(C) OpenDemocracy This story was originally published by OpenDemocracy and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . How Russia exploited Argentina’s media to run influence operations [1] [] Date: 2026-04 In all, Diario Registrado published 26 stories that openDemocracy traced back to the Russian misinformation campaign. The documents claim the Company paid $28,600 to place these articles on the site. The outlet’s editor didn’t reply to our requests for an interview. C5N published 17 articles that the Company paid $32,500 for, according to the Russian documents. Fourteen of these articles were under Lopreiatto and di Taranto’s fictitious bylines. C5N’s editors declined to comment. The Russians also claimed to have paid $20,000 for eight articles in Ámbito, a traditional financial newspaper that moved online in 2024; $16,500 for 10 pieces in A24.com, the news website of the A24 TV channel; $40,700 for 37 pieces on Diario Con Vos, a news site that was at the time part of the Radio Con Vos media group and has since changed its name to Es Nota; $12,000 for 16 stories on Big Bang News and $6,300 for 18 stories on Dos Bases. In a written response sent to openDemocracy following the publication of this article, Ámbito’s general director, Gabriel Morini, denied that his media outlet had received any money or had any connection to destabilisation campaigns originating in Russia. “Neither AMFIN SA, nor NEFIR SA [Ámbito’s publishers], nor any marketing agency representing these publishing companies has received any payment from any entity or nation to publish inaccurate, negative, or campaign-related information intended to favour or harm any government.” Regarding the content, Morini added: “None of those disputed articles (8) can be classified as fake news.” He pointed out that several of the articles in question were written by a real person in Argentina, who was writing under their own name, while others had no author but were news based on facts. Regarding another of the articles, signed by the fake profile Gabriel di Taranto, Morini explained: “Ámbito acknowledges a flaw in its editorial process that led it to verify only that other publications existed under the same name in other media and assumed it must be a real person without verifying the details of his existence. The opinion piece in question referred to the conflict over oil in the war between Russia and Ukraine.” Editors from A24 and Dos Bases didn’t answer our repeated requests for comments, while Es Nota (formerly Diario Con Vos) declined to comment. A source from Big Bang News denied any involvement with Russian campaigns or money, and claimed all its pieces we identified in the Russian documents had been assigned by the outlet’s editors to its own journalists. openDemocracy also found stories planted by the Russian agents at Infobae, El Destape, La Patriada Web, En Orsai, Sección Ciudad, El Ciudadano Web, Política Argentina, Tiempo Argentino, El Cronista, Osorno en Vivo (Chile), Infocielo, Data Clave, Agenda Urbana, Ciudadano Agro, Contraste MDP and En la Mira del Poder. El Grito del Sur, a leftist digital outlet founded in 2012, appears to have published six stories placed by the Russian network. The Russians claim to have spent $2,400 to place each article, a claim denied by the publication. El Grito del Sur denied accepting payment for content, though it said it does take “any information intended to discredit Milei’s government, provided it is based on objective facts”. In an email, El Grito del Sur’s editor in chief, Yair Cybel, said he would not share information about their journalists or contributors with openDemocracy. “We’re not snitches or informers, certainly not for the British media”. He added: “Our outlet wholeheartedly supports the Russian Federation in its conflict with Ukraine, Palestine in the genocide it is subjected to by Israel, and Argentina in its claim over the Malvinas (Falkland) Islands. “Our entire editorial committee eagerly hopes that Putin’s Russian troops will advance to take London and will make its humble contribution through its reporting to ensure that this comes to pass”. Fake news On August 23, 2024, news website El Destape published a story about three Argentinians detained by the Chilean police while carrying an explosive device, a drone and “electronic maps” of Chile’s Ñuble region, near the Argentine border. The piece was authored by Fernanda Velázquez, whose only digital footprint is her author page on El Destape, and picked up by two Chilean websites, which ran shorter and identical versions, Osorno en Vivo and La Razón. But the story was fake news planted by the Russians “to create tension between Argentina and Chile”, according to the documents translated and analysed by openDemocracy, which reveal a plan to plant a “story about Milei sending a sabotage group to organise a terrorist attack on the Trans-Andean gas pipeline in Chile to disrupt a gas contract in US interests”. El Destape did not respond to openDemocracy’s request for comment, but the story was subsequently taken down. Juan Luis Rubilar, the editor of the Chilean outlet Osorno en Vivo editor that carried a version of the story, told openDemocracy: “Someone copied the article and posted it online. We don’t know who. No payment was received. We’re very sorry if it’s fake, we can take it down from the website.” Representatives of La Razón didn’t reply to our questions. The Russian files also included ideas for other fake news stories to inflame tensions between Chile and Argentina – which were on the verge of a war in 1978 – such as publishing a “map of the partition of Chile after the war with Argentina” or false claims that Argentina was drafting recruits for a war with Chile. openDemocracy could not find these stories online, suggesting they were ultimately not published. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/russia-argentina-influence-operations-media-javier-milei-investigation-kremlin-putin/ Published and (C) by OpenDemocracy Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/opendemocracy/