The page on Medvedev’s VKontakte account referred to former Soviet countries neighboring Russia, such as Georgia and Kazakhstan, and was deleted within 10 minutes. His assistant Oleg Osipov told the Tass news agency that the social media account had been hacked. The message was still open long enough for opposition TV personality Ksenia Sobchak to post screenshots of Medvedev’s purported post, which outlines an aggressive geopolitical vision for Russia’s future after the war in Ukraine. The post said that “after the liberation of Kiev and all territories of Little Russia from nationalist gangs … Russia will become united again.” United Russia Party chairman and deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev speaks during an interview at the Gorky residence outside Moscow on January 27, 2022. A social media post that appeared on his account described how Russia should to “restore the borders of our Motherland”. Yulia ZYRYANOVA/Getty Images He also said that before 1801, Georgia as a country did not exist and that it was part of the Russian empire and that “North and South Ossetia, Abkhazia and the rest of the territories of Georgia can only be united as part of a single state with Russia ». Medvedev, who is now the vice chairman of Russia’s security council after serving as prime minister, was president in 2008 when war broke out between Georgia, Russia and the Moscow-backed self-proclaimed territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. After the conflict, the latter two declared independence from Georgia, which was recognized by Moscow. The post shared by Sobchak also described Kazakhstan as an “artificial state” that was predominantly Slavic before the collapse of the Soviet Union. It said Kazakhstan’s government was resettling various ethnic groups within the country, which “can be described as a genocide of Russians”, in the wake of Moscow’s justification for invading Ukraine. “We have no intention of turning a blind eye. There will be no order until the Russians go there.” “No one should have any doubt that the fatal mistake made in the early 1990s will be corrected,” the post said, referring to the collapse of the USSR. “All the peoples who once lived in the great and powerful Soviet Union will live together again in friendship and mutual understanding.” “Russia will again become united, strong and invincible as it was a thousand years ago,” he added. “We will proceed to the next campaign to restore the borders of our Motherland, which, as you know, never end.” Ever since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, his ally Medvedev has turned hawkish and used his social media account to call for the dismemberment of Ukraine. This month, he said a proposal to punish Russia for war crimes in Ukraine threatened the “existence of humanity” given Moscow’s nuclear arsenal. In sharing the post, which by Tuesday had received more than half a million views, even Sobchak said it was a bit over the top from Medvedev and that his account had probably been hacked. That’s because no matter how hawkish he was, he wrote: “He certainly wouldn’t touch northern Kazakhstan, especially considering his personal meetings” with its president, Kassym-Jomart Kemeluly Tokayev. Meanwhile, Medvedev’s aide told reporters that the last post he had published was “dedicated to congratulating military sailors on Navy Day.” “Those who hacked the page, wrote and published a remote post, will be dealt with by the VK administration,” Osipov added. Newsweek has contacted VKontakte for comment.
