Former Obama administration US vice-president, Joe Biden, has accused the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, of "brazenly assaulting the foundations of Western democracy around the world", a system he says it sees as "greatest external threat to its survival". In this context, among other examples, Biden cites the Catalan independence referendum as an example of one of the votes Russia has tried to interfere in.
In an article published in US international affairs magazine Foreign Affairs, co-authored by Michael Carpenter, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense from 2015 to 2017, the former vice-president says that the Kremlin has tried to "sway political campaigns in a wide range of European countries". Specific examples he gives include referenda in "the Netherlands (on Ukraine’s integration with Europe), Italy (on governance reforms), and Spain (on Catalonia’s secession)". He doesn't, however, go into more details about exactly what Russia's actions involved in the case of Spain.
Biden, in a more general overview of Russian interference talks of the existence of intermediaries who spread "disinformation using fake accounts on social media", targeted at specific demographics, depending on the Kremlin's objectives. These goals, he says, "have ranged from discouraging voter turnout to boosting attendance at political rallies held by Russia’s preferred candidates".
According to Biden, these messages are spread by “patriotic hackers” and trolls who are normally working for "entities loosely connected to the Kremlin rather than directly [employed] by the government".
Nationalist passions
The politician writes that "to safeguard its kleptocratic system, the Kremlin has decided to take the fight beyond Russia’s borders". "By attacking the West, the Kremlin shifts attention away from corruption and economic malaise at home, activates nationalist passions to stifle internal dissent, and keeps Western democracies on the defensive and preoccupied with internal divisions", he added, saying that Moscow's aim is to "consolidate its power at home and exert untrammeled influence over its 'near abroad'".
To this end, Biden claims that the Russian government is carrying out a "coordinated attack across many domains—military, political, economic, informational—using a variety of overt and covert means".