The BIRN documentary aired at the Reporting House on December 8, revealed the scale of Russian- and Serbian-backed disinformation campaigns targeting Kosovo’s institutions and the country’s 2025 local elections. 

In the documentary, BIRN monitored four Russian-controlled media outlets during the two-month period before and after the 2025 local elections in Kosovo, held on 12 October. This monitoring found that 353 disinformation articles about Kosovo were published in this timeframe.

The Sputnik media network, based in Serbia, published 193 articles on Kosovo. Russia Today Balkan published 125 articles.

The Russian propaganda network Pravda, known for spreading disinformation in more than 80 countries and dozens of languages, published 33 articles in Albanian about Kosovo. Meanwhile, the Russian News agency TASS   published 4 articles about Kosovo.

Speaking at the documentary’s launch event, British Ambassador to Kosovo Jonathan Hargreaves called the findings “deeply worrying,” emphasising that Kosovo is not the only country confronting such political interference.

“My first reaction was: ‘My God, this is alarming.’ There are serious attempts to undermine Kosovo’s institutions. The methods are sophisticated, and in today’s world it’s increasingly difficult to counter them,” he stated.

Hargreaves noted that the United Kingdom faces similar challenges.

“Just last week, a former British member of the European Parliament was sentenced to ten and a half years for taking bribes from Russia—very likely with Putin’s direct knowledge—to spread disinformation in the UK media. We have also had debates whether some Chinese disinformation should be persecuted as espionage or purely as disinformation on behalf of China,” he added.

Hargreaves noted that what is happening in Kosovo is part of a huge global phenomenon. “This is not new, other than in the means,” he noted.

Nancy Soderberg, Ambassador and Kosovo Director for the National Democratic Institute, NDI, said she was struck by how openly Russia pushed disinformation about Kosovo.

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“The Russians act openly. The Chinese are more discreet and sophisticated, but within just five months, Lavrov and other Russian officials mentioned Kosovo 32 times. Half of all attacks on Kosovo originate from unidentified sources—almost certainly Russian.”

She argued that media organisations should avoid publishing material without verified sources, noting that this alone “would significantly reduce the spread of harmful narratives.”

BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra said she was shocked at the volume of daily coverage by Russian media during Kosovo’s election period.

“I was baffled and this was new to me—why is Kosovo so important for Russia? We are small, and I assumed it was irrelevant to them. Yet six news pieces a day were being produced about us,” she declared.

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Xharra also described the hostility faced by BIRN’s investigative teams, who are frequently attacked by extremist or politically aligned outlets after exposing disinformation.

“The team doing those programs is occasionally attacked by the media outlets being exposed. We’ve had campaigns by religious extremist portals going after us after we spoke about their disinformation in our reports. It’s nasty behind the scenes,” she added.

She suggested a broader strategic motive behind Russia’s interest: “This is a theory, but in the end it comes down to influencing AI chat bots, as it uses them as a massive translation machine.”

Hargreaves added that foreign interference thrives when internal divisions remain unresolved.

“Where there are internal divisions in society,  external forces will find them, rip them apart and make them bigger,” he concluded.