BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

22/04/2006

Russia's main TV channel hints at alleged Lithuanian-Georgian conspiracy against Belarus opposition

The State Security Department of Lithuania asserts that the program that was trying to impose an image of the terrorist confreres on Lithuanian diplomats, broadcasted on the main Russian television channel, was targeted against the Lithuanian state, news agency BNS reports on Friday. "The program that appeared on the ORT channel (Russia's First Channel) is one more evident fact proving what the State Security Department has repeatedly told the leadership of the country and the Lithuanian society - that systematic information actions have been taking place against Lithuania with an aim to discredit the image of the country, said the Press Secretary of the department Vytautas Makauskas. He called the program an example of propaganda campaign". Author and presenter of the analytical program Odnako of the Russia's First channel, the known pro-Kremlin proponent Mikhail Leontyev, accused the Chairman of the Parliamentary Defense and Security Committee of Georgia, Givi Targamadze, of a political conspiracy against Belarus opposition leader, Alexander Milinkevich with an assistance of Lithuanians. To support his charges, Leontyev even presented an audio material, which, as he said during his last TV appearance, had been obtained through a certain source close to Georgian special agencies. According to the recordings, Targamadze allegedly had stricken a bargain with certain Lithuanians, Albinas and Renatas that there is a need to kill Belarus opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich for his inactivity. The mobile phone numbers of the Lithuanian diplomats also were disclosed in the program; Lithuanian daily Lietuvos Rytas has cleared out that these are the phone numbers of Albinas Januska, Undersecretary of the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry, and staff member of the Foreign Ministry Analysis and Foreign Planning Desk Renatas Juska. Januska admitted that he often has phone conversations with Targamadze but told BNS that the insinuations of the Russian TV program are absurd and nothing but provocation and called the kind of phone conversations splicing by Russian special services. the broadcasted conversation is a provocation and montage. "We support Milinkevich, the leader of the Belarus opposition, but the Russians announce that we are willing to kill him. We would have never spoken about anything so absurd like necessity to kill or friend", Januska told Lietuvos Rytas. On the basis of the broadcasted sound bits from the phone conversation between Targamadze and Albinas Januska Lithuanian media outlets have made conclusion that Russian special services wiretap and record phone conversations of the Lithuanian diplomats. Lithuanian experts admit that wiretapping is rather expensive but it is evident that Russian special services do not spare money in this connection. Lithuanian Foreign Ministry has called the TV program a provocation "intended for Russia's domestic use". Nerijus Maliukevieius, Fellow of the Institute of International Relations and Political Sciences of Vilnius University comments that the alien propaganda is methodically trying to create doubts on the intentions of Lithuania towards the neighbouring Belarus, and distrust towards the officials responsible for this area of the Lithuanian foreign policy, manipulating the public opinion, BNS writes. He believes that in the war of such type not only psychological but also technological protection of information is important -- special services that have overcome this very obstacle, could obtain recordings of talks between Lithuanian and Georgian officials and its fragments used to create doubts and mutual distrust between Lithuania, Georgia and Belarus. BNS is quoting Maliukevieius saying that this new dose of provocation" makes to recall the program of the Russia's First channel daughter company First Baltic channel Secrets of the century, showed a year and a half ago and throwing doubt upon the consequences of Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, as well as the pro-Soviet version of the modern Baltic history The Baltic-style Nazidom by Russian TVC channel.

Source:

http://www.axisglobe.com/article.asp?article=807