The report by the Gabriel Narutowicz Institute of Political Thought in Warsaw says Russia and Belarus are waging an information war against Poland via the Telegram messaging platform.
Researchers found that the channel's content—targeted mainly at Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians in Poland—is aimed at eroding confidence in state institutions and destabilising the country.
The report’s author, Russia and Belarus expert Katarzyna Kwiatkowska-Moskalewicz, told Poland’s PAP news agency that the campaign is coordinated from Minsk, which has the technical capacity and trained specialists to run such operations, and maintains close technology links with China.
She said Belarus manages smaller channels such as Warszawska Syrenka, while Russia controls larger media outlets such as Sputnik.
The propaganda has a strong anti-Ukrainian focus, portraying Ukrainians as cheap labour taking jobs from Poles, abusing welfare and contributing to crime – claims that are contradicted by available data.
Other narratives depict them as unwelcome guests and question their contribution to the Polish economy.
Historical issues, particularly the Volhynia massacre, are used to inflame tensions, as are disputes over memorials and exhumations.
According to the study, the channel employs "political technologies"—psychological influence techniques rooted in the post-Soviet space—to create the impression of political instability, weak democracy, and unreliable European institutions.
It spreads anti-EU and anti-US content, casting the European Union as a threat to Polish sovereignty and the United States as exploiting Poland as a submissive satellite and not much more than an arms market.
Propaganda activity was particularly intense during Poland’s last presidential campaign, targeting centrist candidate Rafał Trzaskowski with claims that he served EU and LGBT interests and advanced German policy.
A fabricated letter, allegedly from the Ukrainian House Foundation, and a fake video of Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya endorsing Trzaskowski, were among the examples cited.
The only politician presented positively was Sławomir Mentzen of the far-right Confederation party.
Kwiatkowska-Moskalewicz said that such efforts are unlikely to change election results directly, but aim to show Poland as a “vassal of the West” to the Russian-speaking community.
She warned that this activity will likely intensify and is difficult to counter.
While EU-level blocks on outlets such as Sputnik have had limited effect because of VPN access, she said the state—at central, local and NGO level—must work to integrate new residents, present Poland’s openness, and counter rising hostility toward Ukrainians and other Russian-speaking groups.
The findings echo a March report by the EU's foreign policy service, which named Poland as a target of Russian and Chinese foreign information manipulation and interference, a tactic used to polarise societies, destabilise democracies and drive wedges between the EU and its partners.
Ukraine remains the primary target of Russian and Belarusian hybrid warfare, while foreign information manipulation and interference is also used against EU candidate countries such as Georgia and Serbia to undermine the bloc’s policies and values, the study found.
(rt/gs)
Source: polskieradio.pl, PAP