On Friday Belarusian state broadcaster BTRC confirmed that its Eurovision 2020 act VAL will not be invited back for Eurovision 2021. In a carefully worded statement, they said the duo had “no conscience”, and were essentially ungrateful for the opportunities and effort it had put behind them. The broadcaster’s response, which the majority of fans have taken as extremely harsh, was itself a response to an interview VAL had given the day before, in which they accused the broadcaster of being distant and treating them differently as “non-conforming” artists.
Well on Saturday night the duo consisting of Vladislav Freimann and Valeria Gribusova hit back on Instagram. We’re spelling out the translation below. They essentially say that they knew their support of pro-democracy protestors would incur the wrath of the broadcaster.
VAL responds to BTRC’s Eurovision 2021 statement
Six months later, we finally heard a response from BTRC regarding our possible participation in Eurovision 2021.
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The official release says that we will not represent Belarus at the competition in May, because we “have no conscience”.
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The trigger, as we understand it, was our active citizenship — a frank interview for the @ilinterviews project and a weekly video message for our listeners.
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To say that we are very upset would be to deceive ourselves. When we took certain steps, we understood the possible consequences.
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For us, such concepts as honor, decency, freedom, respect, love and, most importantly, people’s lives are much more important than personal preferences from any current state organization.
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The preparation for Eurovision was a joint work of our creative team and BTRC. We made every effort to adequately represent Belarus at the international level. VAL put their whole soul into this work. Precisely because artists have a soul, we could not ignore the violence and injustice that swept Belarus. We made our choice. And BTRC made theirs.
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We will always be together with our listeners!
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Thank you for such warm support !!!
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Together, until the end, forever!
Davidna 🙁
will be following their musical career from now on. go VAL!
More power to them and wishing VAL all the best and love they deserve, they did the right thing by standing with people rather than continuing with ESC known the severity of the situation.
Stay strong Belarus, Stay strong VAL!
I feel sorry for them but at the same time I am glad they did the right thing to stand up for what it is right. Kudos to them, i like them even more!
There’s no question that Belarus will be booed in next year’s show, unless there is a change in the current political climate. We all know what happened with Russia in 2014 and 2015.
If Belarus participates in 2021 and the show goes on in Rotterdam with audience, they will not receive a warm reception.
Val is the National Icon of the new Belarus
I don’t know if its possible (regarding the rules) but I think it would be fantastic if the Netherlands invited VAL to perform as an interval act next year. I really think we should stand in solidarity with the people of Belarus
Wouldn’t be a good idea, the arguement is an internal issue. It would be a political provocation which can have far-stretching consequences. Don’t forget that the contest is supposed to be apolitical.
You’re not wrong. At least a video showing all contestants that were supposed to make it in 2020 but didn’t would be much wiser, maybe.
an interval act with the rejected 2020 contestants
As much as I know your heart is in the right place, I dont think that would be fair on the act that does eventually represent Belarus. It wont be that artist’s fault that this fiasco between VAL and the broadcaster has happened.
“1944” belongs to a category of songs that are more in the grey. Jamala wrote it as a reaction to Russia’s annexation of Crimea but the song itself references the experience of her grandparents in the year the song was named after so it’s small hole in what can qualify as an entry in ESC. Notable examples of songs utilizing historical events are “Waterloo” by ABBA, and most recently “Face the Shadow” by Geneology. And of course, there’s “Don’t Ever Cry” and “Sva bol svijeta” from 1993 whose respective writers drew their inspiration from then-recent but life-altering changes to their… Read more »
More power to them. They represent the real Belarus. As long as BTRC is responsible for their Eurovision participation, they’ll never send a real representative of Belarus.
Let’s not sound defeat just yet for BRTC. Times change, and nothing stays the same forever. The broadcaster could yet get it right one day if either the wider situation allows for it, or if the people at the broadcaster are changed or transformed. So, let’s try not to doom the future before it happens. I wish VAL all the best, and perhaps they can even return to the ESC one day.
Hear, hear!
This is true. Look at Portugal in the ’70s.