DISINFO: Events in Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan are communicating vessels
SUMMARY
The Belarusian, Ukrainian and Kazakh cases are communicating vessels. [Developments in these countries] overlap with relations between the West and Russia. The alleged people’s revolt in Kazakhstan (which turned into riots), the concentration of the Ukrainian and Russian troops on the border, a dispute on the Polish-Belarusian border – these developments include things behind-the-scenes, which we have no idea about. Russia presented its expectations during the talks with the US in Geneva and now the West is trying to take the ball.
RESPONSE
This claim advances an emerging pro-Kremlin narrative alleging that the January 2022 anti-government protests in Kazakhstan are part of a US policy of staging “colour revolutions” worldwide with the aim of destabilising Russia.
The pro-Kremlin media frequently falsely portray popular protests around the world as instigated from abroad, often by the US and the West. This disinformation narrative has been applied, among others, to reports about protests in Ukraine and Belarus with the aim of discrediting these movements as aggressive actors supported by foreign powers.
Regarding the Belarus / Polish border: the casue of the dispute is the Lukashenko regimes cynical use of irregular migrants, primarily from the wider MENA-region to manufacture a crisis for the EU. By luring people with false promises of easy entry into the EU, Lukashenko, backed by Russian and pro-Kremlin media outlets, drove migrants towards EU borders. This campaign failed in January 2022, but the disinformantion suggesting no role of Belarus lingers on. The trigger and immediate cause of the protests in Kazakhstan was the government’s lifting of price controls on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) that took place in early January in the Western region of Manghystau and unrest soon spread to the capital.
As the Guardian reports, the official story from the Kremlin began with explanations that the protests were a military coup organised by foreign terrorists. Later the notion of a “colour revolution” is added. However, the narrative is not based on facts and contains many gaps and inconsistencies.
See also the statement by the EU High Representative here.
Read also related examples of disinformation claims: US-sponsored Kazakhstan protests aimed to undermine CIS stability, Protests in Kazakhstan are a new Western attempt to organise a colour revolution or EU and the US aim to generate a new wave of anti-government protests in Belarus.