One of the Czech Republic’s largest disinformation portals publishes thousands of pro-Kremlin articles a month, reaches millions of readers across Central Europe, and operates in open violation of EU sanctions law – while its true financiers remain hidden behind a web of offshore companies and front figures.
CZ24 News is not a fringe outlet. According to an investigation by Radio Free Europe, the portal’s monthly traffic can reach several million visitors, making it one of the most-visited disinformation platforms in the Czech and Slovak information space. Yet, as Radio Free Europe’s reporting and Insight News Media’s own 2024 investigation into pro-Russian outlets in the Czech media landscape both document, the site operates largely unchecked — translating content from sanctioned Russian state media, radicalising audiences, and obscuring its real funding sources behind layers of shell companies.
What CZ24 Publishes and Why It Matters
Registered in 2018, CZ24 grew steadily before accelerating sharply after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. By 2025, the portal was publishing up to 2,000 articles per month — several times more than comparable Czech pro-Russian portals, according to Radio Free Europe. On its website, the outlet describes itself as “an independent news portal for Czechs and Slovaks around the world, which is in no way governed by the legislation of the EU, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic or other EU member states.”
Vojtech Boháč, journalist and editor-in-chief of Czech investigative outlet Voxpot, found that a significant share of CZ24’s content consists of articles republished from other Czech and Slovak disinformation sites, transcripts of speeches by pro-Russian politicians, and — critically — an average of 12 articles per day that are word-for-word translations or retellings of material from Russian state propaganda outlets including Sputnik, Russia Today, and RIA Novosti. The overwhelming majority of media cited by CZ24 are under European Union sanctions.
Boháč describes the portal’s purpose as distinct from competing with mainstream media. “The goal of such information operations is to feed and shape a specific audience that may be small but can have political influence,” he told Radio Free Europe. “These portals are more focused on radicalising voters within an already existing political current.” He warns that many readers of these portals “sincerely believe the lies written there, particularly about the war in Ukraine” – and that the fear-based framing used by CZ24, including threats of nuclear war and economic collapse, makes constructive public debate significantly harder.
A Pattern Years in the Making
CZ24’s role in the Czech pro-Kremlin information ecosystem is not a recent discovery. As Insight News Media documented in its 2024 investigation into pro-Russian outlets in the Czech media landscape, CZ24 was already among the most active nodes in a tightly interconnected network of disinformation portals — sites that routinely cross-cite each other, reference Russian state media, and publish nearly identical content in coordination.
At the time of that investigation, CZ24’s monthly unique visitors stood at around 40,000–50,000. The figures cited by Radio Free Europe for 2025–2026 — several million monthly visits — indicate dramatic growth over a relatively short period, suggesting the portal has significantly expanded its reach as Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has continued.
Our investigation also documented that CZ24 was among the Czech outlets citing Voice of Europe — the Kremlin-funded influence operation formerly based in Prague that was sanctioned by the EU in 2024. The dominant narratives identified at that time map precisely onto what the portal continues to publish today: that Russia was “forced to respond” to Western aggression, that Ukraine’s government is illegitimate, that Western military support for Ukraine is pointless, and that NATO represents a threat rather than a defensive alliance. What the Radio Free Europe investigation adds is the financial and organisational infrastructure behind what our research had already identified as a systematic, coordinated operation.
The Network Behind the Portal
On paper, CZ24 is operated by a Czech company called Slovanský svět (Slavic World). Until mid-2025, the company was owned by Jitka Entlichová, a businesswoman from Kladno who previously belonged to the pro-Russian movement Alliance of National Forces, which advocated for Czech withdrawal from both NATO and the EU. Entlichová told Voxpot that the site was run by “three or four volunteers, with most of the work done by artificial intelligence”, and declined to name co-founders or reveal funding sources.
The trail, however, leads to a more significant figure: pro-Russian activist Vladimira Vítová. According to Voxpot’s investigation, cited by Radio Free Europe, Slovanský svět is closely linked to Vítová, with Entlichová serving as her deputy in two pro-Russian organisations — the Alliance of National Forces and the Czechoslovak Peace Forum. Vítová has long campaigned for Czech withdrawal from the EU and NATO and holds a VKontakte account following the Russian Foreign Ministry, Sergei Lavrov, Maria Zakharova, and Vladimir Putin.
After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Vítová and her associates publicly apologised to Russia on multiple occasions — including for a banner hung on the Czech Interior Ministry building depicting Putin in a body bag and for a Ukrainian strike on Belgorod in December 2023 that Czech media reported may have involved Czech-supplied rocket systems. Radio Free Europe found no condemnation of Russia’s attacks on Ukraine anywhere on the websites of Vítová’s organisations or on her personal pages.
Voxpot further established that Vítová is a member of Russia’s Club of National Unity — an organisation whose stated goals include “conducting campaigns to counter disinformation and the spread of negative and discrediting information about Russia”, promoting “a positive image of Russia in the media and digital space”, and engaging with foreign bloggers, journalists, and public figures. Fellow members of the club include former Ukrainian Prime Minister under Viktor Yanukovych Mykola Azarov, arms dealer Viktor Bout, Akhmat unit commander Apti Alaudinov, propagandist and “Russian world” ideologist Alexander Dugin, and Russian television presenter Artyom Sheinin.
FSB Connections and Moscow Visits
After Russia’s full-scale invasion, Vítová travelled to Moscow at least twice — in April and November 2024 — to attend conferences of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems (AGP), an organisation whose website states it “conducts systemic geopolitical research to prepare recommendations for state authorities on Russia’s foreign and domestic policy”. She also participated in a conference organised under the Russian Ministry of Defence’s Army forum.
Radio Free Europe identified at the same AGP conferences Alexander Klipachev, listed as academic secretary and member of the AGP presidium. A source cited by Novaya Gazeta described Klipachev as an FSB general. Open databases confirm he co-owned land on what sources describe as an “FSB dacha enclave” in the Moscow region alongside other senior security service officials. Klipachev also spent approximately 20 years as a co-founder of an organisation described as having been “created on 15 September 1998 by active and former state security employees.”
Vítová told Radio Free Europe she does not know Klipachev and that they were “never introduced to each other”. She stated that AGP conferences were large events and that during the November conference she was personally introduced only to representatives from India, Iran, and Syria. She also said she had “unfortunately not received a single crown or ruble” for any of her appearances in Russia.
Offshore Money and Shell Companies
CZ24 claims to be funded exclusively by donations. Radio Free Europe examined the portal’s cryptocurrency wallets and found that one had received no payments in nearly three years, with total transactions of just $265. The Bitcoin wallet held $4,300 with a total transaction volume of just over $5,000 — the last incoming payment dated to September 2024. However, funds from that wallet were transferred twice to a significantly larger account that had received $144,000 in total.
In autumn 2025, shortly after speaking to journalists, Entlichová transferred Slovanský svět to Slovak businessman Miloš Dúč. Voxpot established that Dúč is linked to a figure named Marko Horovetz, who through one of his companies owns the Slovak Slovanský svět foundation. That foundation, registered in 2022, co-founded a UK company called ENICCA LLP together with Czech citizen Vojtěch Huserék. Shortly after its incorporation, ENICCA posted job advertisements on various websites offering media work — publishing content on social media, including Telegram — for $250–300 per month.
ENICCA’s registered London address is shared with the Czech Slovanský svět company, Dúč’s construction firm, and Vítová’s Czechoslovak Peace Forum. When Boháč visited the London address, he was told that ENICCA representatives never physically appeared there.
ENICCA was incorporated just two weeks after a Seychelles-registered company called YUPPEX CORP was founded on February 23, 2023. The Yuppex website links to an online shop that sells no products and a forum that does not exist. Its only geographic identifier is a “Slovakia” geotag in the site description.
“We did find that money is coming into this environment through offshore channels from somewhere outside,” Boháč told Radio Free Europe. “We are trying to understand where exactly, but this structure has many layers.” He described a three-tier system: an operational layer of disinformation sites and peace forums, a political layer through parties like the Alliance of National Forces, and a financial-ideological layer connecting the Czech environment to Russia — with Vítová at the intersection of all three. “Who exactly from the Russian services stands behind the financing of Czech organisations, we cannot yet say,” he added. “We plan to report on this in future investigations.”
CZ24 in Practice: Ten Narratives From March 2026
An analysis of CZ24’s content from the past month illustrates the type of messaging the portal delivers daily. The following examples, drawn from the site’s recent publications, reflect its core disinformation patterns.
1. Kremlin war framing. A March 17 article uses the Kremlin acronym “SVO” — Russia’s official term for what it calls a “special military operation”, used to avoid acknowledging its full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine — throughout the text, describes Russian advances as “liberation”, and refers to Ukrainian forces as “the enemy”.
- https://cz24.news/svo-aktualne-neuveritelny-rusky-napor-osvobodili-popivku-a-vysoke-drti-grisino-a-konstantinovku-ukrajinske-brigady-nemaji-munici-vojaci-masove-dezertuji-a-fronta-se-hrouti-pred-ocima/
2. “Nazi junta” framing. A March 12 article refers to Ukraine’s government as “Kyjevská nacistická junta” (Kyiv Nazi junta) and describes Brussels as “fascist”.
- https://cz24.news/kyjevska-nacisticka-junta-jde-po-orbanovi-a-jeho-rodine-iran-hlasi-zasahy-v-dubaji-dnesni-briefing-mo-rf-aktualni-zpravy-z-frontu-12-3-2026/
3. NATO as a “dead project”. A March 16 article declares NATO “de facto a dead project into which it no longer makes sense to pour large resources”.
- https://cz24.news/babisova-vlada-se-prave-rozesla-s-trumpem-a-spalila-vsechny-mosty-od-chabadu-zpatky-k-domu-sion-vlada-cr-do-mrtveho-nato-jiz-sypat-nechce-proto-miniaturni-rozpocet-pro-armadu-a-prisel-rev-od-amer/
4. Ukraine as a physical threat. A March 14 article claims Ukrainian intelligence threatened Hungarian officials and their families with “physical liquidation”, framing Ukraine as a rogue assassin state:
- https://cz24.news/vydeseny-orban-varoval-rodinu-pred-ohrozenim-ukrajinci-jim-vsem-vyhrozuji-fyzickou-likvidaci-general-sbu-ktera-po-svete-vykonava-popravy-nepratel-mu-sdelil-ze-o-jeho-rodine-vedi-vse-fas/
5. Ukraine as a blackmailer. A March 17 article frames Ukraine as engaging in “blackmailing” of Hungary and Slovakia over energy supplies.
- https://cz24.news/koniec-ukrajinskeho-vydierania-madarsko-a-slovensko-postavia-priame-prepojenie-ich-rafinerii/
6. EU “doomed to liquidation.” A March 10 article claims the EU economy is “doomed to liquidation” and declares an “oil Armageddon” has begun.
- https://cz24.news/trumpuv-telefonat-putinovi-prozradil-jeho-hanebnou-prohru-ve-valce-s-iranem-vybuchl-mezinarodni-obchod-s-ropou-analyza-ropne-krize-ukazuje-masakr-ekonomika-eu-odsouzena-k-likvidaci-zacala-masi/
7. Derogatory war terminology. A March 11 article refers to Ukrainian armed forces throughout as “Banderovci” — a derogatory term rooted in WWII-era associations, routinely used by Russian propaganda to delegitimise modern Ukraine.
- https://cz24.news/banderovci-zatlacily-ruske-jednotky-v-dnepropetrovske-oblasti-douglas-macgregor-izrael-by-mohl-zautocit-na-iran-jadernymi-zbranemi-dnesni-briefing-mo-rf-aktualni-zpravy-z-frontu-11-3-2026/
8. World War 3 fear-mongering. A March 6 article uses “WORLD WAR 3?!?” as a headline and claims NATO is preparing to invoke Article 5 against Iran, using conspiracy framing, including references to an “Epstein strike coalition”.
- https://cz24.news/3-svetova-vojna-nato-chce-aktivovat-clanek-5-proti-napadenemu-iranu-trump-narychlo-sklada-epsteinovu-udernou-koalici-pote-co-se-seredne-prepocital-konvoje-us-armady-miri-k-ir/
9. Brussels-Kyiv collusion narrative. A March 17 article claims a leaked recording proves secret cooperation between Brussels and Kyiv against EU member states Hungary and Slovakia.
- https://cz24.news/unikol-skandalny-zvukovy-zaznam-brusel-spolupracuje-s-kyjevom-spomina-sa-fico-i-orban/
10. Ukraine as energy saboteur. A March 17 article, sourced from a Russian commentator, frames Ukraine as intentionally deepening the global gas crisis, referring to “the Kyiv regime” and its “destructive course”.
- https://cz24.news/ukrajina-je-pripravena-prohloubit-globalni-plynovou-krizi-olga-samofalova/
Why Is This Still Legal?
Systematic republication of content from sanctioned media is a violation of EU law. Yet as Boháč explains, prosecuting outlets like CZ24 remains a low priority. “Police often cited that such cases are very complex and the outcome unpredictable,” he told Radio Free Europe. With enforcement resources directed at higher-priority sanctions violations—such as dual-use goods supplying the Russian military—information space violations remain unaddressed. “They are dealing with it, but they do not have sufficient capacity to resolve the problem quickly,” he said.
CZ24 denied all accusations in response to Radio Free Europe’s questions.
The political will to act is also absent, Boháč argues. Neither Czech nor European authorities have yet established a practice of genuinely penalising media outlets for sanctions violations in the information space — leaving portals like CZ24 free to publish thousands of pro-Kremlin articles per month, reach millions of readers, and collect money through offshore channels whose ultimate source remains unknown.
