DISINFO: British website Bellingcat is suspiciously close to the US and UK authorities
SUMMARY
The independence of Bellingcat is often called into question. On their site, they present the entities that financially support them.
Among these we find, for example, the National Endowment for Democracy. A foundation that claims to support freedom around the world and that happens to be funded by the White House and the US Congress.
Among the other partnerships claimed by Bellingcat, there is the Open Information Partnership. An organisation that presents itself as a network dedicated to the fight against disinformation. And when you look at where their funding comes from, you come across ... the British Foreign Office.
The UK government's Foreign and Commonwealth Office has provided funding for the OIP, so that we can support the crucial role civil society can play in tackling disinformation.
So Eliot Higgins, the founder of Bellingcat, may well deride these accusations, but the close links between the investigative site and the British and American authorities, are enough to question its independence.
Moreover, in the past, Eliot Higgins worked in the digital department of the Atlantic Council, an American think tank very close to NATO's positions.
And the last revelation on the links between Bellingcat and British diplomacy is therefore part of a larger question around the independence of this investigative site. Questions that we would liked to have asked Bellingcat's journalists directly: unfortunately our requests went unanswered.
RESPONSE
This is part of a recurrent Russian effort to discredit the highly respected investigative site Bellingcat, which uncovered many elements in cases such as the downing of the MH17 flight or the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergey Skripal and recently the case of Russian opposition activist Alexey Navalny that contradict and expose Russian disinformation narratives and other hostile activities.
Bellingcat is not a British media outlet but an independent international collective of researchers, investigators and citizen journalists using open source and social media investigations to probe a variety of subjects. The staff and contributors are present in more than 20 countries around the world. Their office is located in the Hague and the company is registered in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
The documentary film Bellingcat, truth in a post truth world, released in 2019 shows how keeping talent inside a small NGO is difficult when the world's top media can offer far better salaries. Since detailed investigations are published freely and the collective is committed to provide freely with their stories and the methods they use to investigate other contributions create their budget: about two third of grants and donations and one third of trainings:
"around 35% of Bellingcat’s budget is currently raised from workshops."
The fact that some of this money comes, indirectly, from tax payers or through workshops or a donation doesn't mean that the independence of Bellingcat might in any way be compromised.
Read also related stories: Bellingcat is a part of information war against Russia and Bellingcat is a western weapon against Russia.