DISINFO: Joe Biden's administration uses Russophobia to limit America's gun rights
SUMMARY
Joe Biden's administration uses Russophobia to limit America's gun rights. The latest sanctions against Russia go beyond trying to tarnish the image of the country through unproven accusations, they are a clear attack against the Republican Party and the National Rifle Association. As a response to the alleged “poisoning of Alexei Navalny with Novichok”, the Biden Administration imposed a 12-month ban on the “permanent import of fire weapons or ammunitions fabricated or stored in Russia”. As usually happens with US sanctions, no evidence was provided to back the accusations. When it comes to use Russophobia as a geopolitical weapon of last resort, Democrats and Republicans are reading exactly the same script.
RESPONSE
Allegations of “Russophobia” are a frequent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative to deflect any criticism for Russia’s illicit actions. In this case, it also aims to frame sanctions by the Biden Administration as a domestic partisan issue against gun rights.
The US imposed additional sanctions on Russia on 20 August 2021 over its use of a Novichok nerve agent in the poisoning of Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny the previous year. And contrary to the claim, these accusations have been proven beyond any doubt.
There is unequivocal evidence showing that Navalny was deliberately poisoned in an assassination attempt, as established by initial clinical findings at the Charité hospital which indicated that he had been intoxicated with a substance from the group of cholinesterase inhibitors. Subsequent toxicological tests established the presence of a Novichok-type chemical nerve agent in Navalny's blood.
On 14 December 2020, a special investigation by Bellingcat, The Insider, CNN and Der Spiegel identified members of the Russian FSB unit involved in the attempt on Navalny’s life. According to the New York Times, the report was also consistent with the information on the case gathered by German intelligence services. Bellingcat also provided a detailed account of the methods used to identify the FSB operatives. A week later, on 21 December, Navalny disclosed a recorded conversation in which a member of the suspected FSB poisoning squad describes how his unit carried out, and attempted to clean up evidence of, the poisoning of Alexey Navalny.
See other examples of similar disinformation narratives in our database, such as claims that an anti-Russian campaign is the real reason behind the expulsion of Russian diplomats from Czechia, that the ‘highly likely’ argument is often used to spread lies about Russia, that only caffeine and alcohol were found in Alexei Navalny’s blood, or that the US wanted to use Navalny’s poisoning to block Russia's vaccine against coronavirus.