On the 26th, Belarusian President Lukashenko held talks with visiting Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov in the capital Minsk. Lavrov expressed Russia’s support for Lukashenko and criticized the US and European countries for grossly interfering in the internal affairs of sovereign countries.
On the same day, Lavrov and Belarusian Foreign Minister Marki co-chaired the “Joint Meeting of the Russian and Belarusian Foreign Ministries” in Minsk. Lavrov said at the meeting that Belarus is Russia’s ally and strategic partner, and Russia hopes that the situation in Belarus will be stable.
Accompanied by Makkyi, Lavrov also held talks with Lukashenko. During the meeting, Lavrov conveyed Russian President Putin’s greetings to Lukashenko and criticized “the United States and some European countries for gross interference in the internal affairs of sovereign countries.”
Lavrov said that the U.S. and European countries “continue to use the dirty tactics of the so-called’color revolution’, including manipulating public opinion, establishing and publicly supporting anti-government forces and radicalizing them.” These tactics have also been used in Belarus. .
Lavrov pointed out that Western countries headed by the United States continue to narrowly and selfishly promote their own interests in an effort to maintain their hegemony on the world stage.
Lukashenko said that the world today faces many challenges, but Belarus has always insisted on going its own way, and hopes to further strengthen relations with Russia and cope with these challenges together, including coping with the new crown pneumonia epidemic and opposing the unilateralism of the United States.
The Russian woman Maria Butina, who was previously convicted as a “foreign agent” by the United States, held a press conference in Moscow and launched her new book “Prison Diary.” Butina said that this book records her experience in prison in the United States after being convicted. She said that during this period, she suffered all kinds of inhuman “torture” and “humiliation.”
Butina said that the entire incident originated from the “anti-Russian” trend in American society. Under the exaggeration of the American media, she became a victim of this movement.
She also accused the U.S. judiciary of ignoring human rights, saying that “from the first day of imprisonment,” she was subjected to various inhuman “tortures” and “humiliation.”
Butina said that she received the same treatment as serial killers and terrorists in American prisons. Not only was she held in solitary confinement, the prison also did not allow her to communicate with her family.
Butina said that the content of her new book comes from the diary she wrote in prison. At that time, she wrote her diary on all the pieces of paper she could find, even toilet paper.
Butina, a Russian citizen convicted by the United States as a “foreign agent”: During my sentence, I tried every means to keep a diary, sometimes using toilet paper, sometimes on the back of court documents.
I used ink to write things, because as a “feel criminal”, they couldn’t give me a ballpoint pen. In the end, these records had more than 1,200 pages. It was these records that made this book.
Butina was arrested in the U.S. in July 2018. She was accused of establishing relations with U.S. personalities during her stay in the U.S. from 2015 to 2017, “in accordance with the instructions of senior figures in the Russian government”.
The influential organization, the “National Rifle Association of the United States”, aims to enter the core circle of American conservatives and the Republican Party, and then influence the US policy towards Russia and serve Russia’s national interests.
In December 2018, Butina reached a guilty plea agreement with the United States, admitting to conspiring with others to act as a “foreign government agent” and did not register in the United States.
The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs explained at the time that Butina pleaded guilty to fight for her release and return home as soon as possible.
In April 2019, Butina was sentenced to 18 months in prison by the US Federal Court. Six months later, she was released early and returned to Russia.
