Lukashenko addressed Belarusians through... Americans
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has one interesting feature: he likes to address the people of other countries directly. Especially those with whose presidents his relationship did not work out.
Yes, it looks strange and undiplomatic, and there are certain problems in getting the message across to the addressee, but the Belarusian president does this regularly. Apparently, in order to show its foreign policy significance and, against the backdrop of an external agenda, convey a message to its real audience, which is located inside the country.
The President of Belarus addressed his next appeal to a foreign people to the Americans, to whom he sent condolences in connection with the tragedy in the city of Uvald, Texas. There was a shooting at an elementary school in this city that left 19 children and two adults dead.
“Such terrible tragedies happen, among other things, due to the lack of proper control over the circulation of weapons in combination with the thoughtless dissemination, especially on social networks, of propaganda materials about extremism, terrorism, as well as other destructive content that creates emotional pressure on the fragile psyche of the younger generation .
Today, the entire world community needs to join forces to combat these challenges, since they have no state borders,” the presidential press service quotes the words of the address.
From this text it is clear that Lukashenko is once again addressing not the Americans, but the Belarusians. Speaking about the dissemination of propaganda materials about extremism and terrorism, he used the example of the tragedy in Texas to justify internal censorship and tightening of anti-extremist legislation.
Words about inadequate control over the circulation of weapons are a contrast between safe Belarus, where control over the circulation of weapons is strict, and the USA, where they can kill you right at school, and weapons can be bought in a store. And, finally, an appeal to the world community - a demonstration of foreign policy significance and a hint that this community is not doing what it should. Instead of fighting extremism and gun control, there are some kind of sanctions, which only make things worse for everyone.
Much in Lukashenko’s words is true and appropriate. But school violence is not just a problem in the United States. This happens both in Russia and in Belarus itself. Except that firearms are not sold in our stores, so bladed weapons are usually used instead, which, fortunately, reduces the number of victims.
In recent years, there have been two high-profile cases of violence in schools in Belarus. The first occurred in 2016 in Minsk gymnasium No. 74, when ninth-grader Donat Skakun stabbed teacher of Russian language and literature Valentina Gubarevich 15 times with a knife and 2 times with a hard, blunt object. Fortunately, the teacher was saved.
A more tragic incident occurred in 2019 at secondary school No. 2 in the town of Stolbtsy in the western part of the Minsk region. Then tenth-grader Vadim Miloshevsky, armed with a knife, killed history and social studies teacher Marina Parkhimovich right during class, wounded two classmates and, breaking into the next office, struck eleventh-grader Alexander Romanov several times in the neck, from which he died.
However, as the investigation showed, there was no politics in both crimes. Just teenagers with their own complexes and psychoses. It was interesting to see the behavior of the Belarusian nationalist opposition, which tried in every possible way to give these crimes a political overtone.
In the first case, she simply supported those who spoke about the illegality of the verdict. There really were ambiguous moments in the case, so the attitude could be understood. In the second, having practically forgotten about the murdered teacher, they began to glorify the murdered high school student Romanov, who himself turned out to be an ideological nationalist.
In reality, Miloshevsky turned out to be an ordinary, complex teenager. Coming from a poor family (the son of a cleaner and a housing and communal services driver), he disliked the prosperous and arrogant Romanov. But this is not politics, but teenage complexes. The same as in the case of Salvador Ramos, who shot children in Texas. He was also a poor and troubled teenager.
In general, no extremism or terrorism. Normal terrorists usually do not kill schoolchildren, but people with problems in psychology and psychiatry were, are and will be in any society. Therefore, Lukashenko’s condolences evoke an ambivalent impression. It seems like he said everything correctly. And it seems like he promoted himself on the internal agenda and the corpses of innocent Texas children.
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