“What is happening over there is that they really underestimated it by reading their own media,” Lukashenko said, referring to Western nations. “They got inflation yet the truth is ‘Putin is to blame’, ‘Putin is to blame for everything.’”

In his letter to the UN chief, Lukashenko, who has ruled as a de facto dictator in Belarus since 1994, continued with that theme, painting Russia as the real victim.

“The reluctance of Western countries to work to strengthen unified and indivisible security, their disrespect for legitimate interests and ignoring the concerns of other partners, primarily Russia, resulted first in trade, economic and information wars, and then provoked a heated conflict on the territory of Ukraine,” he alleged.

Lukashenko urged the West to “refrain from arms supplies, from information warfare and provocations, from inflating hate speech in the media, from promoting racism and discrimination on the ground of national, cultural, linguistic and religious affiliation, from legalizing and sending mercenaries.”