Libya uncovers alleged Russian plot to meddle in African votes

Bloomberg

Libyan security forces have arrested two men accused of working for a Russian troll farm seeking to influence elections in the oil exporter and other African countries.
A letter from the state prosecutor of the internationally-backed Tripoli government to a Libyan security chief said the men were involved in “securing a meeting” with Saif al-Islam al-Qaddafi, the fugitive son of the ousted dictator and a potential presidential candidate who enjoys the backing of some officials in Moscow.
Russia’s foreign ministry said it was aware of the reports and was seeking to verify them. “We haven’t received an official notification from the Libyan side regarding this matter,” the foreign ministry’s press service said.
Laptops and memory sticks found with the suspects showed that they worked for an outfit identified as Fabrika Trollei, Russian for Troll Factory, that “specialises in influencing elections that are to be held in several African states” including Libya, the letter, stamped by the attorney general’s office and obtained by Bloomberg, stated. Two Libyan government officials with direct knowledge of the matter confirmed the authenticity of the document.
Fabrika Trollei was the moniker given to a network of media and political outfits connected to Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, who’s been accused by the US of funding and organising operations to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.
Troll Factory
Libya had planned to hold elections this year as part of a UN-sponsored roadmap to heal the divisions that have plagued the OPEC member since the 2011 NATO-backed revolt that ended Moammar al-Qaddafi’s four-decade rule. That initiative has been upended since eastern-based commander Khalifa Haftar launched in April a military assault to capture Tripoli.
Haftar himself has presidential ambitions and is fighting to seize the capital from the United Nations-backed government led by Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, which carried out the arrests.
Haftar had received Russian assistance, though Russia has also tried to cultivate other partners in Libya, including Saif al-Islam, as it looks to expand its role in North Africa and build its geopolitical might.
Saif al-Islam’s aides have previously said he had the clout to rally disparate Libyan tribes with a promise to restore stability. Others say his influence is over-stated in a country where the rebels and dissidents who ousted his father now vie for power.
“Russia is trying to increase its influence across Africa, it is trying to play its game. And this game is very diverse, it differs from country to a country,” said Alexander Baunov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center.
“Sometimes it is via private actors, sometimes it’s through state actors. Prigozhin is one of Russia’s proxy agents.”
One of the Libyan officials said the detained Russians had met Saif al-Islam twice between their arrival in Libya in March and their arrest in May. They had also confessed to taking part in a campaign to influence elections in Madagascar, he said.
Three Libyans, including the son of a Qaddafi-era foreign minister, had also been arrested. The men have yet to be charged.
The prosecution document named one of the men detained as Maxim Shugalei, a Russian political consultant who works for the Moscow-based Foundation for the Defense of National Values and whose head until recently ran a news website linked by the US to Prigozhin.
Shugalei’s employer confirmed that he and an unspecified number of other employees were detained in May by Libyan authorities.
It said in a statement on its website that they didn’t intervene in the country’s electoral process and were just carrying out sociological studies.