Media: Russia aims to discredit German soldiers in Lithuania using fake news
Bundeswehr soldiers in Lithuania have become the victims of information attacks that involve fake news aiming to discredit the German military.
An official representative of the Ministry of Defense of Germany confirmed this information, Deutsche Welle reported.
A German Defense Ministry spokesman told the publication Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that on February 14, Speaker of the Lithuanian Parliament Viktoras Pranckietis received an anonymous letter by email that accused German soldiers of allegedly raping an underage girl on February 9 in the Lithuanian town of Jonava.
The Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Interior, as well as the Lithuanian police, were all notified of the event, as were the authorities in charge of the Bundeswehr contingent, which had been stationed in Lithuania as part of a NATO battalion in the country. However the newspaper noted that when the Lithuanian police conducted an investigation, they found that there was in fact no victim, no witnesses, and no participants in the so-called "rape”.
German newspaper Der Spiegel, with regard to the case, pointed out the belief of a NATO diplomat who suggested that Russia might be behind this provocation, as Moscow is opposed to the deployment of the NATO battalion in Lithuania because of the participation of thousands of German-led troops. 450 Bundswehr soldiers are included in the battalion composition.