Hm. Is that code for 'none of your business'? I read similar things had happened to others, but my article didn't specify further.
The situation in Belarus
- Thread starter Raoul
- Start date
Apparently they were found – a few opposition leaders including Kolesnikova were arrested while "illegally trying to cross the border to Ukraine", assaulting a border guard on their way. I'm using so many sarcastic quotes in this thread!
That is the way the world works. The EU will use strong words but that's where it will stop. The superpowers of the world can pretty much do whatever they want, we've seen it so many times in the past.
Looks like they were actually at the border getting thrown out of the country (after a day spent in an unknown place), 2 of them got out and Kolesnikova didn’t (looks like it was on purpose from her side). A very difficult situation to assess with almost no information.
Last edited:
I read that she ripped apart her passport and that's why they couldn't deport her into Ukraine like the other two. I suppose the idea was to get them over the border and then deny re-entrance, but Ukraine wouldn't be able to accept someone without a valid passport. Now she's gone missing again apparently.
Seems pretty clumsy, but I guess Belarussian authorities somehow feel compelled to play according to the rules when dealing with Ukraine? I wonder why they didn't just deport these people to Russia though. They'd find ways to make it work no matter what, I'd think.
The idea is to create an image of the opposition leaders running back to their superiors – which are, by Lukashenko’s design, Ukraine, Poland & Lithuania (with an obvious and ominous presence of The West). Like Tikhanovskaya did (presumably blackmailed with the lives of her husband and children, although she still refuses to comment on that). So sending her to Russia won’t serve any purpose, since Russia is (again) Lukashenko’s best and only friend.
It looks like she had ripped her passport apart, but I’m not sure that it was Ukraine that denied her an entry – looks like she never made it to the other side of the border. Who knows, hopefully they’ll let her go at some point and we’ll know the whole story. Lukashenko is well-known for killing his political opponents, but that was back in the 90’s and now the whole world – and his own people are watching, so I hope that she’ll be relatively all-right. Although who knows with this lunatic.
Supposedly he had said to the Russian press that he has “possibly stayed a bit longer than he should’ve” but he “can’t leave because they’ll stab/kill my followers”. There were also additional reports on his constitutional reform proposal (to Russia and OSCE) today, where he would give more power to the parliament compared to the president and will conduct another parliamentary and presidential elections in 2022. Fat chance that.
Right, makes sense - but still seems pretty clumsy. Who in Belarus at this point who would be convinced by a story of an opposition leader joining her western bosses? And who among Lukashenko's fans in Belarus and his Russian allies still needs that story? Although everything about Lukashenko since the start of the protests has looked clumsy to me (betting on five horses at all times), so I guess it fits the pattern.
I see Svetlana Alexievich has left Belarus for medical treatment in Germany:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54326505
Apparently, she was the last opposition leader that was still in Belarus and free - and now it is unclear whether she will be able to return (which she says she wants to) after her treatment. Will that affect the protests? I had previously that one of its strengths was a lack of clear leadership, so it can't be stopped by arresting the leaders. Has that changed?
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54326505
Apparently, she was the last opposition leader that was still in Belarus and free - and now it is unclear whether she will be able to return (which she says she wants to) after her treatment. Will that affect the protests? I had previously that one of its strengths was a lack of clear leadership, so it can't be stopped by arresting the leaders. Has that changed?
I think it is a lot more complicated. Belarus is part of the Collective Security Agreement Organisation. If it is just simple democracy and to get rid of Lukashenko it would be easy as he is not very well liked in Russia. But I feel that this is more and part of the colour revolution and this is what makes it more complicated. If the opposition had reached to Russia they would have abandoned Lukashenko like a hot potato.
Yeah, I think we covered a lot of that on the previous pages. The opposition has been very careful to stay away from both the EU/NATO and Russia though. It's true that it might have helped the opposition to reach out to Putin and ensure him a turn towards the EU/NATO won't happen once Lukashenko is gone, which worked well in Armenia before. But on the other hand, Putin still appreciates Lukashenko, as the latter is now in a sufficiently bad position to have to bend to Putin's wishes. (I.e., eventually turn Belarus into another province of Russia.) So Putin might not want an opposition takeover, as that might the influence in Belarus that he has gained now. Plus, getting a functioning democracy in Belarus might give some Russians the wrong idea about Putin's reign as well.
Cheimoon, functioning democracy comes with maturity of the population. What is going on come is absolute chaos and corruption at a much bigger scale.
This is why Russians trust Putin. They don't love him but he keeps order and they have food on the table and have relative freedom. He doesn't bother them unless they become a threat to him. This is why I don't believe about this Alexei Navalny poisoning business. He has no reason to do so and if it's Novichok he would be dead by now.
But I hope Belarus can and should sort out their problem without interference from Russia and anyone else too.
My experience is that everyone is involved for their own gain and once you ask for foreign help you become a slave to that country be it USA or Russia.
This is why Russians trust Putin. They don't love him but he keeps order and they have food on the table and have relative freedom. He doesn't bother them unless they become a threat to him. This is why I don't believe about this Alexei Navalny poisoning business. He has no reason to do so and if it's Novichok he would be dead by now.
But I hope Belarus can and should sort out their problem without interference from Russia and anyone else too.
My experience is that everyone is involved for their own gain and once you ask for foreign help you become a slave to that country be it USA or Russia.
edit: just to extrapolate a little. I can understand your opinion on Navalny – I was equally bemused by the Skripal’s incident and couldn’t believe that Putin would be so stupid to act like this (and to do this so sloppy). That is, until they have invited the suspects on RT in an order to somehow explain the situation. In Navalny’s case there’s not even a shade of doubt. I mean, if this is a CIA provocation or something like that, surely you launch full-on investigation to expose them and not insist that he’s had an insulin crisis/hangover etc.
Your first point shows that you don’t know much about the situation in Russia though.
Last edited:
I have to agree that I have not been to Russia for a few years now though lived in Novgorad sometime back. But why poison him if they do not want to kill him? Surely they are capable of just getting rid of someone, especially if that person lives in Russia?
edit: just to extrapolate a little. I can understand your opinion on Navalny – I was equally bemused by the Skripal’s incident and couldn’t believe that Putin would be so stupid to act like this (and to do this so sloppy). That is, until they have invited the suspects on RT in an order to somehow explain the situation. In Navalny’s case there’s not even a shade of doubt. I mean, if this is a CIA provocation or something like that, surely you launch full-on investigation to expose them and not insist that he’s had an insulin crisis/hangover etc.
Your first point shows that you don’t know much about the situation in Russia though.
That's the thing, isn't it? For some reason Putin prefers to make a spectacle of this – take Litvinenko or Skripal. Intimidation, I guess. There are more effective ways of killing people, but when it comes to high-profile targets it's as much about making a point as it is about killing someone.
The fact that Navalny had lived is very much a coincidence – if you poison someone with the intention of this, very unique, poison, to start working when he's on a plane is very much a death sentence. The fact that the pilot had reacted so quickly and the doctors in the emergency vehicle decided to give him atropine was insanely lucky, you can't really count on that. There's also not much room to testing substances like Novichok (especially new ones – this is not a one particular substance, but a group of substances and the German authorities say that it was a different version of the substance) on people for obvious reasons.
Also – never underestimate the level of incompetence in today's FSB/GRU/FSO etc. Those are the people that decided that visiting Salisbury to look at "the tallest church spire in the United Kingdom" is a convenient excuse for the public world-wide interview of 2 murder suspects. Those are the people, whose agents kept taxi receipts with GRU's office address on them while on a mission at Rotterdam so that they can get compensated for their spendings after they return back to Moscow.
I loved this phrase by some Russian political reporter, I don't really remember who, but it goes roughly like this: every time a murder of Putin's political opponent happens, it never seems to be a convenient time for him... yet those murders keep happening. What's obviously most damning in that case, is the reaction of Putin and Russia. Omsk's hospital said that Navalny was in an insulin coma (and then proceeded to put up a dozen of equally bat-shit crazy theories neither of which explain what happened with Navalny); there's still no criminal investigation started on the matter by the Russian police. Can you imagine anyone collapsing on a plane with symptoms of neuroparalytic poisoning, falling into coma for multiple weeks and the police refusing even to start an investigation on the matter?
Also, stuff like sequential passport numbers, makes you think how far is the current trade from the levels of the Cold War.
Yes but in every other instance apart from poisoning he has been very effective in getting rid of people or his agenda. The newspaper reporter too was killed. Some other person had a convenient traffic accident. Then the Crimea case too. Why are they so incompetent now? The KGB was fairly efficient.
Not really. There were quite many feck ups that got less coverage outside Russia. There's also seem to be a different message that is sent by Navalny's poisoning – it's clearly is a threat to anyone who tries to oppose Putin, while a convenient accident wouldn't work like that (at least the message won't be that clear). It's interesting that he haven't used chemical weapons on his political opponents before that – only on "traitors" that had fled to the West.
That's the thing. KGB was very efficient... at some point. I guess I can even give you the 80's. That was 30 years ago. And they're still using more or less the same methods. USSR had put lots of money towards military & scientific research etc. – they don't have the same advantage now. The rest is speculation, but I think that living in a corrupt system where you're allowed to do pretty much anything you want (the press and the court will always have your back as there's not real separation of power in Russia) doesn't really motivate you to improve.
The only relatively progressive thing they had implemented was the use of social-media trolls – if the reports are true this strategy had significantly influenced the outcome of the last U.S. presidential election. To be honest I'm quite surprised that we were the first to do it on a grand scale. Those were not FSB though, those were Prigozhin's guys – although we have no idea which organisation exactly was responsible for Navalny's poisoning.
In a way, it might not even be bad for the FSB (or whoever did it) that Navalny survived and the Germans found out what poison did it. Yes, it's clumsy, but it makes very clear to anyone opposing Putin that the government is not afraid to kill them. (Or try and fail, at least.) The opposition has become more effective in recent year's despite all of Putin's repression and tricks, while Putin's popularity keeps slowly dropping; so maybe the government felt it's time for a stronger and clearer (and clumsier) message.
I think everyone understands that if you oppose Putin you could get hit. What puzzled me was the incompetency now. The corruption is unbelievable I know. During the USSR is not even close. I wonder what Putin would do in Belarus now? Marcon is pushing the opposition and Putin to make contact.
It's a bit of a mystery. He openly states that he's supporting Lukashenko, but he hasn't really done anything aside from signing a big check (refinancing a part of Belarus' debt). I doubt that he'd do anything drastic to ensure Lukashenko's victory – to be fair it's hard to envision a scenario where Lukashenko keeps the power aside from a full-on military intervention (and while most of Crimeans actually wanted to join Russia, even though the "referendum" was done in, let's say, highly questionable conditions, there aren't many Belarusians that want to lose their sovereignty).
So far the likeliest scenario that Putin is working towards is to force a constitutional reform, keeping Lukashenko in power until it is done. But I hope that Lukashenko wouldn't last that long – in that case I think that Putin would try to select a pro-Russian candidate from the opposition and establish a connection with him, since it's a bit too late to introduce his own. Probably Babaryka, he had worked at Belarusian Gazprombank so he should have a lot of connections in Russia's highest circles.
Although you can never be sure of what Putin will do. Who could've predicted Crimea...
I think no self respecting Russian leader can let go of Sevastopol. Just like the Cuban missile crisis. I don't think Russia can afford to let Belarus go to NATO.
That's not what the Belorussian opposition is aiming for though. Or at least, from what I have seen, they have been very careful to not take any position regarding Russia or the EU/NATO; it's just about Lukashenko.
Yeah, there’s no way Belarus is going to NATO any time in a foreseeable future. Europe simply can’t afford it in its current state – Belarusian economy is too dependent on Russia. This is not a Ukraine situation, Belarus just doesn’t have a self-sustainable economy at the moment.
Plus, all of the opposition leaders understand that as well and they all insist that this is not a pro-European revolution but rather an anti-Lukashenko’s one. Just read what Tikhanovskaya is saying about Russia and Putin personally.
Plus, all of the opposition leaders understand that as well and they all insist that this is not a pro-European revolution but rather an anti-Lukashenko’s one. Just read what Tikhanovskaya is saying about Russia and Putin personally.
Has Pompeo accepted that there was enormous fraud in the election in Belarus and the incumbent president actually won? That even dead people voted for the opposition candidate and they had Hugo Chavez to organize the voting fraud by flipping votes of Lukashenko to his rival Svietlana.
Is there any news on this? I have not read or heard anything about in ages, basically since @harms's last post here. I'm worried that that's probably a bad thing, and Lukashenko is managing to just 'sit this out'... Does anyone have news?
They've killed a protester (Roman Bondarenko) on the 12th. More than 1000 people detained after that – police went flat to flat, cutting the doors out as people let the protestors in.
A few days ago thousands of people went to the funeral. Tons of criminal cases started – including against a doctor that said that he wasn't drunk at the time of the murder (as Lukashenko states).
The idea of a global economical strike didn't work out as far as I can tell. So far it's kind of a weird stalemate.
Thanks for the update. I guess my media just kinda lost interest and went on to the next big thing...
Are people still protesting every day?
Looks like it.
Those people are impressive!
Apparently Lukashenko said that he won't be president once the constitutional reform is done. Right after Russian minister of foreign affairs visited Belarus.
Either he understands that it's hopeless and simply tries to put in guarantees of personal safety in the constitution before going or he's still trying to outsmart everyone by changing the system and moving to a new position in the country that would have more power than the presidential one.
Interesting.
Either he understands that it's hopeless and simply tries to put in guarantees of personal safety in the constitution before going or he's still trying to outsmart everyone by changing the system and moving to a new position in the country that would have more power than the presidential one.
Interesting.
I tried looking that up now, but I can't find what the reform would be about. Has that ever been specified? I did read that Russia told Lukashenko to press forward with it though, which makes me think it won't be towards a strong democracy...
Who do you think would take over if he left ?
I don't think that he had ever specified what it would be about.
It's hard to say, really – you can look at the ratings of the opposition leaders from before the election, but everything changed so much since then. I'd bet on Babaryka probably, especially since he has some connections to Russia & I think he would be Putin's favourite in the highly likely scenario where he (and Lukashenko) wouldn't be able to push through their own candidate. Plus since his second in command, Maria Kolesnikova, was one of the most popular faces of the opposition during the most active phase of the protest (although who knows, she can even try to get elected herself now*).
*well, not now, but you know what I mean.
They have 101 ways to kill a person.
Using highly specific poison made in russia?
Unless putin wants to make a statement I find it hard to believe.
Overdose, road accident, incidental mugging. Not hard to kill a person with a superpower resources.
This is the point I am making. Twice he tried and failed with the poisoning.
This is crazy: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57219860
Yeah, I saw that too. Very brazen. I suppose Ryanair had no choice under aviation rules?
Anyone have any other updates on Belarus? I have read nothing for ages which probably isn't good news...
Anyone have any other updates on Belarus? I have read nothing for ages which probably isn't good news...
Last edited:
That is quite brazen.
I’ve just read the news. This is insane — surely this breaks all sorts of international protocols?
Lukashenko rules with an iron fist, arresting people one by one retroactively (as well as for any hint of their support for the opposition). The only hope is that this system is not sustainable in the long run, but who knows how long he can do it, especially with full support from Russia.