Updated 00.54 | Published 00.46
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The Russian leader Dmitry Medvedev goes on a furious attack against Poland.
In a long article, he calls the country the “hyena of Europe” and warns of a third world war.
Poland’s government dismisses the accusations as propaganda.
Dmitry Medvedev, 58, has been both president and prime minister. Now he is the deputy chairman of Russia’s National Security Council.
Since the war broke out in Ukraine, he has regularly made threatening statements against the West and become mentioned in international media as “Putin’s attack dog”.
He has repeatedly warned of nuclear war and earlier this autumn he singled out Great Britain and Germany as “legitimate targets”.
Calling Poland “dangerous enemy”
Now Dmitry Medvedev is on the move again. In a more than 60,000 characters long debate article in the state-controlled newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta, he lashed out at Poland.
He calls the NATO country a “dangerous enemy” with “evil intentions” and claims that Poland has a long-term ambition to take over territory from Ukraine.
“By supporting Ukraine in the conflict with Russia, Poland, with the help of NATO and the EU, strives for only one thing – to ensure its total dominance in the region by taking control of the states between Warsaw and Moscow”.
The charge: “Europe’s hyena”
In typical fashion, Medvedev then warns of a doomsday scenario and claims, without evidence, that Poland has troops in Ukraine.
“Poland’s own military rearmament and the Polish military presence in Ukraine could trigger a direct confrontation between Warsaw and Belarus and Russia,” he writes and continues:
“Poland’s reckless actions, with hasty support from NATO allies, could have far-reaching and dangerous consequences for the entire world. And then Poland will fulfill the role of the ‘hyena of Europe’ that started World War III”.
The Polish answer: “Propaganda”
Stanislav Zaryn, deputy minister at the ministry responsible for Poland’s security service, dismisses Medvedev’s accusations as “typical Kremlin propaganda.”
– The article is full of hatred and threats against Poland and NATO. Moscow wants to pressure Europe to resume political and economic cooperation with Russia, he says according to Polskie Radio.
The view that Medvedev’s repeated threatening rhetoric should be seen as Russian propaganda is shared by Tymofiy Mylovanov, head of the Kyiv school of economics and former Ukrainian trade minister.
– Medvedev has a weight as a former president and prime minister. That’s why people listen to him and the West must listen because he ticks all the boxes. But apart from being Putin’s communications attack dog, he has no diplomatic weight, he said earlier this year to the British The Independent.
Expert: “Need meat bones”
The American professor and Russia expert Joshua Tucker at the University of New York assesses that Medvedev’s verbal attacks take place with Putin’s good memory.
– At this point, I think most people outside of Russia simply ignore Medvedev’s comments. At best, his bizarre behavior can be seen as a sign that the Kremlin thinks there is a pro-war domestic audience that needs a bone of meat thrown to them every now and then.