One effect of the series of hostage videos, choreographed confessions, and staged public appearances featuring the kidnapped dissident journalist Raman Pratasevich is to illustrate how Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s Belarus is quickly turning into the “North Korea of Europe.” But another is that they are exposing a potential rift between Lukashenka and his patrons in the Kremlin.
In his June 3 “interview” with the ONT Belarusian state television station, Pratasevich, who was arrested on May 23 after the Vilnius-bound Ryanair flight he was aboard was effectively hijacked and forced to land in Minsk, claimed that the opposition NEXTA Telegram channel he ran was financed by a Russian oligarch from the Urals region.
This was an apparent reference to the Belarusian-born Russian tycoon Dmitry Mazepin, owner of the Russian chemical producer Uralkhem and deputy chairman of the board at Russian potash giant Uralkali.
Mazepin promptly denied the allegation in a video interview with Russia’s RBC news agency. One day after Pratasevich’s interview, the tycoon unexpectedly pulled out of a scheduled appearance at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum.