By Bond Robertson 
Earlier this week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reportedly met with a number of journalists from various African countries.
Videos were shared on X/Twitter, purporting to be from press conferences, in which Zelensky warns the world of Putin’s next move and disinformation maneuver.
The president claims that Russia has close ties to what is happening now in the Middle East, and that this aims to distract the world’s attention from what is happening in Ukraine.
The Tankismaya Institute for the Study of War (ISW) claimed earlier this fall that Russia is using the conflict in Israel to its advantage.
Moreover, the Ukrainian president claims that they now have evidence that Putin is planning to create a new “crisis” in the Balkans, also as a diversionary maneuver. The president did not present the alleged evidence during the press conference.
He writes, among other things Newsweek.
Zelensky was perhaps clear in his speech during the press conference. He firmly believes that Russia has a long-term plan, where the first part will be unrest in the Middle East, and the second will be unrest in the Balkans.
He believes that Putin wants to force the outside world to distribute international economic and military aid to many countries, thus creating division.
– If the countries of the world do not act now, there will be another “explosion.” Zelensky says that Russia will ensure that one country in the Balkans enters into conflict with another country.
Wagner in Putin’s “Private Army”
According to Swedish Aftonbladet Experts are said to have previously expressed concern that the Kremlin may try to further destabilize the Balkans to divert attention from the war in Ukraine.
There has been tension between the Balkan states of Serbia and Kosovo since the end of the war in 1999. In 2008, Kosovo declared its independence, which Serbia has not recognized to this day.
Recently, tensions between the two countries have become increasingly tense, and many believe that the situation is now at its worst since the end of the war.