CA's Press Wing ditches Ananda Bazar's story on BD Army

Fake news scanner, representational image._11zon

Dhaka, Jan 31 –Chief Adviser’s Press Wing has categorically refuted a recent report published by the Indian newspaper Ananda Bazar Patrika regarding the Bangladesh Army.

In a post on its verified Facebook page on Friday, the Press Wing said that the report contained misleading information and misrepresented facts about Bangladesh’s military.

The post said that Indian media is employing techniques of what has become known as hybrid warfare to support the country’s long-time proxy, Sheikh Hasina, and to attempt to discredit the people and institutions of Bangladesh that in July and August brought her despotic rule to an end.

“Hybrid war uses information operations – known as disinformation – to divide its targets both internally and from its natural friends and allies. A disinformation operation typically begins with an entirely fabricated story, with no evidence and views attributed to unnamed people, planted in a friendly or pliable media outlet. If it is sufficiently juicy, the made-up story will be picked up by other media and gain apparent credibility as it spreads. Eventually, people who are interested in what’s going on in the world but too busy to delve into the details may come to believe the story that began as nothing more than a glimmer in a propagandist’s eye. The disinformation operation has succeeded entirely when people who believe the malign fiction are moved to act against the propagandist’s adversary,” the post said.

“In this case, the adversary is the people of Bangladesh and their desire to govern the affairs of their own sovereign country; the willing mouthpiece is Ananda Bazar. Its (your) story about the Bangladesh army has no more basis in reality than a Bollywood romcom. You must choose whether to practice journalism, based on collecting evidence of what is actually happening in the world, or to propagate malign fictions as part of a campaign to undermine the sovereignty and dignity of a friendly neighbor,” the Press Wing added.

The Press Wing reaffirmed the government’s commitment to transparency and maintaining an open dialogue with the media while stressing the importance of responsible journalism. Authorities in Bangladesh continue to monitor the dissemination of false or misleading information and have called for greater cooperation among regional media to prevent the spread of baseless narratives. - UNB