A slick online media machine has recruited a slew of characters from Russian state-affiliated outlets—and joined a sprawling multinational network of pro-Moscow, pro-Beijing content creators backed by a U.S. businessman reportedly probed in India for ties to the Chinese Communist Party. Since it started posting to Instagram and Youtube in early 2020, nearly all BreakThrough News’ camera-facing personalities have been veterans of Kremlin-backed outfits: former Radio Sputnik host Eugene Puryear; pundit Rania Khalek of video generator ‘In the Now;’ Kei Pritsker, Abby Martin, and Brian Becker of defunct propaganda organ RT America. BreakThrough’s earliest productions lambasted America’s presidential system and persistent racial inequality, and attacked the American and Brazilian responses to the COVID-19 outbreak while praising policies in China. But beginning in January 2022, amid the build-up to Russia’s unprovoked assault on Ukraine, the channel began sharing videos with titles like “Risking World War III with Russia: Why?” and “If NATO Goes to War, U.S. & European Soldiers Will Be Called On to Kill & Die.” More recent clips have carried such headlines as “Leaked Pentagon Docs Show US Elites Want Never-Ending Ukraine War” and “G7 Sends F-16 Jets to Ukraine: Flirting with Disaster, Direct War on Russia.” These themes are familiar to observers of a particular fringe of the Western political spectrum, where the U.S.’s domestic and international abuses have kindled sympathy for hostile autocracies—and have even tempted a few to accept paychecks and platforms from their state media. (…) But even the International People’s Media Network’s webpage makes it clear its members all work in conjunction with the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research, a Massachusetts-based think tank—whose founder, controversial academic Dr. Vijay Prashad, is both a vociferous defender of China’s repressive policies toward its Uighur minority and a recurring guest on BreakThrough and its international siblings. All Network members share the same preoccupations, and even some of the same personnel—all unanimously depicting the U.S. as oppressive and imperialistic, China as admirable and benevolent, and Russia as blameless for its invasion of Ukraine. And all the International People’s Media Network’s affiliates, including Tricontinental, appear to drink from the same torrent of dark money pouring out of the bank accounts and nonprofits of tech mogul Neville “Roy” Singham. Efforts to reach Singham for this piece, including through his partner Jodie Evans of the protest group Code Pink, proved fruitless. A 2022 report by the New Lines Institute for Policy and Strategy outlined how Singham sold his multibillion-dollar software company Thoughtworks five years prior and had since pumped money into a labyrinth of nonprofit organizations—Tricontinental among them. Prashad, for his part, has openly acknowledged Singham as the source of his group’s endowment, which has climbed to more than $14 million, mostly funneled through Goldman Sachs’ anonymized philanthropy fund. The financial institution declined to comment on its relationship with Singham, but insisted it abides by all relevant regulations.
via daily beast: U.S Tech Mogul Bankrolls Pro-Russia, Pro-China News Network