Dozens of reports and talk shows are shown on state television, and prosecutors meet with schoolchildren and university students to give lectures on the genocide.

What is behind these actions?

Or do the authorities only need it for their daily political needs?

Freedom tried to answer these questions.

Makei's office was the first to talk about the genocide

For the first time, the topic of genocide of Belarusians began to emerge in the Belarusian state media in connection with the situation in Brest, when Polish language courses marked the Day of Cursed Soldiers in honor of the Krajina Army fighters who fought against the Nazis and the Soviets.

"Absolutely unacceptable for us heroization of war criminals, cynical justification of the genocide of the Belarusian people, gross violations of the Polish side's obligations to prevent the glorification of Nazism," - said in the official position of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

It was Uladzimir Makei

's office that was the first to bring the term

"genocide of the Belarusian people"

into public discussion

.

It happened on March 9, 2021.

This topic was quickly picked up at the state level.

On the same day, the rector of the Academy of Management, former head of the Institute of History of the National Academy of Sciences

Vyacheslav Danilovich

began to speak about the "genocide of the Belarusian people . "

The deputy of the House of Representatives and pro-government historian

Ihar Marzalyuk

also spoke about "acts of genocide" by Poles against the Belarusian population in the interwar period.

The detention of activists of the unrecognized Union of Poles

Andzelika Borys

and

Andrei Poczobut was explained by the "justification of the genocide of the Belarusian people".

The goal is to "show those who teach democracy"

As for the genocide of Belarusians during the Second World War, this topic emerged during a meeting with Alexander Lukashenko on national security and public order on March 18, 2021.

“We began to see in the media, on the Internet, manifestations aimed at whitewashing Nazi criminals who committed crimes against the Belarusian people during the Great Patriotic War, committed genocide here.

In addition, the Prosecutor General's Office began work a few months ago to resolve the issue of instituting a criminal case on the genocide of the Belarusian people during the Great Patriotic War, "said Prosecutor General Andrei Shved.

Literally the next day, the state media began to publish such articles:

"Azarychi… Khatyn… Hundreds… Thousands of destroyed villages… Every third Belarusian died during the war.

Isn't this genocide? ”

This came months after the presidential election, which ended in thousands of protests and violent dispersal.

EU countries have imposed sanctions against the regime.

During his visit to the Milk World enterprise in Hrodna,

Alexander Lukashenko formulated the goals of this investigation.

“It was a real horrific genocide.

And Belarusians, and Russians, and Jews, and Ukrainians - all who lived here.

Here we are collecting materials and we will show them to the whole world.

And to those who teach us democracy today, we will show where the genocide was and what is the genocide of the Belarusian people, "- so for the first time the topic of genocide sounded from the lips of Lukashenko.

Two days later, on March 21, during a visit to Khatyn, Lukashenko spoke about the

"genocide of the Belarusian people, which was carried out under the flags of the BBC

. "

Many saw this as a signal that the symbol would be banned at the state level, but this has not yet happened.

Chronicle of a criminal case

  • On April 9, 2021, the Prosecutor General opened a criminal case "on the fact of genocide of the population of Belarus" during the war;

  • May 16, 2021 Andrei Shved says that the prosecutor's office found information about living Nazi criminals who took part in the Lithuanian battalions of the SS and the Krajina Army;

  • On June 2, 2021, the Prosecutor General's Office requests the interrogation of former Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus as part of a criminal case;

  • On June 19, 2021, a member of the Council of the Republic Viktor Ananich puts the figure at 2,230,000 people who fell victim to genocide during World War II in Belarus;

  • On August 17, 2021, the Prosecutor General's Office initiated the establishment of a commission to assess the property damage inflicted on Belarus during World War II;

  • On December 14, 2021, deputies of the House of Representatives in two readings adopt a bill on the genocide of the Belarusian people.

    The bill was introduced by MP Lilia Ananich;

  • On January 5, 2022, Lukashenko signed a law on the genocide of the Belarusian people.

    By the Belarusian people we mean all Soviet citizens who lived in the BSSR;

  • On March 16, 2022, the Prosecutor General's Office announced that it had interrogated more than 13.5 thousand witnesses in the genocide case.

    An exposition dedicated to the genocide of the Belarusian people is promised to be opened in each district.

  • On March 16, Andrei Shved named the number of victims of genocide during World War II as 3 million;

  • On April 8, 2022, the book "Genocide of the Belarusian People" was published under the editorship of Prosecutor General Andrei Shved.

What else was called genocide?

After the story of the genocide became widely known in the state media, the word began to be used for many reasons.

Thus, on March 11, the House of Representatives sent materials to European structures about the "genocide of refugees on the Belarusian-Polish border."

Speaker of the House of Representatives

Uladzimir Andreichanka

called it “genocide” .

The Minister of Economy

Alexander Chervyakov

believes that Western sanctions against Belarus are an "economic genocide."

Pro-state expert

Nikolai

Shchokin , who calls himself a political scientist, went even further.

He said that "the union state of Belarus and Russia has been declared a sanctioned war in the format of ethnic genocide."

Oleg Gaidukevich

, a member of the House of Representatives and leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Belarus

, said after the start of the war in Ukraine that genocide of the "Russian-speaking population" was taking place in Europe.

The first deputy chairman of the Investigative Committee

Aleh Shandarovich

spoke about the genocide in the context of the fight against drugs.

"It simply came to our notice then.

Those who use it, and those whom we then prosecute. "

Pashkevich: "It's a desire to tighten the nuts"

Historian

Alyaksandr Pashkevich

pondered for Svaboda what is more important in the issue of genocide of the Belarusian people - the desire to answer historical questions or the political situation.

- Does the term "genocide of the Belarusian people" have historical grounds, or is it still a myth?

- In itself, the word "genocide", unfortunately, is very greasy from frequent use to the place and out of place.

It is often used to describe almost any sad phenomenon associated with the death of people, or even if people just live badly due to external factors.

Meanwhile, this term has a fairly clear, internationally recognized definition.

And if it is used without any reservations, then the factor that organizes the genocide against a particular group, there must be an intention to physically remove this group from the world in one way or another.

If we talk about the Second World War, then during it there were only two peoples who deliberately and ruthlessly physically destroyed for belonging to them alone: ​​Jews and Gypsies.

As for the Belarusians, the Germans did not have such precise attitudes, at least during the war itself.

Of course, we can mention the infamous Ost plan, but it was developed by the Nazis for post-war settlement, and since the desired post-war reality for them did not come, then, accordingly, it was not implemented.

And in the form of the approved plan of this document is not revealed, it was rather such a previous project.

Which, of course, does not negate the fact that the German Nazis pursued a very harsh, ruthless policy towards the local people.

In the eyes of the Germans, the natives had no rights, they could do literally anything with them.

And they were especially cruel when faced with resistance.

At that time, the principle of "collective responsibility" was widely used as revenge.

Most of the dead civilians in Belarus are not Jews and gypsies (they have a special situation) lost their lives during the Germans and their aides actions of intimidation, revenge for the actions of guerrillas and underground fighters.

- In your opinion, was there a request from the public for a broad discussion of the "genocide of the Belarusian people" (perhaps there are some unspoken moments from the Second World War), or is it more a political need for the current government?

- Obviously, this is a purely political need of the moment, and nothing more.

And it is not related to the desire of the Belarusian regime to better understand the past, but with his desire to tighten the screws even harder in the present.

All this itching with the study of "genocide" and the intensification of repressive legislation in this regard - pure political conjuncture, the desire through shameless manipulation and pulling, as he said, owls on the globe, to put a stain on their countries and ideological ideas. outside it.

Which, in fact, they are trying to do.

There is, of course, a public demand for a more thorough study of various aspects of that war.

But exactly this aspect of this request, perhaps, concerns at least.

After all, is the fact that the Nazis during the occupation of our - and not only our - lands during World War II committed horrific crimes against humanity, is a debatable issue?

Is there no consensus in society about this, does anyone object to this or deny it at all?

Therefore, from the point of view of revealing the historical truth, this whole campaign is meaningless.

Its task is quite different - attempts to denigrate and stun by manipulating the past of modern opponents of the regime, both internal and external.

- As a historian, have you seen many significant scientific discoveries during the investigation of the genocide?

Can we say that some previously unknown pages of history have been opened, something that was missed both in the USSR and in the years of independence?

- There are no scientific discoveries during this campaign, and it is unlikely they can be, given who is conducting it and for what purposes.

Usually we are told that the prosecutor's office or someone else interviewed witnesses, studied documents, conducted excavations of mass graves and exhumations.

But anyone who has at least some idea of ​​how such research should actually be conducted, well understands that this is how, from the circles and on the march, it is impossible to draw adequate conclusions, even if you carry out all these investigative actions in reality, and not for show.

After all, you need to consider everything in the complex, conduct numerous examinations, correlate with the results of previous studies, conduct a critical evaluation of the results.

All this requires considerable time and high skills.

In our case, there is neither.

And the performers were clearly set a simple task from the beginning: to come to a predetermined time to predetermined conclusions.

At the same time, our prosecutors and other comrades can afford not to think about how credible and convincing the results of their work look.

We are constantly "bombarded" with numbers: so many witnesses were interrogated, so many war criminals were found, so many excavations were conducted, so many documents were studied, etc. Meanwhile, almost 80 years have passed since the end of the occupation of Belarus. the beginning of the year was called the number of 12.5 thousand people), how many even purely by the laws of nature can still be living criminals (and they say that they still live in two dozen countries)?

In general, the question inevitably arises - if you are such fighters for the historical truth about the war, then that you are the previous almost three decades in power, did, why only now rose?

20 years ago, there were many more witnesses and more criminals alive, and access to documents has always been unlimited for the authorities from any archives.

The places of mass burials, which are now being excavated, also did not appear today.

But before that, for some reason, no one was interested, and only in 2021 the impetus suddenly awoke.

Which strangely coincided with the public awakening in Belarus and the loss of legitimacy of power both inside the country and abroad.