“We must take away the microphone” from Russian Xenia Fedorova, columnist in the media of conservative billionaire Vincent Bolloré, because she “is not a journalist” but a “Russian agent” serving a regime which “directly threatens” Europe, Raphaël Glucksmann said on Sunday.
“We have to take the microphone away from her because in reality, she is not a journalist, she is not a commentator, she is a Russian agent and she has been a Russian agent since the beginning” of the Russian offensive in Ukraine in 2022, affirmed the boss of Place Publique, who is preparing for a presidential candidacy. He spoke on the show Le Grand Jury for RTL, Public Senate, Le Figaro, M6.
“So Mr. Bolloré’s media, when they open the floodgates wide to Ms. Fedorova, they become relay boxes for Putinian propaganda,” he added.
“If this is what the extreme right calls patriotism, well that just confirms one thing, it is that these people are in the service of foreign interests hostile to those of our Nation, and in particular of a regime which threatens (…) directly France, which directly threatens Europe,” he added.
Former boss of the official Russian channel RT in France, Xenia Fedorova is accused even within the French government of spreading Kremlin propaganda.
“Defend freedom of expression”
She appears on CNews and Europe 1, writes a column in the weekly JDNews and presents the religious program “Lumières orthodoxes” on CNews and CStar (two channels of the Canal+ group).
She was supported on Sunday by Arnaud Lagardère, manager of Lagardère Radio (which owns Europe 1), and Gérald-Brice Viret, general director of Canal+ France.
“It has contributed for almost 10 years to the diversity of the French audiovisual landscape” and “sheds light on the Russian-Ukrainian conflict that we do not hear elsewhere,” affirmed the two leaders in an article published by the Journal du Dimanche (JDD), another media in the fold of Mr. Bolloré.
“We do not necessarily agree with each of his positions. On the other hand, we oppose its systematic delegitimization,” they added in the column entitled “Defending freedom of expression, especially when it is disturbing.”
On Friday, the chairman of the board of directors of the Canal+ group, Maxime Saada, defended Ms. Fedorova, seeing in her presence on CNews an issue of “freedom of expression”.
“I don’t think we can talk about a Russian agent (…), journalist yes, agent no,” replied Mr. Saada, questioned by a shareholder during the general meeting of Canal+.
More broadly, Raphaël Glucksmann deplored that political leaders “almost no longer talk about Ukraine” with “the risk of a war on European Union soil before 2029”. Therefore, “we must massively support the Ukrainians, not simply out of solidarity with a Nation whose only crime is wanting to live free, but because it is our vital interest.”
