Leaked documents from the Kremlin's Presidential Administration reveal that Sebastian Ghiță, the fugitive owner of România TV, has been discussed as a potential collaborator in Russian disinformation operations targeting Moldova and broader Eastern European democracies.
The revelations, published May 16 by Armenian investigative portal FIP.am, detail communications between Russian operatives and Sofia Zaharova, a department head in the Kremlin's Presidential Administration who oversees information warfare campaigns against Western democracies. In an April 24, 2025 message, Zaharova and an agent using the codename "Edward Bernays" discussed two specific propaganda operations involving Ghiță.
The first proposed that Ghiță would publicly claim Moldova's President Maia Sandu attempted to pay România TV €150,000 to suppress negative coverage—a payment he allegedly refused. The second would have Ghiță assert that Sandu tried to purchase the channel's loyalty during Romanian presidential elections, warning that despite support for far-right candidate Călin Georgescu, the electoral outcome was "already decided"—a reference to the subsequent cancellation of Romania's first-round presidential vote.
Analysts familiar with the leaked communications noted that the phrasing suggests prior contact between Russian intelligence and Ghiță, rather than an initial outreach. "The language indicates an existing relationship where Ghiță is seen as someone willing to execute orders," one analyst told G4Media.
Ghiță, a businessman currently operating from Belgrade, Serbia, has transformed România TV into what Moldovan analysts describe as "the primary instigator of hatred toward Moldova" in Romanian media. The channel has consistently provided a platform for pro-Russian politicians, including Moldova's Marina Tauber in February 2023, and has disseminated what observers characterize as "abject falsehoods" designed to inflame Romanian-Moldovan tensions.
Sofia Zaharova, who operates under the codename "Kristin Kiler" in internal Russian communications, was sanctioned by the European Union in late 2024 for her role in undermining European democracies. She supervises the "Doppelgänger" campaign, which has cloned major European news outlets including Le Monde and Der Spiegel to spread disinformation.
The leaked documents are part of a broader investigation revealing systematic Russian efforts to manipulate media infrastructure across Eastern Europe. For Romania, a NATO member state and EU frontier country bordering Ukraine, the revelations underscore persistent vulnerabilities in the information space—vulnerabilities that Moscow continues to exploit.
In Romania, as across Eastern Europe, the transition is not over—it's ongoing. The country joined the European Union in 2007 with commitments to democratic consolidation and rule of law. Yet nearly two decades later, the leaked Kremlin documents suggest that domestic media can still serve as vectors for foreign influence operations designed to destabilize democratic institutions.
The Romanian government has not yet issued an official response to the leaked documents. Ghiță, who fled Romania in 2016 while under investigation for fraud and money laundering, remains beyond the reach of Romanian authorities in Belgrade, where he continues to control România TV's editorial direction.
Moldovan officials, who have faced intensifying Russian hybrid warfare since the country granted EU candidate status in 2022, view the revelations as confirmation of what civil society has long documented: a coordinated campaign using Romanian media to undermine pro-European leadership in Chișinău.
The leaked communications also mention the agent "Edward Bernays"—a reference to the American public relations pioneer—as coordinating provocations in Paris, campaigns against Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, and operations targeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. This suggests a centralized coordination of influence operations across multiple European countries from Zaharova's department within the Kremlin.
For Romania, the scandal arrives amid ongoing political instability following the cancellation of presidential elections and parliamentary deadlock. The revelations add another dimension to domestic debates about media regulation, foreign interference, and the resilience of democratic institutions in the face of sustained hybrid threats from Moscow.
