#norddeutscher rundfunk | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

madisonmccoy · 4 months ago

Text

Rykter cast featured in Bergens Tidende while filming season 3

translated below :)

New rumors are spreading: “Getting in the mood very quickly.”

The TV success from Bergen continues: “We had to think differently”.

The TV series from Bergen is finally starting again.

Teo Tomczuk, Sisilja Garen, Martin Storebø Koh, and Alisah Süssmann also have central roles in the next season of \"Rykter\". Shown here on the sofa during a morning party in Telavåg.

By: Frank Johnson

Alice Bratshaug (photography)

Published: September 19, 2023

It is Friday morning in Telavåg. The seaside house at the water's edge is full of festive young people from 16 to 17 years old. The alcohol is on the table, the guys and girls are dancing, the atmosphere is both amorous and aggressive. Many adults are standing around, watching and filming.

Sexual identity

Suddenly, a fair haired man stands up, shouts “cut” - and everything calms down. Before the music is turned up.

“It's a bit weird to dance in the morning without music. But the crew is also moving, so we get into the mood very quickly”, says Teo Tomczuk (17) smiling when the camera is switched off.

Sisilja Garen has makeup done for new party scenes.

“The adolescents in the scene are going to be at a party, so we play music between takes. Then they're on it right away”, adds director Andreas Milde.

The Bergen company “Mothership” is finally starting to film new seasons of the teen series "Rykter" for NRK. Most recently, students in tiende klasse (final year of lower secondary school) were followed on fictitious Vesterøy. Now the main characters have started videregående skole (upper secondary school).

Photographer Christer Steffensen and part of the crew in filming for "Rykter".

Things that were hinted at in the last episode – drug problems, identity, taking responsibility – are all made clear.

“They have reached a new phase in their lives and will, among other things, explore sexual identity”, says photographer Christer Steffensen, who will also direct ten of the episodes.

Success in Italy

In addition, 30 ten-minute episodes will be recorded this time. These will be released in two parts on Norway’s national channel, probably in the first few months of 2024 (liars). The series creator is, the same as last time, Christoffer Ebbesen.

Producer Linda Bolstad Strønen is keeping up with the recordings in Telavåg.

The budget is 22 million NOK. Producer Linda Bolstad Strønen admits that it has been tough to get funding after NRK, like most other channels, has reduced its budget. Despite the fact that each episode is seen by 200,000 in Norway alone.

Therefore, among other things, they had to go to the broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) in northern Germany. Production money from the West Norwegian Film Center and the Norwegian Film Institute, as well as support from the Media Fund Zefyr in Bergen, has also helped secure a new season.

“We had to think of an alternative, so it is a patchwork of contributors. The fact that "Rykter" was also picked up by the public broadcaster RAI in Italy, with great success, gives us good momentum”, says Bolstad.

Alisah Süssmann from Fana goes to the dance department at Langhaugen upper secondary school.

The Nordic countries have aired the series. Now Mothership is betting even stronger internationally.

“It is a clear advantage that we have a finished season to show off.”

We are a "Rykter" (rumors) gang

Glesvær and Telavåg became important recording locations. This time Sund secondary school is the new base.

“The collaboration we have with the school there is incredibly important. They really show up”, says Bolstad.

The atmosphere is good between recordings at the seaside house.

Many of the main actors are students themselves, so there has been a lot of planning with parents and schools to get the schedule in place.

“Last year we shot 30 episodes in one go. Now we record ten at a time and have a two-week break until the next few. It gives everyone some breathing room”, says Bolstad.

It has been a whole year since the actors last stood in front of the camera. The party scene comes along in episode six. Now there will be recording until the middle of January.

Teo Tomczuk grew up in Solund municipality in Ytre Sogn, while Sisilja Garen comes from Øystese.

“I have missed the gang very much, both in front of and behind the camera”, admits Tomczuk, who plays Mathias.

“We are a "Rykter (rumors) gang" who both know each other well and try to keep in touch, but we live spread out. It's not often that everyone gets to meet up”, says Alisah Süssmann, Sara in the series.

We bring ourselves into the roles

They are happy that another season came. It gives them the opportunity to go deeper into the roles and explore new issues.

The seaside house they use for filming is close to other buildings.

“I was a bit afraid that I wouldn't fully get into my character, Thea, but everything came back as soon as I got on set. The production crew wants it to be authentic, so we bring ourselves into the roles. We know the characters best”, says Sisilja Garen.

“From day one, I have heard from a friend of mine: "You are exactly like yourself. What you're doing is not acting". One day the director said we should screw with the script and just do what we wanted”, says Martin Storebø Koh, who plays Felix, and laughs.

Martin Storebø Koh from Austevoll gets an even bigger role in the next season of “Rykter”.

“We have had a little part in the script’s process, and have adjusted when needed to make it even more believable”, adds Süssmann.

Followed home by young girls

And since the TV series has become a success, they are also becoming well-known again.

"I am followed home by young girls every day, they stand outside the door until my mother chases them away”, says Tomczuk and laughs. He also talks about emails from Italian fans.

Director Andreas Milde and lighting master Poul Iversen during a break.

“I happened to be in Italy and got a login to RAI. It was very strange to see yourself dubbed. They kept my laugh, but used a different voice for me”, says Süssmann.

Director of the first episodes, Andreas Milde, thinks the target audience is getting older this season.

“Since the main characters in the series are getting older, the audience will probably be older as well. But we know that 13-14-year-olds like best to watch somewhat adult series.”

(y'all this is literally the last promotional thing i had saved to translate... NRK why are you not hyping people up about this show?!? 🤨)

#rykter #rykter nrk #rykter spoilers #rykter cast #nrk rykter #teo tomczuk #sisilja garden #martin storebø koh #alisah süssmann #rykter season 3

14 notes · View notes

rollsrocker · 2 years ago

Text

Kremlin's Plan for Moldova

Greetings everyone.

The RISE investigative journalism agency published a highly detailed account of the Russian efforts to infiltrate Moldovan politics with a comprehensive strategy to integrate the country firmly in the Russian sphere of influence by 2023, with the side effect of completely alienating Moldova from Romania, the EU, NATO and the wider west.

Bellow I took the liberty of translating it into English, and the hyperlink of the Investigation in Romanian.

If you are Moldovan/Romanian, or if you take interest in the regional geo-politics, I highly recommend this read.

Thank you for your attention and time!

A document leaked from behind the scenes of the Kremlin presidential administration reveals Russia's plan to bring Moldova under its own umbrella by 2030.

The document, which has not been made public, is called "Strategic Objectives of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Moldova" and was created in 2021. Several key points of Moscow's strategy have also appeared over the years on the public platforms of pro-Russian parties and in speeches by politicians.

"The document is an interesting one, but it shows that they are one step behind the general situation because of the war in Ukraine and because of the regional capacity of EU countries and other international organisations to mobilise and face Russia's intentions to achieve this," Sergiu Diaconu, head of the Moldovan Prime Minister's Office, told us after we showed him the resulting strategy.

Against the backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the government in Chisinau is increasingly promoting Moldova's rapprochement with the European Union. The head of state recently set a deadline for this goal. The year 2030.

This year - 2030, is also included in Russia's strategy as the deadline for gaining control over the Republic of Moldova and moving it away from the EU, NATO and other partners.

The document detailing Moscow's strategy was obtained by RISE Moldova together with an international consortium of journalists including Yahoo News, Delfi Estonia, the London-based Dossier Centre, the Swedish newspaper Exane Westdeutscher, Rundfunk and Norddeutscher Rundfunk, the Polish investigative station Frontstory, the Belarusian Investigative Centre and the Central European news website VSquare.

The document comes from the same Presidential Directorate for Cross-Border Cooperation that produced a similar strategy on Russia's plans to annex the Republic of Belarus. The strategy was drafted in autumn 2021, as was the Belarus strategy, with input from the Russian General Staff and Moscow's special services: the FSB, SVR and GRU. "There is zero percent [chance that] these documents are fake," according to the source who provided us with the documents.

The strategy was built on three spheres of influence: political and military, economic and humanitarian.

PRO-RUSSIAN POLITICAL AND BUSINESS INFLUENCE GROUPS

Strategic objectives in the political, military, military-technical and security spheres

In the short term (until 2022), Russia has set out to open a consulate in ATU Gagauzia, but this has not happened. The idea of opening a Russian consulate in Comrat has been promoted by former head of state Igor Dodon since 2012. At the time, Dodon was a member of parliament.

In 2021, an initiative group started collecting signatures in support of the idea, arguing that "many Gagauz residents have Russian citizenship and go to this country to earn money. Many citizens of the autonomy got married in Russia, have businesses there. We are linked to Russia by many threads".

Mihail Vlah is the chairman of the supervisory board of the public company Teleradio Gagauzia (GRT) and one of the organisers of the rally against price increases in the summer of 2022. His wife, Tatiana Vlah, owns 67% of Bakayan, which is on the list of Moldovan companies that Rosselkhoznadzor allowed to export to Russia in December 2022, after imposing an embargo on all agricultural producers on the right bank of the Dniester in August. Vlah denied at the time any link between obtaining the right to export to Russia and the organisation of the protest.

Mihail VLAH, civic activist from Gagauzia: I think Russia is generally not interested in Moldova. What is happening in the Transnistrian region is very important for Russia, because about 50% of the population there is Russian, they keep their weapons there and there are peacekeepers there.

As far as Moldova as a whole is concerned, I think Russia would naturally like to see Moldova in its sphere of influence. Just as Europe and America would like to see Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia in their sphere of influence.

And from Gagauzia, Russia wants nothing. We live as badly as the whole of Moldova. We pay 30 lei each for gas and electricity. Our products do not reach Russia. We, like our Moldovan brothers, suffer from the fact that there is war in Ukraine and from this relationship between the authorities of the Republic of Moldova and the authorities of the Russian Federation.

Another objective of the Russian Federation is 'Countering Moldova's collaboration with NATO', which it has set itself to achieve by 2025. And in the long term, i.e. by 2030, Russia wants to "form a negative attitude towards NATO in Moldovan society and political circles". This was one of the "10 priority objectives" promoted by the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM) in the February 2019 parliamentary elections: "We will not allow NATO membership and we will achieve the closure of the NATO office in Chisinau".

"Countering Romania's expansionist policy in Moldova" - Russia's medium-term goal - by 2025. In the same 2019 elections, the PSRM claimed that if it had a parliamentary majority, it would ban "unionist parties and movements". At the same time, the socialists promised that Moldova would "achieve full membership of the Eurasian Economic Union" (EEU). The objective is also reflected in the Russian Federation's strategy.

Also in the political, military, military-technical and security spheres, Russia wants to "broaden the electoral base of political forces in Moldova that advocate constructive relations with the RF", "create stable pro-Russian groups of influence among the Moldovan political and economic elite", 'developing cooperation in the politico-military sphere, including intensifying Russian-Moldovan contacts between the armed forces and law enforcement institutions' and 'increasing the level of Moldova's participation in CIS activities, including restoring the participation of Moldovan representatives in all Community formats as well as through the EEU'.

Dorin RECEAN, Prime Minister: From a military point of view, at the moment, they do not have the resources and circumstances to do much. They cannot advance on the Transnistrian side. They are not aligned enough.

But in terms of increasing insecurity and fear and anxiety and funding protests and different kinds of destabilization, that's what they're trying to do. And that coincides with the agenda of these groups that normally should be in jail, and their money - recovered by the government, because they stole money from the people.

"Russia sees the Shor Party as a reliable partner"

One party that satisfies the Russian Federation's agenda in Chisinau is Shor. The party led by fugitive Ilan Shor has openly shown sympathy for Moscow.

Alongside socialists and communists, Șor has not once spoken out against NATO, even threatening that our country's rapprochement with the military alliance could lead to war with Russia.

"As if it is not clear how our traditional partners in the East will react to our giving up our neutral status and joining NATO. [...] Do we want war? Maybe we should tell this witch (Maia Sandu - ed.) to stop bringing NATO trouble to our peaceful land," Ilan Shor said in early 2023.

Amid the large-scale war unleashed by Russia, Șor has shown his support for the aggressor state, campaigning against the sanctions imposed by the EU. "In the case of support for sanctions against Russia (by the authorities in Chisinau - ed.), I reserve the right to call people to the streets," Șor said in a Facebook video.

Moreover, back in 2021, the parliamentary party claimed that it aimed to establish cooperation relations with "Edinaia Rossia" (United Russia), the party that has been governing in Russia for more than a decade. A statement published by the Shor Party said that the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Russian State Duma, Leonid Slutsky, said that "in recent years, the big problem has been that we have not had a reliable and long-term partner in Moldova for all our big companies. Today, however, we have found this partner in the person of Ilan Shor and the 'Shor' Party."

Ilan Shor and his party have been included on the US sanctions list for representing Russian interests in Moldova.

"Before the 2021 parliamentary elections, Russia was planning [...] to bring Moldova back into its sphere of influence. To support this effort, it worked with Russian citizens to create a political alliance designed to control Moldova's parliament and then support the adoption of a series of legislative acts in the interests of the Russian Federation," a document issued by the US State Treasury in October 2022 said.

We interviewed Marina Tauber in front of the government during the Sunday, 12 March 2023 protest organised by the Shor Party. Tauber denied that she was financed by Russia in any way.

Marina TAUBER, member of the Shor Party: No, we are not financed by Russia in any way. I declare this officially. And when people say or affirm this, please ask them to prove it to you and show you the concrete evidence. Otherwise, sorry, blah, blah, blah. I can't answer for all the people in the world. If they hired some of their employees, they have to answer. Mr Chernăuțan (Viorel Chernăuțeanu, head of the General Inspectorate of Police), as far as I heard from his briefing, said nothing about the Shor political party. If there are provocateurs here, what can I say? How can I tell you? I show you people who came from the district at our invitation. What the others are doing, I can't answer for the whole world.

PRO-RUSSIAN NGOS, CHURCH SUPPORT AND SPECIAL STATUS FOR THE RUSSIAN LANGUAGE

Strategic objectives in the humanitarian sphere

By 2025, Russia aims to create a network of "NGOs promoting the development of Russian-Moldovan relations" in Moldova and to provide "organisational, financial, legal and informational support for Russian-friendly NGOs". Igor Dodon founded such an NGO in 2021.

Transfers to the Moldovan-Russian Business Union

About the former president's "Moldovan-Russian Business Union", RISE Moldova wrote in the "Rubles for Dodon" investigation, in which we showed how from October 2021 to April 2022, i.e. in just seven months, more than 20 million Russian rubles (about five million lei) entered the association's Moldovan account. The money came from the "Delovaia Rossia" organisation in the Russian Federation, financed by businessmen close to the Kremlin and represented in Moldova by Igor Chaika, younger son of Yurii Chaika, Russia's Prosecutor General in 2006-2020.

Also on the humanitarian track, the authors of the plan set as their objectives "ensuring that the Moldovan authorities give up the idea of abolishing the study of Russian in schools" and "reconfirming the status of the Russian language as a language of inter-ethnic communication". The issue of the status of the Russian language on the territory of the Republic of Moldova is also reflected in the political programmes of the Socialist and Communist parties. In the latest political programme, approved in 2021, the PSRM "advocates strengthening the legislative framework on the status of the Russian language as a language of interethnic communication throughout the Republic of Moldova". And the PCRM notes in its electoral programme that "the state authorities will strictly observe the rules stipulating that Russian is the language of interethnic communication on the territory of our country". At the end of 2020, the parliamentary majority made up of socialists and the "For Moldova" Platform (made up of Shor Party MPs and defected MPs) passed a law in Parliament giving the Russian language special status. A month later, the law was declared unconstitutional and subsequently repealed.

Young people are also on the Russian Federation's radar. Russia aims to "expand opportunities for Moldovan students to receive distance education in Russian", to increase the quota allocated by the "Russian government to Moldovan students for studies at Russian universities with budget funding", and to create consortia between "higher education institutions of the two countries", open branches of Russian universities and develop an academic exchange programme.

Sergiu DIACONU, Head of the Prime Minister's Office: Interesting in this document, what we know exactly, but it is just a confirmation that they will put a lot of pressure on the so-called humanitarian and social zone. And here they can really cause some damage, because they are using institutions, including the Russian Cultural Institute here in Moldova, where you can see the permanent presence of the young generation, especially from the socialist side. It's a kind of enclave for the exchange of anything but cultural issues.

And the most interesting thing in the humanitarian sphere is that they want to increase the number of student organizations and the growing presence of the Russian language. They want to increase their media capacity.

The Russians' strategy also targets the church. According to the plan, by 2030 they aim to support "the Russian Orthodox Church in defending the interests of canonical Orthodoxy in the Republic of Moldova".

Mihail VLAH, civic activist from Gagauzia: The European Union is a very big and friendly family. It is like an intellectual, brain, technology. And Russia is Orthodoxy, a shared history of centuries that you cannot break with a pickaxe.

MAINTAINING DEPENDENCE ON RUSSIAN GAS

Strategic objectives in the commercial and economic sphere

"Maintaining the volume and legal framework for Russian natural gas supplies" is the objective with which the plan for the commercial and economic sphere begins.

Sergiu DIACONU, Head of the Prime Minister's Office: I would be very happy if people in Moldova could see this strategy. Because in the second point, in the economic sphere, they set out in the short term that they want to maintain the volume of gas deliveries to Moldova, which they did in 2021. But in this year, 2022, they have cut the supply by 40% and they are keeping us permanently under the prospect of the permanent cessation of gas imports from Russia. Every month we have this problem, that they say we're going to cut gas across the country. So how does what they say here stack up against what they do?

The goal of expanding "Russian-Moldovan cooperation in trade, economic and interregional relations" is similar to the mission of Igor Dodon's organisation. The "Moldovan-Russian Business Union" advocates the development of bilateral relations in the business environment of Moldova and the Russian Federation.

A Moldovan-Russian investment project is also AgroHub Moldova, a business started in Hincesti, which RISE Moldova wrote about last March. Specifically, the investment involved the creation of an agro-industrial and logistics centre, which aims to facilitate the export and import of agri-food and wine products. Worth $55 million, the project was also included in the protocol of the Moldovan-Russian Intergovernmental Commission meeting of 2 October 2020 and, according to the document, the agrohub was "aimed at improving trade relations between the Republic of Moldova and the Russian Federation". Except that, a few months after the publication of the RISE investigation, the lease contract for the public land on which the agrohub was to be built was terminated. Details, HERE

RISE Moldova sent requests for information to the Party of Socialists and the Party of Communists in which we asked them if there is any connection between the political and humanitarian objectives in the parties' programmes of activities and the exact same objectives found in the Russian Strategy. At the time of going to press, I had not received any reply.

Intelligence and Security Service of the Republic of Moldova: A multitude of subversive strategies, scenarios or plans with direct or indirect reference to the Republic of Moldova are circulating in the public space, elaborated by various experts or pseudo-experts. However, in most cases, these have little prospect of materialisation, as they are launched either to attract generous financial resources from sponsors or to manipulate public opinion.

"THE KREMLIN'S 'MOLDOVAN DIVISION

The document "Strategic Objectives of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Moldova" was reportedly drafted under the leadership of Russian Foreign Intelligence Service Colonel Igor Maslov, who headed the Kremlin's so-called "Moldovan Division" until 2021. We talked about this subdivision in the #Kremlinovich series of investigations.

Our partners' sources report that Andrei Vavilov, an employee of the "Moldovan branch", was among the authors of the strategy. Our sources in special services in several countries claim that Vavilov's superior is Victor Lisenko.

Vavilov and Lisenko are not just officials of Putin's administration. They also communicate with FSB General Dmitry Miliutin, who is in charge of the Moldovan-Transnistrian intelligence network. We talked about how Miliutin influences Moldovan politics in the investigation "FSB agents in charge of Moldova".

According to data obtained by RISE Moldova together with the Dossier Centre, from November 2021 to May 2022, Vavilov called Miliutin at least three times, and Lisenco is one of the most frequent phone contacts of the FSB Moldova coordinator. During the period mentioned, Lisenko called the general at least ten times, being surpassed in terms of calls only by Miliutin's wife - Natalia.

If Miliutin came to Moldova in 2016 when Igor Dodon took office as Moldova's president, then Lisenko paid a visit to Chisinau relatively recently. In June 2019, an official Russian government delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak arrived in Moldova. Kozak was also accompanied by Viktor Lisenko, only his presence in the delegation was not made public.

Viktor Lisenko at the meeting between representatives of the Moscow and Chisinau governments. 24 June 2019. Photo:gov.md

In Chisinau, the Russian guests met with Maia Sandu, newly appointed prime minister in a coalition government with the socialists. The incumbent president at the time, Igor Dodon, also met with the Russian delegation. The parties discussed bilateral trade and Moldova's gas supplies, which later became the focus of Russia's ten-year strategy.

RISE Moldova contacted Vavilov on one of his phone numbers just a day before this story was published. As soon as he heard his last name, the man asked:

Andrei Vavilov

- But who is calling?

- This is Vladimir Thorik calling from Moldova.

- About what?

- I'm a journalist with RISE Moldova. I have a question about a document concerning Moldova. We have a document: "Strategic Objectives of the Russian Federation..."

- You... you got the wrong number... Then he hung up.

We sent an official request to the Embassy of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Moldova to find out which of Russia's strategic objectives had been achieved, but until the inquiry was published we had not received a reply.

#politics #moldova #romania #russia #nato #ukraine #maia sandu #putin #political science #kremlin #ukraine war #unionism

46 notes · View notes

mylanguagesblogger · 8 months ago

Text

In Germany, we don't say: That is a nice big shower! Instead: I wouldn't want to clean that.

Credit: NDR Norddeutscher Rundfunk

German Culture & More

#learn german #germany #german

5 notes · View notes

blogencenamais · 11 months ago

Text

youtube

"Dinner for one", uma bizarra tradição do réveillon alemão

Como sempre acontece no último dia do ano na Alemanha, milhões de pessoas vão se reunir na frente da televisão para ver o sketch britânico Dinner for One. A peça cômica em inglês costuma ser exibida em diversas emissoras ao longo do dia.

O quadro humorístico, filmado originalmente em preto e branco e com pouco mais de 15 minutos de duração, tornou-se cult e virou uma tradição de fim de ano na Alemanha, embora seja quase completamente desconhecido nos países de língua inglesa.

A peça de humor pastelão foi escrita para o teatro por Lauri Wylie nos anos 1920, mas virou um fenômeno de mídia décadas depois, após o sketch ter sido filmado em 1963 pela emissora alemã Norddeutsche Rundfunk (NDR), com os atores britânicos Freddie Frinton e May Warden.

Após algumas poucas reprises, o número foi transmitido no Réveillon de 1972 para fechar um buraco na programação da NDR. A partir daí, Dinner for One passou a ser exibido todos os anos e se tornou o filme mais reprisado na história da TV alemã e uma tradição de Ano Novo, não só na Alemanha, como também em algumas nações escandinavas e em países de língua alemã, como a Suíça e a Áustria.

O sucesso fez com que a peça tenha ganhado diversas outras versões ao longo dos anos, desde uma versão colorida por computador até dublagens em diversos dialetos alemães. Em 2016, a Netflix fez uma paródia na qual os amantes de Miss Sophie são os personagens de seriados Saul Goodman (interpretado por Michael Pan em Better Call Saul), Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey em House of Cards), Pablo Escobar (o ator brasileiro Wagner Moura em Narcos) e Crazy Eyes (interpretado por Uzo Aduba em Orange Is the New Black).

#Youtube

2 notes · View notes

nicklloydnow · 1 year ago

Text

“A leaked internal strategy document from Vladimir Putin’s executive office and obtained by Yahoo News lays out a detailed plan on how Russia plans to take full control over neighboring Belarus in the next decade under the pretext of a merger between the two countries. The document outlines in granular detail a creeping annexation by political, economic and military means of an independent but illiberal European nation by Russia, which is an active state of war in its bid to conquer Ukraine through overwhelming force.

(…)

According to the document, issued in fall 2021, the end goal is the formation of a so-called Union State of Russia and Belarus by no later than 2030. Everything involved in the merger of the two countries has been considered, including the “harmonization” of Belarusian laws with those of the Russian Federation; a “coordinated foreign and defense policy” and “trade and economic cooperation … on the basis of the priority” of Russian interests; and “ensuring the predominant influence of the Russian Federation in the socio-political, trade-economic, scientific-educational and cultural-information spheres.”

(…)

To some observers, the strategy confirms what has long been obvious and, at times, openly acknowledged, by both Moscow and Minsk. Rainer Saks, the former head of Estonia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, told Yahoo News that “in the grand scheme of things, this document is no different from what you might think Russia wants from Belarus. Of course, Russia will take control of Belarus, but the question is if it does so at the cost of independence. It is surprising to me why this target — 2030 — is set so far ahead. Why should Russia wait so long?”

(…)

The strategy document, never before made public, was obtained by an international consortium of journalists from Yahoo News, Delfi Estonia, the London-based Dossier Center, the Swedish newspaper Expressen, the Kyiv Independent, Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung, and the German radio networks Westdeutscher Rundfunk and Norddeutscher Rundfunk, the Polish investigative outlet Frontstory, the Belarusian Investigative Center and Central European news site VSquare.

The authorship of the strategy document, according to one Western official with direct knowledge of its construction, belongs to the Presidential Directorate for Cross-Border Cooperation, a subdivision of Putin’s Presidential Administration, which was established five years ago. The rather innocuously named directorate’s actual task is to exert control over neighboring countries that Russia sees as in its sphere of influence: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova.

The directorate is headed by Alexey Filatov, who reports directly to Dmitri Kozak, the deputy chief of the Presidential Administration. Filatov’s team was tasked to come up with new strategies that would detail Russia’s strategic goals in all six countries, relying on the resources and input of most of the vital Russian state institutions. According to a Western intelligence officer with direct knowledge of the strategy document, Russia’s domestic, foreign and military intelligence services — the FSB, SVR, GRU, respectively — in addition to the General Staff of the Armed Forces, all actively contributed to the Union State plan. The resulting document was presented to Kozak in the fall of 2021, the same source told Yahoo News.

(…)

The concept of a Union State was first introduced in the mid-1990s, in the form of a treaty designed to politically, economically and culturally integrate Russia and Belarus. A federation modeled on the former Soviet Union was created in 1999 with its own governing institutions, including a council of ministers, parliament and high court. But the project fizzled, and full implementation wasn’t discussed in earnest again until 2018, to coincide with Putin’s aggressive geopolitical ambitions.

(…)

In November 2021, Lukashenko and Putin signed an agreement allowing for 28 integration programs, mainly focused on economic and regulatory questions. They also inked a joint military doctrine. Left out were the political aspects of fusing the two countries.

(…)

Russia has been steadily encroaching on the territory of its neighbors, with an emphasis on Russian-speaking populations. Putin invaded and illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014. That year, the Kremlin fomented, armed and financed a “separatist” movement in Donbas, in eastern Ukraine, drawing from a well-tested playbook for hybrid warfare already long in use in the breakaway territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia, and in Transnistria, Moldova, where 1,500 Russian troops are currently garrisoned. In September 2022, Russia announced it was annexing four regions in southern and eastern Ukraine last year, even as its military was being pushed back in those very areas.

(…)

The leaked document also outlines how Russia’s military presence in Belarus will expand to feature a joint command system and Russian weapons depots. Such a development would be deeply concerning to the NATO members along Belarus’s western border.

“If a strong Russian air defense force is permanently deployed in Belarus, it will also change the defense calculus for Poland, because the Russian-Belarusian force can intercept missiles from Poland from Belarusian territory,” according to András Rácz, a senior research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations. “The question from the Visegrad Group side,” Rácz said, referring to the Central European umbrella of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, “is whether combat capable troops will be permanently stationed in Belarus. They already have Russian military objects, but no Russian military bases.”

Anna Maria Dyner, an analyst at the Polish Institute of International Affairs, a Warsaw-based think tank, said Russia's strategic goal is to maintain a permanent Russian military presence in Belarus. “This basically guarantees the realization of the remaining strategic goals of taking political and economic control of the country. This situation guarantees Russia an increase in security stability, that is, first of all, some cover from NATO countries, while flanking the military operation in Ukraine,” she said.

The Belarus strategy document is divided into two parts. The first lists Russia’s goals in the short-term (2022), mid-term (2025) and long-term (2030). These are categorized into three sectors: the political, military and defense sectors; the humanitarian sector; and trade and economy. The second part of the document identifies risks associated with the goals.

For example, the document advocates the “formation of pro-Russian sentiments in political and military elites and the population” by 2022, while at the same time “limiting the influence of ‘nationalist’ and pro-Western forces in Belarus.” It also envisages the completion of the constitutional reform in Belarus that would be predicated on Russian priorities. Such reforms are in keeping with what has already taken place in Belarus in the last year.

(…)

By 2025, the strategy document states, there need to be “sustainable pro-Russian groups of influence in Belarusian politics, military and business.” It also advocates the expansion of Russian military presence in Belarus and the introduction of a simplified procedure for issuing Russian passports to Belarusian citizens.

A Western military officer who was not authorized to speak on the record told Yahoo News that “passportization” is one of the key processes Russia uses to quietly take over sovereign territory. “They used it in Abkhazia as well as in South Ossetia and Eastern Ukraine,” the officer said. “They hand out Russian passports to local people in order to extend their interests in the regions. When needed, they can use their compatriots' rights as a justification to intervene with force.”

The Kremlin has made no secret of its “compatriots policy,” which has evolved to include not just ethnic Russians but anyone who speaks the Russian language. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov wrote in an article for Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta in 2015 that offering “comprehensive support” to Russian speakers outside Russian Federation territory was “an unconditional foreign-policy priority for Russia.”

Belarus’s political establishment is to eventually fall under the dominion of “stable pro-Russian groups of influence,” the document states. But it’s not only political and military control that Russia wants to have over Belarus.

Another unmistakable aspect of Russia’s slow-motion state capture is the introduction of a single monetary currency. While the document doesn’t explicitly state that this would be the Russian ruble, the implication is obvious, given Russia’s hegemonic role in the relationship.

Indeed, the general context of the strategy doesn’t leave much room for interpretation that Moscow is seeking to gobble up Minsk’s marketplace. The majority of Belarusian exports have always gone to Russia, but with the introduction of Western sanctions on Lukashenko’s government, they became even more crucial. Russia has also propped up its economically straitened neighbor in the form of loans and budget transfers.

Energy integration is another factor for the pending Union State. The document implies that Ostrovets 1, Belarus’s lone nuclear reactor, which was financed by Russia’s state-owned atomiс energy corporation, is intended to be enlisted in a power-sharing scheme between the two countries. Belarus already imports its gas from Russia. According to Dzmitry Kruk, a senior researcher at BEROC, a leading Belarusian economic think tank, currently based in Kyiv, “Russia remains in control of the Belarusian energy sector, further deepening the country’s dependence on Russia. And Belarus will also have to pay for it.” The document also redirects the landlocked Belarus’s cargo shipping from its Baltic neighbors to Russian ports.

A significant part of Russia’s strategy for Belarus focuses on what the document calls “the humanitarian sphere,” a euphemism for Russianizing and controlling the country’s civil society. One stated long-term objective is doubling the number of Belarusian students studying in Russian universities, or “opening of new centers of science and culture” in the Belarusian cities of Mogilev, Grodno and Vitebsk. These centers would be branches of Rossotrudnichestvo, a Russian cultural outreach organization that technically operates under the auspices of Russia’s Foreign Ministry. However, Rossotrudnichestvo is a notorious clearinghouse for Russian intelligence operatives and agents of influence, making Moscow’s capacity to recruit Belarusians to its security organs that much easier.

The Union State program calls for the creation of a network of Moscow-friendly nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), with financial and legal support from Russia to keep them running. This, too, would pose new international security headaches for NATO and the EU. “The Kremlin has long used dirty money, banks, companies, NGOs and law firms to support malign and subversive activities in the West,” John Sipher, a former CIA officer focused on Russia, told Yahoo News. “They’ve had an even easier time in the Russian-speaking countries in their periphery, and what this document outlines is what they’d have liked to do in Ukraine before the war and probably still think they can do now.”

By 2030, the strategy document states, Russia must have “control of the information space” and must establish “a single cultural space” and “common approach to the interpretation of history” in Belarus. One key deliverable in this realm is the predominance of the Russian language over Belarusian — something already largely in place. Russian is enshrined in the Belarusian constitution as one of two state languages. According to a 2019 census, more than 60% of Belarusians claimed Belarusian as their native tongue, but more than 70% of the country indicated that they also speak Russian at home.

(…)

There are also signs, according to analysts and government officials, that Lukashenko does not look at the prospect of evolving from client to vassal with unmixed delight.

“Neither the politicians nor the local oligarchs have a desire to join the Union State,” the Western intelligence source said. “Despite its closeness to Russia, Lukashenko has always emphasized the independence of the country in the past. He and Putin don't like each other very much. Either is waiting for the other to die.”

(…)

Russian troops invaded northern Ukraine from Belarusian territory on Feb. 24, 2022, making a play for Kyiv. Belarusian military installations have been used ever since to fly Russian aerial sorties and launch Russian cruise missiles and drones into Ukraine. Some Western observers have gone so far as to characterize Belarus as a legal co-combatant in Russia’s war of conquest. Following Russia’s invasion, one Western diplomat to the United Nations told Yahoo News, “Putin keeps asking Lukashenko to go in, and Lukashenko keeps telling him he needs ‘three more weeks.’ Then three weeks pass and Belarus still hasn’t gone to war. And so the cycle repeats itself, comically.”

(…)

There have been a few telling episodes, too, of Belarus signaling its stated desire to remain, if not neutral, something short of an active participant in the carnage in Ukraine. In December 2022, a Ukrainian missile attempting to intercept a Russian one landed in Belarus. The incident caused no hiccups in Belarusian state propaganda, which might have otherwise easily turned this into a pretext for attack. Lukashenko has even publicly thanked Ukraine for not submitting to what he characterizes as Western pressure on Ukraine to strike back at Belarus.

He is said to be acutely aware that deploying Belarusian troops across the border would be unpopular and destabilizing to his rule. Acts of sabotage along Belarusian rail lines have been frequent since the start of the war, as have hacks waged by exiled Belarusian IT experts that have halted train cargo carrying materiel to the front. Piotr Żochowski, a senior fellow at the Department for Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova at the Center for Eastern Studies, a Warsaw-based think tank, said: "Lukashenko is trying to build his public authority by telling Belarusians that they will not fight on foreign soil. He just keeps repeating the phrase: ‘If we are attacked, we will defend ourselves.’”

(…)

The war in Ukraine has evidently slowed down the pace of implementing the Kremlin’s plans in Belarus. However, the war has by no means halted them. “The long-term goal to achieve total control over Belarus is still in force and hasn’t changed,” the Western intelligence officer told Yahoo News, adding that Russia continues to bank on its articulated strategy for the Union State and is still working to achieve its benchmarks. “Russia is aware that Belarus is trying to torpedo these processes,” the officer said. “Some of that is visible publicly, for example dragging out the political integration process. Russia continues to pressure Belarus regardless.”

Sergiy Kyslytsya, Ukraine's permanent representative to the United Nations, told Yahoo News: “Belarus is already a de facto Russian colony. And Lukashenko is in a Catch-22. The Russian invasion of Ukraine left him with no options. Putin doesn’t like him. His days are numbered. Lukashenko knows that well."”

#russia #belarus #ukraine #russia ukraine war #annexation #putin #lukashenko #russian empire #pax russica

1 note · View note