EU Parliament urges fight against Russia's "fake news":
The European Parliament has warned that "hostile propaganda" by Russia against the EU is growing, while urging member states to increase their efforts to counter disinformation.
Lawmakers voted on November 23 in favor of a motion condemning Russian state media outlets like the television channel RT and the news agency Sputnik for disseminating "absolutely fake" news.
They said the Kremlin was using "a wide range of tools and instruments", including think tanks, multilingual TV stations, "pseudo news agencies", and social media to spread fake information, challenge democratic values, and divide Europe.
The resolution says the Kremlin has stepped up its propaganda efforts against the EU since Russia's illegal annexation of Ukraine's Crimea territory in 2014.
Lawmakers urged the European Union to boost its "tiny" communication force and invest more in "awareness raising, education, online and local media, investigative journalism, and information literacy."
They said they were "seriously concerned by the rapid expansion of Kremlin-inspired activities in Europe, including disinformation and propaganda seeking to maintain or increase Russia's influence to weaken and split the EU."
The motion was approved by 304 votes to 179, with 208 abstentions. (AFP, Reuters)
This ends our live blogging for November 23. Be sure to check back tomorrow for our continuing coverage.
Poroshenko to press EU leaders on Russia sanctions:
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is to meet with top European Union leaders to press them to keep up sanctions against Russia.
Poroshenko's November 24 meeting with Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker comes amid worries in Kyiv that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will weaken Western resolve against Russia upon taking office in January.
The EU is set at its next summit next month to discuss a six-month renewal of sanctions that were imposed after a Malaysia Airlines flight was shot down over Ukraine in July 2014.
But Trump has signaled a more conciliatory approach to the Kremlin, and even suggested he might accept Russia's 2014 annexation of the Crimean Peninsula.
Internal political reforms demanded by Brussels in exchange for visa-free travel will also be on the agenda.
"I think the focus must be on the situation in [eastern Ukraine], on Russian aggression, on the extension of sanctions," Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin told Ukrainian television.
Fighting in eastern Ukraine between government forces and Russia-backed insurgents has claimed more than 9,600 lives and forced hundreds of thousands to flee. (AFP, UNIAN)