In Burkina Faso, how the ICRC would have been the target of a manipulation campaign
[Illustrative image] A member of the Red Cross on January 25, 2014 in Leo, Burkina Faso.
AFP - LIONEL BONAVENTURE
Text by: RFI Follow
2 mins
Since February 14, 2023, an international media collective has been broadcasting every day in a dossier dubbed "Story Killers" the result of an investigation into influence operations, smear campaigns and information manipulation designed by discreet commercial companies.
This February 16, investigators say that in Burkina Faso, a hostile campaign against the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was set up from scratch by a mysterious Israeli company.
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The fuse was reportedly lit by
a column published in the
far-right French magazine
Valeurs Actuelles
in August 2020. A text questioning whether the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was not in fact an involuntary support of the terrorism in Burkina Faso, in particular through negotiations between the ICRC and the Islamists to deploy humanitarian aid there.
This kind of practice has existed for decades.
It is used by many humanitarian organizations to reach populations in difficulty.
The old power questioned
The information would then have been blown up, manipulated and disseminated widely in Burkina Faso, in the local and national media, on the Internet, before going around the world.
The aim was to damage the image of the ICRC, perceived as too critical of the Burkinabè army.
Because, indeed, the Burkinabè power is called into question by the investigation.
Behind this campaign, we would find Samuel Sellem,
presented by the author of the column in
Valeurs Actuelles
as the “
Special adviser in charge of communication
” of the Burkinabè president at the time, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré.
There would also be an Israeli company called Percepto.
Created in March 2021 by Lior Chorev and Royi Burstien, Percepto presents itself as a marketing and intelligence company.
Ostensibly, she would use legal influencer marketing services.
But the investigators claim to have discovered in fact a formidable disinformation machine with extremely dubious, if not totally illegal, methods.
" School case "
The Forbidden Stories investigators met with Percepto officials who described this operation in Burkina Faso as “
a textbook case
”.
An operation that it would classify in “
unattributed campaigns
”, that is to say anonymous.
On behalf of its customers, the company says it has fake Facebook and WhatsApp accounts to spread misinformation.
The mysterious company also has a network of influencers responsible for disseminating biased or false information from its campaign on the Internet.
This network is made up of fake personalities, which are actually Percepto employees themselves.
The investigation revealed the existence of fake Twitter accounts posing as Burkinabè Internet users and sharing messages favorable to President Kaboré.
They were also very active at the end of 2021 in the dissemination of a video hostile to the activist Ibrahima Maïga, known for his criticism of power.
► To read also: A shadow Israeli company would have influenced dozens of elections around the world
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