I just searched the web sites of Reuters, AP and The New York Times. So far there is no mention of the "Integrity Initiative." The Integrity Initiative is an information warfare campaign run by the Institute for Statecraft, a Scottish charity which receives money from the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office and which acts as a front for UK military intelligence to spread misinformation, mostly of the New Cold War, Russophobic variety.
The Integrity Initiative was hacked and some of its confidential files revealed early last month. As explained in a Sputnik opinion piece:
On November 5, international hacking syndicate Anonymous published a series of internal files it'd appropriated from Integrity Initiative, an off-shoot of the Institute for Statecraft. The material was explosive, revealing the organization — which claims to be concerned with defending democratic institutions from Russian "destabilization campaigns" — to be an international "information war effort" run by British military intelligence specialists, which has disrupted the domestic politics of other countries.
As part of this enterprise, the organization has amassed 'clusters' the world over — lists of politicians, businesspeople, military officials, academics and journalists — who "understand the threat posed to Western nations" by Russian "disinformation" and can be mobilized to influence policy. The files suggest clusters are operational in France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Norway, Serbia, Spain and the UK — and there are plans to extend the scheme to every corner of the globe.
They also offer numerous examples of cluster mobilization in action — one boasts of the success of 'Operation Moncloa', an effort to block the appointment of Pedro Banos, an army reservist and author the Spanish Socialist party wanted to make the country's Director of National Security.
When Banos' candidacy was announced, members of the Integrity Initiative's Spanish 'cluster' — including Gonzalez Ponz, spokesperson of the Partido Popular in the European parliament, and Nacho Torreblanco, director of the European Council for Foreign Relations Office in Madrid — colluded via a WhatsApp group to flood social networks with anti-Banos messages, and provide the Spanish media with a 'dossier' of negative material on the former head of counterintelligence and security for the European army. The Initiative's UK cluster supported their work — within 24-hours, the planned appointment was dropped.
While the files don't offer an example of any similar plot in the UK, its cluster there includes Ben Nimmo, a fellow at the Atlantic Council, who has repeatedly claimed Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is being supported by the Russian state through various means, including a "twisted cyber campaign", without any supporting evidence whatsoever. The Integrity Initiative's official Twitter account has also posted numerous tweets and links to articles attacking Labour, Corbyn — one post said he was a "useful idiot" in service of the Kremlin — and other prominent party figures.Given how fraught Westminster is these days, it's the attack on Corbyn, and the blanket denials by Theresa May's government, that lead me to believe that the story will find its way to the principal mainstream outlets.
In the meantime, Moon of Alabama has posted a substantial article on the Integrity Initiative, as has Craig Murray, with the promise of further revelations. Niqnaq re-posts a Yandex translation of Colonel Cassad's piece on the Integrity Initiative:
Operation Integrity Initiative: The Institute for Statecraft
Hackers Anonymous continue to spread in parts of a large leak on the operations of British intelligence in Europe, held in the framework of the program Integrity Initiative. In the next portion of revelations describes the activities of the Institute of Statecraft and the influence of agents in Italy, France and Scotland. Interesting highlights:
1. MI6 paid their own agents to fabricate evidence of Russian involvement in the organization of a referendum on secession of Catalonia from Spain, for the subsequent charges of Russia meddling in Spanish Affairs.
2. Money from British Intelligence paid for a campaign to discredit Jeremy Corbyn and his entourage, which actually was done in the interests of the Cabinet Office of Theresa May. In fact, Intelligence became a tool of internal political struggle.
3. Agents of influence paid by MI6 in different countries had to constantly speculate about Russian involvement in the poisoning of the Skripals, in order to create the ground for diplomatic condemnation of Russia.
4. In 2014, one of the functionaries of the network proposed mining the harbour of Sevastopol and lock in the Bay of the Black Sea Fleet, followed by demonstrations of military presence of NATO in the Black sea.
5. The Institute for Statecraft, led by Director Christopher Donnelly, was in fact a front for British Intelligence and part of the infrastructure of the operations of Integrity Initiative.
6. The document expressed regret that Russia’s influence is strong in the countries where lustration has not been completed in relation to people educated in the Soviet Union. It was written before the lustration of MGIMO graduates in Poland.
7. Expected to negotiate with Yushchenko that he told the world that Skripal not the first one who became victim of the “cruelty” Russia, connecting the “attempt on the Skripals” with the “poisoning” of Yushchenko in 2003.
8. Emphasizes the reliance on prominent public figures for stream of best abstract operations of Integrity Initiative. For example, the famous footballer Gary Lineker during the World Cup in Russia.
Remarkably, today part of the published documents was removed or unavailable.
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