Russian Tycoon Mazepin Denies Funding Belarus Opposition
Russian fertilizer tycoon Dmitry Mazepin denied Monday that he had financed opposition social media in his native Belarus after a jailed journalist hinted at an unnamed Urals oligarch’s role in the country’s anti-government protests last summer.
“Neither I nor my companies have ever financed the [Nexta]
Telegram channel,” Mazepin said in a video interview published by the RBC news
website.
Nexta's co-founder and former editor Roman Protasevich, who
was arrested with his Russian girlfriend after their flight was forced to land
in Minsk on May 23, told state television that a company run by an unnamed
Russian businessman from the Urals had sponsored the project.
Protasevich’s allies and Western powers have denounced the
televised interview, saying it was filmed under duress.
Observers said Mazepin — the Minsk-born owner of the
Uralchem chemicals company who had called for dialogue to end the harsh
crackdown on anti-government rallies that broke out after the August 2020
Belarus presidential election — fit Protasevich’s description.
St. Petersburg media reported Friday that Mazepin had
unexpectedly withdrawn from a scheduled roundtable at Russia's flagship St.
Petersburg International Economic Forum after the Protasevich interview aired
the previous evening.
Mazepin on Monday said that Nexta, which galvanized the
Belarusian protests and had 2 million subscribers at its peak, goes against his
views and allegations of his involvement are part of widespread claims of
Russian influence in the ex-Soviet republic’s affairs.
“I understand the authors of this political melodrama well.
On the one hand, they would like to show a plan by Western special services to
capture Belarus and on the other hand to show the Russian trace,” the tycoon
said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov cast doubt upon Mazepin’s
role in financing Belarusian opposition social media, telling reporters at a
daily briefing that Protasevich may have been referring to a different Urals
businessman.
“Mazepin wasn’t accused of anything. Actually, Protasevich
never said the last name Mazepin. Perhaps he or the Belarusian side should
explain who he’s talking about, you can’t play cat-and-mouse here,” Peskov was
quoted as saying Monday.
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