Former Moscow correspondent of The Guardian Luke Harding wrote in his book Mafia State that Russian state-controlled media failed to mention the ethnic cleansing of Georgians in South Ossetia and the focus was solely on the martyrdom of the South Ossetians. He also noted that the ethnic cleansing of Georgians looked more like a systemic attempt to drive out Georgians and redraw the map of Georgia rather than revenge. According to him, the Kremlin launched a "furious attack" on foreign journalists and intimated that they were, in reality, agents of the CIA.