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White House briefs top social media influencers on Ukraine – reports — Analysis

Washington sees it as important to explain the US’ “strategic goals” to TikTok influencers with “millions of views,” media have reported

According to US media, White House officials held an exclusive briefing about the crisis in Ukraine with 30 social media users. They also reported that the Biden administration was exploring new communication methods to reach younger audiences.

Matt Miller, the White House National Security Council’s special advisor for communications and Jen Psaki (White House Press Secretary) hosted the briefing on Thursday. They explained what the US is like. “strategic goals in the region” and answered questions about US aid to Ukraine, about NATO and Washington’s potential reaction to a Russian nuclear strike, addressing the social media creators on a zoom call, The Washington Post has reported on Friday.

People creating products were on the list of people invited to attend the briefing. “explanatory”TikTok and YouTube have content about the conflict. According to the Post, the first to break the story, the Biden administration has cooperated with Gen Z For Change – a nonprofit group – to identify content creators for the briefing.

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Aaron Parnas was one of the invited. He is the son of Lev Parnas and an American businessman from Ukraine. Aaron Parnas was 22 years old and has been associated with Rudy Giuliani (former mayor of New York City and attorney for Donald Trump). Lev Parnas was convicted on October 25th of charges related to campaign finance and pleaded guilty in conspiracy.

“We recognize this is a critically important avenue in the way the American public is finding out about the latest,”Rob Flaherty from the White House, director of digital strategy explained and added that Washington desired to. “make sure”The social media influencers “the latest information from an authoritative source.”

Washington Post reports that some influential people said they had a briefing after which they “felt more empowered to debunk misinformation and communicate effectively about the crisis.” “I’m here to relay the information in a more digestible manner to my followers,”Ellie Zeiler (aged 18), has been a part of 10.5 million people following her on Twitter. She spoke to the Washington Post afterwards. “I would consider myself a White House correspondent for Gen Z,”TikTok added a TikTok influencer

However, other people were unimpressed with the outcome. “The energy of the call felt like a press briefing for kindergartners,”Jules Suzdaltsev (a Ukrainian journalist and a TikTok creator) said that he was not surprised by the decision. He added that the officials had avoided answering difficult questions.

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This is all happening amid ongoing Russian military operations in Ukraine. Moscow has accused Kiev of failing to implement the Minsk Agreements – a set of accords regulating its relations with the then-rebel regions of the Donbass. Also, the Kremlin maintains that it launched an operation to defend the Donbass republics and their people. “demilitarize” Ukraine.

Kiev has attacked the operation calling it a totally unprovoked incursion and asserting that in the first instance the Kiev government never had planned to attack these secessionist territories.

The US media have also claimed that a lot of misinformation has surfaced on TikTok and other social media amid the conflict, and that Moscow had reportedly paid Russian influencers to share videos promoting the Kremlin’s narrative.

TikTok blocked all new content and livestreaming from Russia altogether from March 6, citing Russia’s own ‘fake news law’ that prohibits the spreading of false information about the Russian military. The company insisted at that time it was putting the “the safety of our employees and our users” first.

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