Most climate-related misinformation spread in the Western Balkans has been copied and adapted from global misinformation narratives, most often mirroring narratives in the United States of America, China, Russia or Western European countries, according to a report by North Macedonian fact-checking organisation Metamorphosis Foundation.
The report examines the most common misinformation narratives in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Kosovo, tracing their spread in individual countries and throughout the region through data collected by local fact-checking organisations.
Spread
Three of the false narratives most frequently found in the region include: chemtrails – the white residue left in the sky from aeroplanes – are used to intoxicate people; the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Programme (HAARP) manipulates weather conditions and is to blame for weather phenomena such as such as floods, fires, droughts or hail-falls; climate change does not exist, but rather is an excuse for states and political actors to control populations.
One notable exception to the trend of climate-related misinformation originating abroad then being adapted locally is in Serbia, where the report found that approximately half of false narratives spread were started by local actors, unlike other countries in the region; however, even in this case, a significant portion of the misinformation had international roots.
The authors of the report from Metamorphosis Foundation said: “Revealing key disinformation narratives related to climate change in the Western Balkans is of great importance for the region. Even though the countries do not appear to be fully connected to the European Union in many respects, the analysis confirms that many European trends, including the topics and ways in which climate disinformation is spread, have been copied and imported into the region.”
Disinformation
The report, Climate Conspiracies in the Western Balkans: Widely Imported and Persistently Repeated, was developed by North Macedonia-based fact-checking organisation Metamorphosis Foundation as part of the Climate Facts Europe project, coordinated by the European Fact-Checking Standards Network.
The report draws on fact-checks and debunks from 24 fact-checking organisations across Europe as part of the Climate Facts Europe database, complemented by other sources and data.
This report is the third of four planned to analyse misinformation and disinformation identified in the Climate Facts database as part of the Climate Facts Europe project, which will be released about once a month through September in the lead up to and the weeks following the 2024 European Parliament Elections.
This Author
Brendan Montague is the editor of The Ecologist.
Access the fact-checking database at climatefacts.efcsn.com. Read more about the EFCSN on their website. Follow the EFCSN on X, Threads, and LinkedIn for regular updates about their projects.
