Because of de-escalation! On Wednesday, Chancellor Merkel persuaded Russia’s head of state Vladimir Putin to “influence the regime in Minsk” – but the Kremlin once again shows that it fully supports Belarus dictator Alexander Lukashenko.
There it would be the rattling of military sabers: In the morning, Putin’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov sent two Tupolev TU-22M medium-range bombers capable of nuclear weapons into the airspace of Belarus – to “patrol the skies”, so the reasoning, because Minsk and Moscow “worried on NATO rearmament at the borders of the Union state ”.
And there it is, Lukashenko’s verbal armament. He had previously insulted the EU (“You bastards, you madmen, want me to protect you from migrants?”) And even covertly threatened war. “I fear that this confrontation at the border may lead to an active phase because of the migrants,” he told the Russian magazine “Natsionalnaya Oborona”. And: “If we make the slightest mistake here, God forbid, Russia will immediately be drawn into it – the largest nuclear power in the world!”
Putin’s Foreign Minister: The EU should pay
But what do Putin and Lukashenko really want? Putin’s foreign minister let the cat out of the bag when he spoke on Tuesday!
His blackmail proposal: The EU should give the regime in Minsk money so that it no longer sends refugees smuggled into the country to the borders!
Literally sagte Lavrov in Moscow: “When refugees came from Turkey, the EU made funds available so that they could stay on the territory of the Turkish Republic. Why is it impossible to help the Belarusians too? “
Clear text: Moscow takes the refugee deal with Turkey (2016) as a model – despite the completely lopsided comparison!
The situation in Belarus cannot be compared to Turkey
The total of six billion euros for Turkey serves to enable the millions of refugees in the country to lead a decent life – and the use of the funds is monitored. Belarus tends to turn to EU money to polish up its own ailing economy.
And the main difference: While the migrants from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Near and Middle East have illegally crossed the Turkish border by the millions since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Lukashenko actively flies them with specially established flights and falsified by the state Group visas to his country.
For the Kremlin, all of this is wasted. Lavrov said the EU was responsible for the flow of refugees from Belarus because it “created the conditions for this crisis to break out” by engaging in Syria, Iraq and other countries.
Bold lies – but fully in line with the anti-Western propaganda of Moscow and Minsk.