of them have subsequently had to apologize to Azerbaijan, but for others, unfortunately, this has not become a lesson. Reading Russian press one gets an impression that every edition, expert, political, and public figure dances to their own tune, which not only radically differs from the state policy of RF, but often does great harm to it. One does not need to go far to find examples; all one needs to do is familiarize oneself with the agenda of the last few days.

For example, the call by the former leading expert of the Center for Military-Political Studies of MGIMO, Doctor of Political Science Mikhail Alexandrov to bomb Baku and Azerbaijan's oil facilities. According to Aleksandrov, "Azerbaijan is trying to change the status of the Lachin corridor and take it under its control using the Russian Federation's war against Ukraine". As a way out of the situation, Aleksandrov suggested retaliating by launching missile strikes on the oil industry and energy infrastructure in Baku.

This is not Aleksandrov's first attack against Azerbaijan. And it is not surprising - after all, he is a popular respondent in Armenian publications. Moreover, Aleksandrov was once an expert at the Institute of CIS countries, which is headed by the notoriously anti-Azerbaijani politician and Russian State Duma deputy Konstantin Zatulin. I am sure that there is no point in talking about the latter's destructive activities. However, unlike Zatulin, Aleksandrov was "less fortunate" - he was fired from MGIMO for calling for terrorist acts and inciting national hatred.

The official website of MGIMO explained Alexandrov's dismissal by the fact that the "expert" blatantly distorted the goals and objectives of Russian policy towards the neighbouring friendly state: "Last Friday, on one of the Russian TV channels, Mikhail Aleksandrov, who held the position of a leading expert at the Center for Military-Political Studies of the MGIMO, made statements that were detrimental to the allied relations between Russia and Azerbaijan, grossly distorted the goals and objectives of Russian policy towards a neighbouring friendly state.

The groundless aggressiveness and flagrant unprofessionalism of Aleksandrov's statements caused an extremely harsh adverse reaction from the foreign policy community and the anger of the MGIMO team. The image and interests of the university were seriously damaged. Based on the incompatibility of Aleksandrov's actions with the status of an MGIMO employee, as well as the facts of extreme neglect of official duties on the part of Aleksandrov, the rector signed an order to terminate Mikhail Alexandrov's contract and dismiss him from the institute."

However, he will certainly not go hungry - the Armenian diaspora in Russia will take care of his daily bread. So, we will soon be waiting for new libels from this doctor of political sciences with a tarnished reputation.

Then Konstantin Sivkov, the deputy president of the Russian Academy of Rocket and Artillery Sciences, expressed his groundless aggression towards Baku: "When the problem in Ukraine is solved, and it will be solved in a fairly short time, the Russian armed forces will untie their hands, they will not be so constrained, and then the conversation with Azerbaijan will go in a different context".

As we can see Sivkov uses the same narratives, but with a slightly different interpretation. It's strange to hear such things from the man who still mourns for the collapse of the USSR, and calls the signatories of the Belovezhsk agreements "malicious, stupid, unintelligent people". God only knows how this officer, who cares about the restoration of "USSR-2.0", sees this project together with countries he is calling for the Russian army to deal with. However, even in the past Sivkov repeatedly took the pro-Armenian position, so everything is clear here.

Meanwhile, if the blatant unprofessionalism of some individuals can be explained by the high degree of Armenian brandy, how can the incompetence and one-sidedness of an entire TV channel, which, moreover, positions itself as a liberal one, be explained? We are talking about the Dozhd (Rain) TV channel, which once again demonstrated its one-sided (pro-Armenian) stance. In the last two months alone, Dozhd has repeatedly proved that it has a maximally negative and biased attitude toward Azerbaijan.

I think it is worth recalling here that despite the fact that Dozhd is recognized in Russia as a foreign media agent, the channel was stripped of its broadcasting license and was even declared a threat to national security in the democratic West as well. At present, Dozhd has been abandoned in Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. But judging by the work of the channel's editorial board, this is only the beginning. Dozhd was cut off from broadcasting and even kicked out of the studio in Latvia. And now, apparently out of despair, the channel has turned to defend (or, more accurately, sold to) Ruben Vardanyan.

No sooner had passions subsided after the recent interview with Ruben Vardanyan, the Russian emissary, who proudly calls himself "state minister," than Dozhd again aired an anti-Azerbaijani report with a sentimental title "In the mountain loneliness. How Karabakh disappears". The report was made in the Armenian style - tears, sobs, whining, and appeals for help. In a word, the authors of the piece were trying with all their might to make the liberal viewer cry and feel pity for the "long-suffering".

Of course, Azerbaijan's position was "politely" disregarded. And it is not surprising, because he who pays the piper calls the tune. We have already seen that what the people of Azerbaijan went through in the two Karabakh wars is of little interest to the editorial office of Dozhd. But Ruben Vardanyan, David Babayan, Sergey Shahverdyan, and other separatists cried a lot on the air of Dozhd. The channel's journalist Ekaterina Kotrikadze, whose eyes were blurred by rain (Dozhd) that it turned out that the Lachin road was blocked not by Russian peacekeepers temporarily stationed in Karabakh, but by Azerbaijani civil activists. Moreover, the rain (Dozhd) completely washed away Ekaterina's memory and she forgot to specify the reason why Azerbaijanis were on the Shusha-Khankendi road, that they were protesting against the illegal exploitation of mines. Environmental terror was also not mentioned in all the airtime.

Curiously, in both cases, the interests of occupants were represented on the TV channel by Russian TV anchor Ekaterina Kotrikadze. She did not even try to hide her admiration for the fugitive Russian oligarch Vardanyan and ahead of the event called him "Prime Minister". It is possible that at that moment the current Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan started hiccuping somewhere in Yerevan, but anyway, knowing how Vardanyan looks, it is not hard to guess that it was not his personal charisma that got to Ekaterina, but the convincing look of Benjamin Franklin on green banknotes. By the way, an interesting point that explains Kotrikadze's love for the Karabakh separatists is that for 8 years she was the head of the information service of RTVi channel, the owner of which is oligarch Mikael Israelyan...

Dozhd itself survives on donations, which fully explains the logic of the pro-Armenian position of the TV channel's management. Clearly, the tears of the CEO and founder of Dozhd Natalya Sidneeva were not shed in vain; a sponsor in the person of Vardanyan was found after all. I would like to ask the editorial board of Dozhd: how much does it cost to lie to the people? It is clear that in recent years, the channel's sources of funding have been cut. And here Vardanyan stepped in to help (financially). It's an appropriate reason for Dozhd to lose the sense of proportion and forget about objectivity.