BAKU, Azerbaijan, November 10. The Azerbaijani parliament has issued a press release condemning a hybrid assault by the worldwide NGO World Witness towards the COP29 local weather convention, Dasfazit stories.
On November eight, 2024, World Witness revealed two articles as a part of its “investigation.”
The stories, titled “COP Officers Facilitate Fossil Gas Offers by Faux Investor in Secret Investigation” and “COP29 for Oil Offers,” referred to a digital assembly through Zoom with Elnur Soltanov, the CEO of COP29. The knowledge revealed needs to be deceptive to the worldwide neighborhood.
A joint investigation by the Azerbaijan Parliamentary Fee on International Interference and Hybrid Threats in cooperation with related authorities confirmed that on September 13 this yr, a Zoom name came about between Elnur Soltanov and an individual named Stephen Lee, who claimed to signify a Hong Kong Kong-based firm. Nevertheless, Soltanov was not knowledgeable that the assembly was being recorded.
World Witness was discovered to be utilizing strategies that contradicted globally accepted ideas for non-governmental organizations and had been much like intelligence company ways. By making a pretend firm referred to as “EC Capital Holdings,” together with a fraudulent web site (www.eccapitalholdings.com) and a pretend LinkedIn profile for Stephen Lee, World Witness contacted the COP29 workforce. They exploited the belief of a number of officers and have become a part of a coordinated disinformation marketing campaign towards Azerbaijan within the run-up to the COP29 summit.
Specifically, the BBC offered media assist to World Witness on this operation. The BBC article titled “COP29 CEO caught on digicam discussing fossil gas deal” revealed that the footage was secretly recorded. Nevertheless, the report selectively introduced solely components of the assembly, resulting in potential manipulation of the data and thus violating the ideas of neutral journalism.
The Azerbaijani Parliament's Fee on International Interference and Hybrid Threats considers the actions of World Witness and the BBC to be a hybrid assault and plans to contact related authorities our bodies to research the difficulty in additional element.