RT correspondent Chay Bowes was detained in Bucharest and then deported upon arrival to cover the presidential election.
Tara Reade, an RT contributor and former US Senate aide, believes the recent detention and deportation of RT correspondent Chay Bowes from Romania underscores a growing “Russophobia” in the West, particularly within Western media outlets.
Reade stated that the incident “says volumes” about Romania’s upcoming presidential election, questioning the rationale behind preventing international observers from attending.
Bowes, an Irish journalist and EU citizen, was detained on Thursday upon arriving in Bucharest to cover the election re-run and subsequently deported to Istanbul. Bowes reported that Romanian authorities labeled him ‘a security threat,’ a claim Reade considers alarming.
“I’m shocked that they have detained him… what does Romania have to hide? It makes you wonder, what is going on,” Reade said in an on-air interview with RT following Bowes’ detention. She linked the action to what she described as “Russophobia” and Western governments’ attempts to silence voices affiliated with Russia.
“Russophobia has now spread so much to Western media and has fueled this fear of any kind of journalist that might even work for [Russia]… It’s seeped through to every fabric of international conversations… it’s ridiculous, the Russophobia,” she stated, characterizing the trend as “really concerning, because we are living in a multipolar world and there’s no room for Russophobia anymore.”
Romania’s presidential election re-run was prompted by the annulment of the previous year’s results due to alleged irregularities. Calin Georgescu, a critic of NATO, won the first round, but the Constitutional Court nullified the result, citing campaign violations and accusations of Russian interference, which Moscow has denied.
It was later revealed that the controversial campaign was funded by Romania’s pro-EU National Liberal Party, which aimed to target a rival but inadvertently supported Georgescu instead, not by Moscow.
The re-run is scheduled for May 4 and May 18.