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  • 2019-12-09 (xsd:date)
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  • Is This a Photo of Vladimir Putin with Fiona Hill? (en)
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  • In November 2019, shortly after U.S. Foreign Affairs Specialist Fiona Hill testified during the U.S. House Intelligence Committee's impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump, a photograph supposedly showing Hill with Russian President Vladimir Putin started to circulate on social media: This is a genuine photograph of Putin and Hill. While those spreading the above-displayed meme may believe that this photograph is evidence of some sort of nefarious plot — the logic appears to be that Hill was somehow in cahoots with Putin and that her testimony was therefore unreliable — there is a much more logical explanation. This photograph was taken at the seventh meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club, an annual think tank attended by international scholars, historians, politicians and other experts, in Sochi, Russia, in September 2010. Hill attended the conference for the U.S. think tank the Brookings Institution as an analyst of various trends related to Russia's economic and political development. Here's a photograph from Russia's government archives that more accurately portrays the numerous people who attended this conference dinner, as well as a second image of Hill: Hill presented her findings in an article published by the Brookings Institution in October 2010. Here's how the think tank described the Valdai International Discussion Club and Hill's work (emphasis ours): Hill is a leading expert on Russia with decades of experience. She has worked as a national intelligence analyst for the National Intelligence Council under Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump, and served as the director of the Center on the United States and Europe (CUSE) at the Brookings Institution. Hill has also penned a number of books on Russia and Putin. In other words, there is nothing particularly unusual about this photograph. It shows a leading expert on Russia at an annual conference hosted in Russia by the country's president. (en)
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