RUSSIAN INFLUENCE

Suspect Russian accounts tweeted about Brexit in run-up to vote

Nigel Farage in celebratory mood on June 24 last year as the referendum results came in
Nigel Farage in celebratory mood on June 24 last year as the referendum results came in
HANNAH MCKAY/EPA

The Russian town of Gelendzhik, on the banks of the Black Sea, has a population of 55,000. According to Twitter, one of its inhabitants is Svetlana Lukyanchenko, a voracious user of the social platform who signed up in May 2016 — less than a month before Britain voted to leave the European Union.

Sveta1972, as she called herself online, did not fit the profile of someone interested in British politics. Yet in the four days before the vote on June 23 she posted or retweeted at least 97 messages mentioning “#Brexit”.

Her messages were mainly pro-Brexit and often repeated conspiracy theories. On June 21 she retweeted a story by the website Zero Hedge that said Britons were “appalled and disgusted” by a Brexit postal ballot