Russian propaganda targets Georgia – 2024-04-04 07:49:39

Kazakhstan has only one uranium enrichment facility built by China, and the product is exported to China. France needs to make major investments. In that case, it will be possible to enrich Uzbek uranium as well. In three years, the European NPPs will need this nuclear fuel, – the opinion of Margarita Asenova, a senior researcher of the Jamestown Foundation, in the discussions held at the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies of the George Washington University in the USA, “Nezavisimaya Gazeta” conveys. The “middle corridor” is designated as the export route of nuclear fuel needed for European NPPs from Central Asia. The transit role of Georgia is highlighted here.

In the “Military secret with Igor Prokopenko” program of the Russian RenTV TV company, as reported by the pro-government media of Baku, an opinion was voiced that during the regional visit, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg pursued the goal of “turning Georgia into a springboard for strikes against Russia.” By the way, the problem is presented in such a way that NATO “bet on radical forces that are ready to sacrifice their own people, just to fulfill the order of the West”. In the fall, there are elections in Georgia, and the competition will, in fact, unfold between the “Georgian Dream” party and the former president Saakashvili.

To say from the beginning that NATO supports the “radical pro-Westerners” is to predict that the elections in Georgia will be difficult, to say the least. The current government of that country has been subjected to serious political tests especially in the last two years, but managed to avoid a confrontation with Russia and to a certain extent improve trade and economic relations. Today, it seems, the situation is changing. The European Union is investing ten billion euros to modernize the infrastructure of the “middle corridor”. And if the issue comes to the export of nuclear fuel from Central Asia, then, probably, security measures will also be required.

The Russian propaganda thesis that NATO will “target Sochi, Novorossiysk, Krasnodar from the land or water territory of Georgia” is not serious from a military-technical point of view. if desired, it is possible to target the south of Russia from Eastern Europe as well. And considering the existing geopolitical realities, however “radically pro-Western”, even Saakashvili is unlikely to repeat the mistake and give Georgia an opportunity to be attacked twice.

Apparently, the problem lies in the choice of the “instrument” of Russia’s opposition to the plan to export nuclear fuel and fertilizers from Central Asia to Europe. According to information, a pre-storage terminal for fertilizers is being built in Baku. The export of fertilizers is also of considerable importance in Russia’s foreign trade. The war in Ukraine has blocked transit routes. Not to mention that EU countries intend to stop importing nuclear fuel from Russia.

And if Russia undertakes a propaganda offensive against Georgia as well, it can be assumed that Moscow has a serious problem with the Georgian part of the “middle corridor”. Recently, information appeared in the press that the “Georgian horizontal” can also serve the Russia-Turkey-Europe trade. But is the European Union ready for this? It is difficult to say. In any case, the vision voiced by RenTV that “it will take only thirty minutes for the Russian Space Forces to destroy the NATO bridgehead” on the territory of Georgia sounds very strict. Who will give such an occasion or who will create a casus belli?