‘They Ban the Truth, We Show It’: Russia’s RT Makes a Comeback in Italy
By Giulia Pozzi and Sara Badilini
What happened: Banned in the European Union for spreading war propaganda, Russian state-operated propaganda outlet RT (Trust Score: 20/100) has found another way to promote its propaganda in Italy. Thanks to a new campaign involving billboard ads and public screenings of pro-Kremlin documentaries, RT-content is now being promoted in major Italian cities, including Bologna, Milan, and Rome.
A closer look: Billboards with slogans translating as “They ban the truth, we show it. Find RT documentary screenings in your city” have appeared across Italy.
The Italian-language RT documentaries being aired in venues across Italy include “Io Sono Vivo” (“I Am Alive”), a film portraying the Russian ‘liberation’ of Mariupol; “Bambini del Donbass” (“Children of the Donbass”), featuring testimony from residents who “live under the bombs of Kiev”; and “Donbass. Ieri, Oggi, Domani” (“Donbass. Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow”), which details, from Russia’s perspective, the recent history of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions and the “horrors” experienced by the region’s Russian speakers.
Who’s behind it? According to pro-democracy think tank Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), screenings of RT content have been organized by Andrea Lucidi and Vincenzo Lorusso, two pro-Kremlin journalists based in Russian-occupied Donetsk, and have been promoted by Lorusso’s pro-Kremlin Telegram channel Donbass Italia. They also have been pushed by outfits such as ControNarrazione and InfoDefense, which promote pro-Kremlin narratives under the guise of alternative media or peace activism.
Although it is unclear whether RT is actively involved in this campaign, the initiative apparently circumvents a 2022 EU regulation, issued following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, prohibiting the distribution of RT and Sputnik content in EU member states.
It is unknown who is paying for the campaign. Pina Picierno, vice president of the European Union, said she plans to file a complaint with judicial authorities to investigate the source of funding.
In a July 2025 email to NewsGuard, Italian journalist Andrea Lucidi said that neither he nor Vincenzo Lorusso was responsible for organizing the screenings of RT documentaries, but stated that he had taken part in some of them as a guest. He added that "the actual organization of the screenings is handled by autonomous local groups, which freely choose to use the content."
Public backlash: Political and community pressure have led to the cancellation of several scheduled screenings, local media has reported.
Planned screenings of “Voices from Donbass” in Arezzo and Tortona and a planned screening of “Donbass. Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow” in Bologna were called off following protests from local politicians and democracy activists, according to the ISD and Bologna Today.
By the numbers: Posts on X that have promoted or positively discussed these documentaries collectively reached 13.4 million social media accounts between Jan. 1, 2025, and July 4, 2025, according to a social media analytics tool used by NewsGuard.
Update: This article was updated on July 10, 2025, to add comment from Italian journalist Andrea Lucidi.
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