Politics
Kate Plummer
Mar 21, 2022
Independent
Well it turns out that the Russian state was behind those calls, according to Number 10, and culture secretary Nadine Dorries was also unsuccessfully targeted.
The prime minister’s official spokesperson said: “The Russian state was responsible for the hoax telephone calls made to UK ministers last week.
“This is standard practice for Russian information operations and disinformation is a tactic straight from the Kremlin playbook to try to distract from their illegal activities in Ukraine and the human rights abuses being committed there.
“We are seeing a string of distraction stories and outright lies from the Kremlin, reflecting Putin’s desperation as he seeks to hide the scale of the conflict and Russia’s failings on the battlefield.”
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Wallace revealed on Thursday that he received a call in which he was "posed several misleading questions" by someone pretending to be PM Denys Shmyhal, leading him to become "suspicious" and hang up.
He said, complete with a Nadine Dorries spelling of Ukraine...: "Today an attempt was made by an imposter claiming to be Ukrainian PM to speak with me. He posed several misleading questions and after becoming suspicious I terminated the call.
"No amount of Russian disinformation, distortion and dirty tricks can distract from Russia’s human rights abuses and illegal invasion of Ukriane [sic]. A desperate attempt."
Priti Patel also revealed she received a similar call earlier in the week.
Obviously the news raises a few security issues but aside from that, people had... thoughts about Dorries being among those targeted and Russia failing to get one over her:
I don't buy that Nadine Dorries was not duped— Sir Guy (@Sir Guy) 1647864968
the Russians *failed* to hoax Nadine Dorrieshttps://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1505879989748699136\u00a0\u2026— Henry Mance (@Henry Mance) 1647864910
Nadine Dorries became suspicious when the caller started taking her seriously.https://twitter.com/PippaCrerar/status/1505879989748699136\u00a0\u2026— Peter Smith (@Peter Smith) 1647868286
they must be pretty rubbish if they can't dupe nadine dorries— Chris Woodward (@Chris Woodward) 1647864806
They actually did manage to speak to Dorries for a few minutes, but gave up - convinced they were speaking to someone who was hoaxing *them*.— Jim Grace (@Jim Grace) 1647865302
The phone they\u2019ve almost certainly given Dorries https://twitter.com/pippacrerar/status/1505879989748699136\u00a0\u2026pic.twitter.com/LgYD4OgY88— Liam Stoker (@Liam Stoker) 1647867697
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