How did the new year 2023—the year of peace and creation—begin? At the Vitebsk division of the railway, a reward is being offered for identifying unauthorized persons on the tracks and reporting them to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the operations staff of the railway division. This appeal to railway workers and simply to “concerned vigilant” citizens appeared on the division's information resources after the New Year holidays. It is fortunate that they at least did not propose capturing people personally or presenting “the sheriff with a scalp”!
In this manner, the Vitebsk division is attempting to combat potential “saboteurs” and “provocateurs” approaching the railway tracks.
The anxiety of Vitebsk railway management is primarily motivated by the desire to conceal the movements of troop trains and special service trains transporting Russian military equipment and military personnel into Belarus, the majority of whom are currently stationed precisely in the Vitebsk area and at the Losvido training ground. And, of course, the entirely justified fear for their own “positions” and “hides” compels them to demonstrate activity and a commitment to ensuring the uninterrupted operation and security of Russian military transport. Here there is real danger for the managers personally, and therefore a much higher priority area of activity for the Belarusian Railway division than ensuring stable and accident-free operations for the benefit of the Belarusian people.
If previously in the imagination of railway functionaries, the image of a spy threatening railway security was associated exclusively with a person of athletic build, covered in tattoos, dressed in camouflage, with an automatic weapon in hand and a parachute dragging behind, now potential reward recipients are advised not even to pay attention to whether the person may be dressed in railway uniform or work clothing. To put it simply: if you walk near the tracks, you will be detained and held accountable. And the fact that you were performing your official duties during working hours does not concern anyone! You should not be walking around and seeing what you were not permitted to see!
The message set forth in this “wanted poster” concludes with the phrase: “It is time to teach everyone—the railway is no place for outsiders!” But it appears that ordinary railway workers are becoming the outsiders…
In fact, since 2020, when officially it became “no time for laws,” the actual outsiders at Belarusian Railway are precisely such managers, various ideologists, security enforcers and their accomplices—informants—as well as illegal armed formations of occupiers in the form of Russian military personnel.
