Belarus Teddy Bear Prank rumles on

Regular readers will realise that I do not hold Belarusian leader Alexander Lubyankashenko in a high regard.

Unsurprisingly he was less than amused by a recent stunt by a Swedish advertising agency (on behalf of a human rights organisation) which flew a light aircraft to Belarus where it dropped teddy bears with a human rights message attached to them over the town of Ivanyets.

Two Belarusian men, Anton Suryapin and Sergei Basharimov, had already bee detained on suspicion of complicity in "illegal intrusion". Suryapin , who runs the Belarusian News Photos website, appears to have been arrested simply for uploading  photos of the teddy bears on to the site.

Last week  the Chairman of the State Border Committee, Maj Gen Igor Rachkovsky, and Air Defence Commander Maj Gen Dmitry Pakhmelkin had been dismissed for failing in their duties.

Yesterday the BBC reported that Belarus expelled Sweden's ambassador on 3 August, and withdrew its own envoy to Stockholm. Sweden's ambassador had apparently angered Minsk by holding meetings with the Belarusian opposition.

Sweden then said it would not allow a new Belarusian ambassador to take up his post, and asked a further two Belarusian diplomats to leave.

After Belarus announced further action on Wednesday, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said in a Twitter comment that Mr Lukashenko's "fear of human rights [is] reaching new heights".

What to say? Whether or not you consider the stunt silly the Belarusian response has been ridiculous

Sweden bombs Belarus....

Well it looks lie war between Sweden and Belarus... Well maybe not but the the latter has confirmed that an airplane "invaded" its territory earlier this month to drop a payload of..... teddy bears holding signs promoting free speech. According to  Aljazeera  confirmation came on Thursday from Belarusian Dictator Lubyankashenko at a meeting on the modernisation of the country's armed forces, 


Chartered by Studio Total, which bills itself as "northern Scandinavia's most notorious ad agency", the single-engine aircraft  crossed over the Lithuanian border on July 4, dropping 876 teddy bears on the capital Minsk and the small town of Ivyanets.  




For weeks, Belarus' government denied any plane illegally entered the country's airspace that morning, claiming that videos of the airdrop released by Studio Total were faked. 


On a darker note KGB (why change names after the USSR broke up) detained Anton Suryapin, a 20-year-old journalism student, after he posted a picture of one of the teddy bears to a website he runs called Belarusian News Photos. Suryapin is being held by the KGB under Article 371, Part 3 of Belarus' Criminal Code, which concerns "organising illegal migration". Syarhei Basharimau, a real estate agent who rented apartments in Minsk to the plane's two pilots, has been charged under the same article.

Andrei Savinykh, the spokesperson for Belarus' Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said police. believe that the flight couldn't have taken place "without some previous preparation", and that they believe Studio Total "might have accomplices" who  helped plan the mission. Savinykh told Al Jazeera that the aircraft was detected, "but the air defence did nothing. They didn’t consider the aircraft as a military threat because it was a small aircraft and usually the air defence system is focusing on high-speed heavy crafts." However, Savinykh said their failure to act was a "violation of instructions" and that the responsible personnel will be punished. Savinykh also described the penetration of Belarusian airspace as a "crime". "The citizens of the Western countries, they are simply committing crimes out of their countries in, as they say, [a] fight for freedom. It looks like a Western fundamentalism".

One one level it was an amusing stunt but not for those who have ended up in the hands of the KGB and probably will end up in jail.Then agai Belarus is the last bastion of the old Soviet Union and acts accordingly. There's little chance we will see the back of Lukashenko any time soon sadly

Calligushenko bans applause in Belarus

Belarus is the last Stalinist state in Europe. While it may have elections to actually have the temerity to stand against Alexander Lukashenko and his minions is not recommended, not unless you want harassment, arrest and torture.

Lukashenko is a brutal, paranoid piece of shit whole rules the state of Belarus as if Stalin was alive and kicking but even Stalin never abolished applause!

Actually there is a reason behind his decision and it stinks

The story was picked up by the Economist:

"Every Wednesday a few hundred people come out on the streets of Belarusian cities and wordlessly clap their hands. They may not shout slogans, but everybody knows what it is they are silent about.


Unlike the thousands-strong protest last December brutally put down by Mr Lukashenka, the clapping protests are modest in scale. And though their organisers talk of “a revolution through social networks” their real point is to demonstrate the protesters’ courage and Mr Lukashenka’s paranoia. Each Wednesday plain-clothed thugs with earpieces swarm the streets of Minsk dragging people out of crowds and pushing them into security vans parked in side streets with their licence plates covered.


During celebrations of Belarus’s independence day on July 3rd, the police said that any applause other than to war veterans would be considered an offence. So nobody applauded Mr Lukashenka’s combative speech. But even those, including journalists, who just gathered at one of the city’s squares were arrested"

Hopefully Lukashenko will meet his demise soon. Belarus will be better of for his parting.

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Alexander Lukashenko is a proud recipient of the Hugo Chavez "Dictator of Distinction" award

Chavez fetes Lukashenko win

Lukashenko to be the Lucky Pierre in this threesome?

Following his unsurprising landslide victory in last week’s elections in Belarus (the only strange thing being that he did not claim that 2,377.48% of the electorate had cast votes in his favour) , it did not take long for one of the truest friends of freedom (ha!) to send his heartiest and most hyperbole-filed congratulations

Hugo Chavez, made this statement in the wake of Stalin’s, sorry Lukashenko’s victory: “It was an extraordinary day for democracy, which resulted in the re-election of the great European leader. Lukashenko knows how to lead the glorious motherland to independence, putting the sacred interests of his people ahead of the narrow- minded intentions of the world powers.”


By contrast Ahmadinejad was rather muted saying, if Press TV is to be believed (a big if) that the recent presidential election in Belarus was another "golden page in the honorable history" of the Belarusian people.

What can I say but repeat my assertion that Chavez is an utter wanker. I suppose I could rant on about the man but I just cant be bothered…

Alexander Lukashenko, President of Belarus and unreconstructed communist dictator has joined the likes of Margaret Thatcher and McLaren Mercedes by becoming a client Tory peer and PR guru Tim Bell.

Lord Bell, who came to fame as the man who burnished Margaret Thatcher's image in the early days when she was leader of the opposition, has now been hired to help soften the grim image that Belarus presents to the outside world as it clings to the Soviet way of life. Belarus badly needs foreign investment, which it is unlikely to get from the US, where Congress has condemned the country's civil rights record. Mr Lukashenko wants the UK to step in and become his country's biggest foreign investor. Just over a week ago, he played host to a delegation of peers headed by Cecil Parkinson, who chaired the Tory party during the 1983 election. Lord Parkinson obligingly declared that he thought foreign investors could feel "secure and confident" in Belarus. At the same time, Lord Bell was in Minsk to sign a tricky but no doubt very lucrative contract. "Lukashenko would like his country to be better understood, and his successes to be better grasped," Lord Bell told The Moscow Times. "Lukashenko doesn't see why Belarus can't be a friend to the West and a friend to Russia at the same time."

Hmm even if Bell is a PR magician, why do the words polish and turd spring to mind?