Big brands such Lidl, Coca-Cola and L'Oréal must stop advertising on pro-Kremlin media outlets in the Balkans, European Parliament lawmakers told the companies in a letter seen by POLITICO.
The 15 brands should "rigorously review [their] advertising policies to ensure that your expenditures do not, even unintentionally, fund outlets known for disseminating harmful disinformation," said the letter sent Thursday by Bulgarian conservative MEP Andrey Kovatchev and 15 other lawmakers from the center right, liberals, socialists and the Greens.
The targeted companies are Lidl, Delhaize Group, Procter & Gambler, Coca-Cola, A1, Yettel, Ferrero, Heineken, Mars, Mondelez, L'Oréal, GlaxoSmithKlein (GSK), Bosch, Samsung and Amazon.
EU officials and disinformation experts have been warning about a growing tide of fake news online and foreign attempts to sway the vote ahead of the June parliamentary election.
"Many media organizations that promote pro-Kremlin disinformation often use advertising bought by reputable companies to strengthen their credibility," Kovatchev said, adding that these brands were not always aware they could end up "support[ing] pro-Russian propaganda channels."
TV Pink and TV Happy — two of the most popular stations in Serbia, which rely heavily on advertising revenue from international companies — have relayed false claims that Russia had been "under aggression for a long time" itself and "was forced" into conducting a "special military operation" in Ukraine, the euphemism coined by Moscow to refer to its full-scale invasion of the country.
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