Arms manufacturers, aluminum smelters, and the cartoon ‘Masha and the Bear’: what’s on Ukraine’s latest sanctions list

Filed 6d ago · Via Meduza · The Buffoon Desk

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Mister Exposition

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: Basil D Soufi · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

President Zelensky signed decrees sanctioning Russian defense manufacturers and Rusal aluminum group companies, plus the animated children's series Masha and the Bear, its studio Animaccord, and five Russian nationals connected to the show. Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council says the cartoon spreads pro-Russian narratives disguised as children's content.

The show has drawn similar objections elsewhere: British politicians asked the UK culture secretary to pull it from streaming in July, calling it unsubtle propaganda, and Estonia's foreign minister has described it as Kremlin soft power normalizing Russian aggression.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

Sanctioning a cartoon bear alongside actual weapons manufacturers is either a sign of how seriously cultural soft power is now taken in wartime, or a sign the sanctions list has room to spare. Possibly both.

Source: Read the original at Meduza → Scored: Mister Exposition · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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