A commotion emerged from the archway that framed a 4-meter-high Buddha seated in the dining area. On the evening of Wednesday, March 12, at this fashionable Parisian location near the American embassy, attendees gathered around a tall woman dressed in black. Xenia Fedorova, the former head of RT France, was marking the release of her book Bannie (“Banned”), which serves as a critique of the downfall of the Kremlin-funded television channel, a satire on the “complacent, lazy, and sheepish” French media, and a revisionist analysis of “the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, often depicted internationally as Russian aggression.” Access to the event was managed by a hostess, and Le Monde was denied entry.
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The modest reception hosted by publisher Fayard was a far cry from the grandeur of the launch of the French version of RT (formerly Russia Today) in December 2017, which took place at the Pavillon d’Armenonville in the Bois de Boulogne and attracted a range of sovereigntist and neoconservative figures. However, three years after the European Union banned RT broadcasts following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Fedorova has made a comeback. With her brown hair flowing over her shoulders and a sardonic smile, she now appears every Thursday on the CNews television channel. Additionally, she writes for Le JDNews and has created a mini-series titled Lumières Orthodoxes, focusing on cathedrals in France and Europe, which aired earlier this year on C8 and CNews. All these media outlets, like Fayard, are owned by the conservative Breton billionaire Vincent Bolloré.
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