4:16 pm, October 6, 2022, modified at 4:19 pm, October 6, 2022
It all begins with the tweet of a Pole in late September who has the idea of connecting the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad to the Czech Republic: “Time to divide Kaliningrad so that our Czech brothers finally have access to the sea”, he wrote. Welcomed for the first time by Czech MEPs and Christian Democrats Tomáš Zdechovský (KDU-ČSL), Tuesday led to the creation of a dedicated Twitter account, which announced: “After a successful referendum, 97.9% of Kaliningrad’s population decided to merge with the Czech Republic and rename Kaliningrad to Královec. ” The account had 68,000 subscribers on Thursday.
The jokes from Twitter users then abounded and Czech institutions had a field day. The Czech-language Kaliningrad Wikipedia page has been updated, while a weather report from a Czech TV channel presented the weather in “King”. Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský himself tweeted soberly but quite clearly: “The partnership with our Baltic neighbors has never been stronger. “
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A foundation partly due to the King of Bohemia
Why the Kaliningrad enclave? Because the city of Kant, also called Königsberg, owes its foundation in part to the Czech king Přemysl Otakar II. Internet users thus imagined the return of Kaliningrad to the Czech Republic. The joke about Kaliningrad was also noticed by the Russian media, some of which, taking the joke in the first instance, evoked the spirit “vindictive” of the Czechs.
However, an appointment was made outside the Russian embassy in the Czech Republic on 10 October at 4:00 pm to assert the Czech territorial claims. Always in the name of humor.
