On day one of the Panama Papers leaked from within law firm Mossack Fonseca, the media was thrown into a feeding frenzy where politicians across the globe came under intense scrutiny and criticism for benefiting from a system of tax avoidance on an industrial scale, whereby they set up front companies in tax havens such as Panama in order to protect their wealth from taxation in their home country.
A myriad of highly interesting figures were identified, forming a pattern linking politicians with close relations to the U.S. and others who are considered enemies by the U.S. but are friendly to Russia. Current and former state leaders inplicated include post-coup Ukrainian president Poroshenko, the King of Saudi Arabia, Emir of Qatar, President of UAE, the late father of incumbent British Prime Minister David Cameron, among scores of other less pronounced political figures. Those implicated who are friendly towards Russia include former Ukrainian Prime Minister Lazarenko, a few known friends of President Putin, two cousins to President Assad, and a number of relatives of Chinese state officials. Additionally, the Icelandic Prime Minister, Gunnlaugsson, was also implicated, but after a single day of nationwide protests against his tax avoidance, he resigned his position, making him the first casualty of the highly sensitive leaks.
Notably, President Putin’s name was absent from a single mention in the 11.5 million documents leaked, however, on the first day of reporting, many Western news outlets took to making him the scapegoat with highly incriminating and inaccurate headlines, only to detail in the smaller print that he is linked only by association to others implicated. Various headlines sought to implicate Putin when the evidence failed to. The Guardian led with “Vladimir Putin and the gang of thieves“, Foreign Policy wrote “Putin Among the World Leaders Linked to Panama Papers“, Time led with “Massive Leak Ties Vladimir Putin’s Associates to $2 Billion Offshore Money Trail“, the Huffington Post had “Panama Papers: £2bn Of Secret Deals Lead To Vladimir Putin, Leaked Mossack Fonseca Documents Reveal“, and the BBC headlined “Panama Papers: Putin associates linked to ‘money laundering‘”, proceeding to produce a barrage of stories and posts focused on Putin alone. These were not the only Western media sources featuring Putin as the primary protagonist in this “money laundering,” “thieving”, “suspect deals” and “corruption” scandal, but to list off all of the damning headlines would be fruitless. The above examples portray a rounded image of the headlines.
The Putin complex that has been made evident in recent Panama Papers reports stems from the old, Western wealthy elite against whom these leaks are a direct attack. Many Western media moguls were around at the time of the Cold War, and thus were casualty to an overblown propaganda campaign that sought to exaggerate the threat posed by the Soviet Union. Dark historical periods like the Red Scare in America saw an aggressive, ideologically rigid culture which exacerbated public fear and thrived in immeasurable paranoia rivalling even Stalin’s and involved deep media censorship in the news, the arts, education, politics and even in the family life at home. Understandably, this era has left a deep legacy on the political and educational environment in the West, more notably in America, and its repercussions are evident in contemporary political speeches and U.S. foreign policy. The media was deployed to great effect during the Cold War to convince the masses that they were on the “right” side, however that media content was directed by the wealthy elite classes from political and private sector circles, a social class which has been implicated by the Panama Papers. This may have triggered an ideologically programmed response to blame the Soviet Union, but in lieu of it no longer existing, remnants of the Soviet Union will do, including Putin, a former KGB agent.
Supporting evidence for the case made in the previous paragraph have been released in the form of formerly classified policy papers from the Cold War era. The British Foreign and Cabinet Offices declassified papers from 1983, revealing a highly hostile Western foreign policy which sought to level accusations and blame on Russia both when Russia transgressed against Western interests, and when they cooperated fully. The papers highlight a policy of constructing the public perception of universal Russian culpability, meaning Russia should be blamed for everything it is involved with, and often when it is not involved at all. The recent collapse and ensuing civil war in Ukraine gave witness to similar treatment of Russia in the media.
On the other hand, the wealthy Western elite who were implicated got secondary media coverage to stories on Putin. David Cameron, incumbent British Prime Minister has been much more closely implicated in the scandal. His late father was a client at Mossack Fonseca and benefited hugely from tax avoidance, and much of his wealth was passed onto Cameron himself after he passed away. The media showed restraint, neglecting to use words like “corruption,” “thieves” and “money laundering,” instead opting to give full credence to Cameron’s response, in which he stated he, nor his family “will not gain from offshore funds in the future.” His response is being given credibility despite the continued ambiguity of his personal connections to offshore tax avoidance funds and his self-designated time frame of “the future.” With dozens of current and former British parliamentarians also implicated, many from Cameron’s own ruling Conservative Party, logically he would be far more implicated than Putin. For the first few days, the BBC consistently reported on Putin’s alleged ties to the scandal without mentioning David Cameron once.
Understandably, the tiresome concerted effort to pile the blame on Russia and its allies led to widespread criticism from the Russian media and the public on social media. RT reacted with a story titled “‘Goebbels had less-biased articles’: Public slams MSM for Putin focus after Panama papers leak”, providing a sample of the public’s consternation at the barrage of anti-Putin propaganda on a story that should on all accounts not feature him as a character at all.
Despite having his name and image plastered on the front page of countless stories, in print, televised, online and on radio, his guilt in this particular scandal is a figment of the wishful imaginations of leading Western editors. However, the evident fixation on Putin when it is clearly not warranted raises serious questions about how he is portrayed in other news stories too. If the media cannot be accurate and emotionally and ideologically detached in a story about countless Western officials, whereby they make Putin the scapegoat, how can they do so in stories on Russia’s role in Ukraine, Syria, Georgia and Eastern Europe? The argument of Putin’s oligarchic connections and his wealth originating from illicit economic activities may hold weight, but the recent reporting on the Panama Papers and efforts to tie it to Putin out of pure ideological malice suggests evidence provided in the past and that which may be provided in the future may not be accurate. Some members of the public are ripe for accepting any anti-Russian allegations and need not a single lick of proof to trigger their sure-footed anger, but most of the public seek coherent, logical and informative information from the news. On Russia and Putin, that is all too often lacking. Having provided a lengthy piece that may appear highly defensive of Putin, I must say this; there is an abundance of proof incriminating him on other matters, just as there is with tyrants around the world, both friends and foes of the West. It should be the duty of any media outlet, no matter how inflated their reputation may be, to provide proof if they wish to incriminate someone, a group, a country etc. Evidence makes us willing to accept an argument put forward, but in the absence of evidence, the media company does more harm to itself than to their victim. Those ready to erupt with outrage at Russia will do so with our without propaganda articles, but such articles will mostly fail to convince the calm and rational reader. The Panama Papers stories have been so far removed from the actual story, skirting around the implicated leaders and politicians with mindless chants of Putin’s name. Their readers can only hope they don’t make it a daily trend.
