The targeting logic behind Armenia’s anti-European disinformation

In June 2026, Russia’s foreign intelligence service accused the European Union of trying to expel the Russian Orthodox Church from Armenia. At the same time, in late May, another claim was circulating that Brussels had secretly agreed to resettle 250,000 Muslim migrants in Armenia . Both claims are false. However, they differ significantly in their content and the concerns on which they are built. One links EU integration to the loss of religious identity and ties with Russia, the other to migration, security, and demographic change.

These examples are not isolated cases. At least three different false narratives have been circulating since Armenia’s EU accession process began in 2025: religious, demographic, and economic. The broader context of their dissemination has also been documented. According to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), from April 2025 to April 2026, Armenia was the most targeted country in the world by Storm-1516, with more than 30 campaigns recorded during that period.

Fact-checking organizations in Armenia and abroad have already debunked each of these claims. But when viewed together, the differences are clear: the three narratives speak to three different fears: religious identity, demographic change, and economic security. These differences raise the question of whether the different narratives are also structured for different audiences. This article attempts to uncover the logic of this targeting through three case studies. Taken individually, they are simply false claims. Taken together, they may indicate a more structured approach: not one lie for all, but a separate lie for each.

The Religious Narrative : The European Direction as a Threat to Identity

On June 3, 2026, just four days before the next parliamentary elections in Armenia, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service issued a statement accusing the EU of aggressive actions against the Russian Orthodox Church in Armenia. According to the SVR, Brussels has made a complete break with “centuries-old religious and spiritual ties” with Moscow a prerequisite for Armenia’s European integration. The statement noted that the EU Partnership Mission (EUPM), established in Armenia in April 2026, is trying to deprive the Yerevan-Armenia Diocese, the local structure of the Russian Orthodox Church, of the right to use church property and block its dialogue with local religious structures, primarily the Armenian Apostolic Church. As evidence, the NPA cited a publication by two Armenian NGOs, the Union of Informed Citizens and the Vanadzor office of the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly, which, according to the NPA, accused Timofey Ghazaryan, an elder of the Archangel Michael Church operating at the 102nd Russian military base in Gyumri, of interfering in the parliamentary elections.

The claim itself is false, and this is supported not by mere contradictory opinion, but by a specific legal basis. There is no provision in the Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement (CEPA), which regulates relations between Armenia and the EU, that conditions Armenia’s European integration on the basis of severing religious or spiritual ties with Russia, restricting the activities of any church, or changing religious affiliation. EUvsDisinfo also came to the same conclusion, classifying the claim by the Russian foreign intelligence service as disinformation . EUvsDisinfo also emphasized that the claims of the Russian intelligence services themselves cannot be considered evidence, given their history of previous unsubstantiated statements. According to the same source, the claim was then disseminated through TASS and a number of Armenian media outlets. In a broader context, EUvsDisinfo views this narrative as part of an information influence operation conducted by Russia before the Armenian elections, noting that its aim was to present Armenia’s European path as a threat to religion, identity, and sovereignty.

However, the mechanism of this narrative is not only in the dissemination of false claims. The immediate target of the APC statement is the Yerevan-Armenia Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church, a specific religious structure operating in Armenia. The Armenian Apostolic Church is mentioned in the statement as the structure with which, according to the APC, the dialogue of the Russian Orthodox Church is being limited. However, the specific claim regarding the relations between these two structures is presented in a broader context, as a consequence of the rupture of Armenia’s “centuries-old religious and spiritual ties” and, consequently, European integration.

This framing changes the meaning of the argument. The issue of the specific structure of the Russian Orthodox Church is transformed into a story about a threat to Armenia’s religious and national identity. Thus, European integration is presented not only as a change in foreign policy orientation, but as a process that could undermine the religious ties and identity that are of symbolic importance to Armenia.

The migration narrative: the European direction as a migration threat

On May 4-5, 2026, the 8th Summit of the European Political Community was held in Yerevan, followed by the first ever bilateral EU-Armenia summit. As a result, a single, 44-point joint declaration was adopted . The document concerns energy, transport, digitalization, security, trade. The only point (24th) related to the issue of migration mentions the strengthening of cooperation between Armenia and Europol, Eurojust, Frontex in the fight against illegal migration. No provisions on the reception or resettlement of migrants are mentioned in any of the 44 points.

Three weeks later, on May 28, a short video appeared on the X platform with the logo of the prestigious Armenian-American newspaper “Armenian Mirror-Spectator” . According to it, another, secret document was signed behind the scenes of the summit, the “Yerevan Partnership Agreement on Migration”, under which Armenia agreed to accept up to 250,000 Muslim migrants from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, including those serving sentences in European prisons. A review by Lead Stories showed that the logo was simply pasted over an already existing video, and the newspaper never published such material.

FIP.am’s investigation also allowed us to trace the source and distribution chain of this story. The article on which the video was based was published on the Turkish website Ulusal under the name Aziz Yerganian. The website is associated with the Turkish nationalist Vatan Party and its leader Doğu Perincek, who is known for his denial of the Armenian Genocide. FIP.am did not find any previous publications by the author under that name, and Aziz Yerganian’s profile photo was identified as an image created by artificial intelligence. In other words, the online identity representing the author of the publication was also fake.

This was the second time Ulusal had published a similar fake story about Armenia. A few months ago, the same website had published another fake story about Armenia , about a bill “protecting Islam,” which was also submitted by a non-existent author with an Armenian surname.

Then the story began to spread more widely. According to FIP.am, as of May 28, it had been spread by about 20 X accounts associated with Storm-1516. During the same period, the same claim, with almost the same wording, also appeared in Pravda EU and Pravda Turkey . As a result, the same false story appeared on different platforms, creating the impression of being verified by independent sources.

But simply stating that it is false does not explain why the story is constructed in this way. The 250,000 figure gives the claim the impression of a specific and official number, while references to “Muslim migrants,” “statusless,” and specific countries link it to concerns about migration, security, and demographic change. Thus, the false claim is built not only around a nonexistent document, but also around several interconnected fears.

The mechanism of spreading the story is equally important. A real diplomatic event serves as a basis for connecting it to reality, a non-existent but official-sounding agreement is added to it, then a fake logo of a real media outlet is used, and the story is subsequently spread through multiple accounts and websites. The result is the impression of information circulating through multiple sources, rather than a claim based on a single source.

In terms of targeting, there is also a noticeable difference here compared to the previous narrative. While the religious narrative built the threat around religious and national identity, in this case migration, security, and demographic change are key. Thus, it is not the goal that changes, but the fear through which it is presented.

Section 3. The economic narrative: The European direction will destroy 80% of exports

On June 1, 2026, six days before the parliamentary elections, the Pravda Armenia website published a statement stating that in the event of Armenia’s withdrawal from the EAEU, the country’s exports would decrease by 80%.

Official statistics do not indicate such a picture. According to data from the Statistical Committee of Armenia, analyzed by Hetq , in 2025 only 38.4% of Armenia’s exports were directed to the EAEU countries, 7.9% to the EU, and the rest to other markets, mainly the UAE (mainly through re-export of gold). Therefore, even in the most extreme scenario of losing the EAEU market completely, it could not have been about 80% of total exports.

Here, however, what is more interesting is not only the wrong number, but its origin. Russian Minister of Economic Development Maxim Reshetnikov stated that more than 80% of Armenia’s exports are food, agricultural and alcoholic products, which are sold to the EAEU countries. Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu separately gave more specific, but different figures: 98% of Armenia’s agricultural exports and 78% of its alcoholic beverages exports go to Russia. In both cases, the issue is about one, specific product category, not about Armenia’s entire exports.

These figures refer to individual product groups or their markets, not to Armenia’s entire exports. In the Pravda Armenia publication , this distinction disappears: the category-specific indicator is presented as Armenia’s total export indicator.

The same mechanism is also noticeable in another publication. The Belarusian state-owned News.by claimed that up to 90% of Armenia’s finished goods exports are absorbed by the EAEU market. InvestigateBel verified that the real figure was around 40%. In these two examples, the numbers are different, but the logic of the distortion is the same. High figures for individual product categories or markets are presented as a measure of Armenia’s overall export dependence.

This is where the political significance of this narrative lies. The trade connection between Armenia and the EAEU markets is real and significant. In 2025, 38.4% of Armenia’s exports went to EAEU countries, so the potential loss of these markets would not have an invisible or insignificant impact on Armenia’s economy. However, this real economic connection does not justify the claim that leaving the EAEU would destroy 80% of Armenia’s exports. Here, the real fact – a significant trade connection – is expanded and reframed as an almost complete dependency. Thus, as in the previous two cases, Armenia’s European orientation is presented as a source of loss, but this time within the framework of a threat to economic security and exports.

Conclusion

When considering the three cases together, it becomes more visible not so much a single common lie, but the different ways in which it is constructed. The religious narrative exploits sensitivities around real religious and national ties, the migration narrative exploits concerns about real international migration crises, and the economic narrative exploits real trade ties between Armenia and the EAEU markets. In all three cases, disinformation does not create its basis from scratch. It takes a real fact or political process and changes its scale, meaning, or potential consequence.

These differences are also important for understanding the logic of targeting. The three narratives present Armenia’s European direction as a loss of different kinds: one of religious and national identity, another of demographic change and security, and the third of economic stability. While these cases do not in themselves allow us to claim that each narrative was crafted for a clearly defined audience, their combination shows that the same political process can be presented through different fears, depending on the concern on which the narrative is built.

So, the problem is not just to expose false claims, but to understand what real concern lies at the heart of each falsehood and what fear is being presented through it.

Hripsime Hovhannisyan

The material was prepared within the framework of the Disinformation Flows Monitoring Project