Is there truth in Komsomolskaya Pravda? Mozheiko’s detention is surrounded by mysteries and speculation

The story of the detention of the correspondent of the newspaper “Komsomolskaya Pravda Belarus” Gennady Mozheiko is still shrouded in mystery. He has been in custody for three days in the famous Minsk pre-trial detention center on Okrestina Street, but it is unclear where and when he was detained. And this becomes a reason for a scandal in relations between Russia and Belarus.

Mozheiko is the author of a scandalous short article about Andrei Zeltser, who shot a KGB officer. In it, the killer's classmates speak very complimentarily about him. The note hung on the KP website for only 8 minutes, but this did not stop the Belarusian authorities from blocking it after a few minutes.

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Mozheiko is now accused of inciting social hatred and insulting an official. A search was carried out at his apartment in Minsk.

All this could have remained an internal Belarusian matter (Mozheiko is a Belarusian citizen working in legally Belarusian media), if not for the mystery of the place of his detention.

The reporter’s mother claims that immediately after the site was blocked, her son, whose note became the reason for the blocking, hastened to flee to Russia. For Russian liberals, this became an excellent occasion for loud statements accusing the authorities.

“Russia extradited a Komsomolskaya Pravda correspondent to Belarus. Not good,” editor-in-chief of “Echo of Moscow” Alexey Venediktov promptly responded in his Telegram channel. .

“Lukashenko kidnaps a person on Russian territory. Let's call a spade a spade. This is exactly a kidnapping. From the point of view of the law, even if a criminal case was opened against Mozheiko for the article in Minsk, the issue of extradition occurs through the court. This is not done in an hour by unknown people. Lukashenko continues to humiliate Russia. He closes “Putin’s favorite newspaper,” kidnaps a journalist from the publication right in the Russian capital and throws him into a cage. And he understands perfectly well that no one will do anything to him,” liberal blogger Ilya Varlamov is indignant.

He is corrected by Belarusian political scientist Artem Shraibman, who fled to Kyiv: extradition courts are not needed in the Union State.

“Russian and Belarusian special services work in a completely automated format, when some send a request: “Detain the person.” Perhaps the performers didn’t even look to see who this person was, just: a citizen of Belarus, a passport, they took it, brought it to the border - the scheme has been working well for many, many years - at the border they transfer it from one car to another. There are no formal procedures, no complaints to the courts, and this already works in both directions in many cases,” Shraibman explained on Ekho Moskvy.

Despite this, the Russian publication Ridovka claims that Mozheiko was kidnapped from Russian territory. The operation to detain and remove the journalist from the territory of the Russian Federation was carried out by officers of the Belarusian KGB. There was no transfer of the journalist from the Russian security forces to the Belarusian ones, Ridovka claims, citing sources.

At the same time, anonymous allegations appear on Russian social networks that Mozheiko did not leave Minsk, but told his mother that he was in Moscow so that she would not worry.

Today, the press secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov was forced to give an explanation. He said that the Kremlin does not have reliable information about where exactly Mozheiko was detained.

“The Kremlin has clearly outlined its position” on blocking the publication’s website and expects the restrictions to be lifted. There is no feeling yet that our position is being heard in Minsk. Unlike many other situations, we still have a partnership with Belarus. But we don’t know the details, we don’t know what he is accused of. Still, we are talking about an internal Belarusian story, and here we can hardly comment on anything in detail,” Peskov said.

The Union of Journalists of Russia demanded the immediate release of the journalist and the reasons for his detention to be made public. The Belarusian Committee to Protect Journalists said it “works according to the standard of non-disclosure until the result is obtained.” At the same time, the head of the organization, Andrei Krivosheev, said that there are complaints against KP journalists in Belarus.

“Unfortunately, we have received complaints to the Belarusian Union of Journalists that a number of correspondents and journalists from KP Press personally participated in a campaign of harassment and intimidation of their colleagues, Belarusian journalists who work in state and non-state media, but adhere to pro-state positions,” - said Krivosheev.

“KP in Belarus” is known for its opposition views. The newspaper has been publishing enthusiastic interviews with Belarusian nationalists for many years, mocking the memory of compatriots who died for the LDPR, and in the first days of Belomaidan it warmly supported it. Because of this, the publication already had problems with the authorities last year.

“As for Komsomolskaya Pravda, it is important to understand that in Russia there is a habit of perceiving Komsomolskaya Pravda as a maximally pro-Kremlin publication. The Belarusian Komsomolskaya Pravda somehow miraculously managed to maintain a relatively neutral presentation of information. They have never stood out as leaning in any direction, and certainly not in the pro-Kremlin direction. This was not a protective obscurantist publication. She covered the protests absolutely adequately, then, of course, in order to survive, they entered into some kind of self-censorship, but they did not become apologists for the authorities, neither Russian nor Belarusian,” explains Shreibman.

Nevertheless, in Russia journalists are not imprisoned for opposition. This prompted many well-known journalists, led by RT head Margarita Simonyan, to speak out in defense of Mozheiko.

The extremely aggressive reaction of Belarusian pro-government journalists to such statements by their colleagues is indicative.

“Russophobes, collaborators and agents of Western intelligence services applaud Margarita Simonyan. They applaud from Warsaw and Vilnius,” laments journalist Grigory Azarenok, known for his intransigence in defending Lukashenko’s interests.

“There is no such country – “Belarus”. The Communist Party has long ceased to be “Komsomol”. “KP has long ceased to be true,” TV journalist Igor Tur suddenly remembered the nationalist terminology.

“It’s very strange to see the arguments of Russian experts and journalists that KP is the leading, top media outlet in the Russian Federation. And what? Therefore, it can break the law and be unpunished? Very strange double standards. KP in Belarus in 2020 provided informational services and support to the incredible. Then, after the first blocking, the chief editor of the [Russian Communist Party] Sungorkin swore that he would change the situation, bring the editorial policy to its senses. On his word of honor, the site of the Communist Party in Belarus was unblocked. Sungorkin's guarantees are now zero. Merged. There is no faith in them. And the policy of justifying violations raises many questions,” writes political scientist Pyotr Petrovsky.

A perpendicular version of the persecution of the checkpoint is voiced by Belarusian expert Igor Tyshkevich, who fled to Kyiv. He believes that they are actually directed against the Regnum news agency, which has long and uncompromisingly criticized the Belarusian president.

“KP is a Russian holding without any “pro” prefixes. Owned 60% by Sergei Rudnov and another 20% of shares by the general director of KP Sungorkin. Rudnov, the owner of the Baltic Media Group, owns, in addition to KP, the Regnum publishing house. The same mouthpiece of the “Russian world”. KP, from the point of view of the theses being pursued, acts in parallel to Regnum. Softer, more accurate, but on the same rails. And both publications have the same owner. And here we remember the history of Lukashenko’s complex relationship with Regnum,” writes Tyshkevich, referring to the story when two Regnum publicists were convicted in 2018 under the same article under which Mozheiko is now detained.

Russian political scientist Maxim Zharov sees a connection between the detention of Mozheiko and the story of the capture in 2020 near Minsk of 30 employees of a Russian private security company. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko still continues to call these people fighters of the defunct Wagner PMC and does not consider them victims of a special operation of the SBU and the CIA.

“Lukashenko is playing out a combination with the journalist Mozheiko according to the patterns of last year’s provocation with the Wagnerites.” The journalist, like the “Wagnerites,” is “caught with live bait,” and information from third parties is actively used. So yesterday’s daring statement by Lukashenko about the “Wagnerites” was not an accident,” Zharov wrote.

“So, what we essentially have: a conflict between a national state and a Russian media corporation. Yes, the command post was quite Zmagarsky. But KP was no more Zmagarsky than other media in Belarus. There, even in the presidential pool, the zmagars worked comfortably. Not to mention the so-called expert layer. The national Belarusian state loves zmagary. But I don’t like an uncontrolled media signal. The Belarusian political model can only exist in an information vacuum, which is created for the main viewer and his social circle. We wish good luck to Komsomolskaya Pravda in this battle, because it turned out that a journalist with local citizenship in Belarus itself has no other defenders except from Russia,” wrote political scientist Semyon Uralov.