"They restored public order without giving in to demands for new elections." What Grokipedia writes about the protests, Lukashenko, language, and how the Grand Duchy of Lithuania divides its legacy

We analyzed a number of articles about Belarus—from political to cultural and historical—and compared them with the corresponding materials in Wikipedia. We were especially interested in the descriptions of the political crisis of the 2020s, key events and personalities, as well as how accurately and from what sources Grokpedia obtains information.

The current version of the project (v0.1) exists only in English and is still significantly inferior to Wikipedia in scale: about 885 thousand articles versus more than seven million in the English-language Wikipedia. The number will probably grow, but for now only basic topics are represented in Grokpedia—there are no articles on less important topics, such as Belarusian regional centers, small rivers, and local monuments.

Visually, the site looks very austere. The articles have a minimalist design without illustrations, templates, and internal hyperlinks, so there is no familiar encyclopedic navigation. Notes open immediately when clicked, but they are poorly linked to the list of sources at the end of the article and look like unformatted links.

Павялічыць

The fundamental difference is that Grokpedia uses only open online sources, while Wikipedia widely uses books and printed scientific publications, which may not be freely available.

Following the English-language Wikipedia, Belarusian toponyms in Grokpedia are presented in transliteration from the Russian versions of the names—Grodno, Novogrudok, Mogilev, Polotsk. This is not the only similarity: many articles are actually copied from Wikipedia.

As with the Russian Ruwiki, Musk's new project uses Wikipedia texts as the basis of its database. Such articles are marked as "adapted from Wikipedia," although in most cases they completely duplicate the content of the original. This is especially noticeable in non-political topics—for example, in materials about Mir and Nesvizh castles or the Dinamo stadium. Sometimes, uncleared remnants of wiki-markup and fragments of links to illustrations remain in the text.

A completely different approach is visible in articles on "political" topics. There are significantly more of them in Grokpedia than one might expect. These are not only articles about current political events and figures, but also materials about the distant past, publications, and even cities.

Artificial intelligence creates very large texts, often several times larger than Wikipedia articles, structures them into sections and subsections, and accompanies almost every fragment with links. But sometimes the model's own generalizations and conclusions appear in the text—without any sources indicated.

Lukashenko

Павялічыць

The article about Lukashenko in Grokpedia looks voluminous and structured, but its tone is noticeably close to the official version.

Already in the first lines, Lukashenko is presented as a leader who "restored public order through the fight against organized crime," "supported low unemployment thanks to the state economy," and "deepened integration with Russia."

The 2020 protests and subsequent repressions are described as just one of the "conflicts," without emphasis on the scale of human rights violations. Separate sections with titles like "Achievements in the Field of Sovereignty and Order" and "Social Welfare and Stability" emphasize the positive, almost official tone of the article.

In the part about "public support," official figures about 87.6% of the votes in the 2025 elections are presented first, and only then—data from the Chatham House study, where real support is estimated at 27%. This order subconsciously reinforces the official version.

Wikipedia, on the contrary, begins with a characterization of Lukashenko as an "authoritarian leader" and the "last dictator of Europe." The Wiki article immediately notes that "the elections were not free and fair" and that "the 2025 re-election was a sham."

Also, information about mass detentions, violence, and sanctions from the EU and the US is presented in detail, with indication of sources and positions of international observers.

As a result, Grokpedia looks more calm and "balanced," but this neutrality is illusory—the text softly retells the rhetoric of the authorities under the guise of an objective presentation.

And this is not accidental; the article in Grokpedia refers more than 70 times to official state resources such as BelTA, the websites of departments, and the official website of Lukashenko.

Tikhanovskaya

Павялічыць

The article about Svetlana Tikhanovskaya in Grokpedia also looks large and detailed, but its narrative is structured so that attention gradually shifts from the essence of the protest and repression to the problems and weaknesses of the opposition. 

After a fairly neutral beginning, where Tikhanovskaya is presented as a "pro-democracy activist" and a candidate in the 2020 elections, the text moves to sections with characteristic titles—"Challenges to Legitimacy," "Internal Divisions of the Opposition," "Effectiveness and Strategic Shortcomings," and "Tensions with the Governments of Host Countries."

These parts describe in detail the scandals in emigration structures, "weakening of the united front," "dependence on Western support," and the decline of her political influence.

This order of presenting facts creates the impression that Tikhanovskaya's main role is not that she became a symbol of resistance to dictatorship, but that the opposition "failed to win."

Personal details are also emphasized—reduced security in Lithuania, family conflicts, criticism from her own allies—which may plant a slight distrust of the person in the reader.

In Wikipedia, on the contrary, the main framework is set immediately: the 2020 elections were recognized as undemocratic, and Tikhanovskaya is an opposition leader and the main opponent of Lukashenko, forced to leave the country and create alternative structures. The Wikipedia text contains fewer evaluations, and the statements are supported by sources.

Protests

Павялічыць

As for the description of the 2020–2021 protests, both articles—in Grokpedia and Wikipedia—look thorough and generally neutral. They do not contradict each other, but differ in optics and the way of presenting events.

The article on Grokpedia, created by artificial intelligence, has a clear analytical character. It builds the narrative from mass street demonstrations to the systematic reasons why they did not lead to a change of power.

The main attention in Grokpedia is paid to how the Lukashenko regime held on: through the loyalty of the security forces, the support of Russia, and the ability of the authorities to adapt to sanctions—reorient the economy to the east and maintain basic stability. The text is impressive in scale and detail, but its focus gradually shifts from violence and torture to geopolitics and economic mechanisms.

Wikipedia, on the contrary, is more documentary. The protests in it are shown through human experience: deaths, torture, banned symbols, repression, and media closures. The main emphasis is on the moral and legal dimension—on issues of responsibility and human rights violations.

Belarusian Language

The situation with the Belarusian language in Grokpedia and Wikipedia is similar—the texts are very close in facts, but different in focus.

Wikipedia describes the Belarusian language in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania as the language of record keeping and culture, while Grokpedia—as a political tool of the state, which allowed the population to oppose itself to Moscow Rus', but later lost its status due to imperial Russification.

Wikipedia also details the current state of the language, the political pressure and discrimination against Belarusian speakers in education, and the reduction of its use in the media and the public sphere.

Grokpedia offers a broader, analytical view: the Belarusian language is shown as part of a larger political, economic, and geopolitical system. It explains how Soviet and post-Soviet Russification, along with economic dependence on Russia, strengthened the dominance of Russian in government, education, and business.

Separately, Grokpedia notes the turning point after 2020, when the Belarusian language became a symbol of protests and, along with its speakers, came under repression—through the closure of Belarusian institutions and the forced emigration of cultural figures, teachers, and researchers.

Grand Duchy of Lithuania

Павялічыць

The articles about the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in Wikipedia and Grokpedia differ significantly in approach, although they are based on the same historical facts. Wikipedia presents the history of the state in a traditional academic key—consistently and through the main political, cultural, and ethnolinguistic milestones. The text strives for neutrality, but tends towards a pro-Lithuanian narrative, showing the evolution from a pagan principality to a European state. The multi-ethnicity and the role of the Belarusian and Ukrainian lands, although noted, are considered in the context of the development of Lithuanian statehood.

Grokpedia, on the contrary, considers the GDL more through a pro-Belarusian and East Slavic lens. Here, the state is presented not so much as Lithuanian, but as a multi-ethnic and multilingual political system, where the main language of administration is Ruthenian, and the political and cultural center of the state shifts to the lands of modern Belarus and Ukraine.

The text emphasizes the administrative, cultural, and demographic weight of the Belarusian lands and shows the GDL as a state project that united Lithuanian and Old Russian traditions.

Minsk

Unexpectedly, but one of the most expressive ideological divides between Grokpedia and Wikipedia became the articles about Minsk in both versions. In Grokpedia, it has a clear pro-government tone, describing the city as a symbol of "order" and "state stability."

The text has many facts—about elections, sanctions, demographics—but authoritarian governance is described as a guarantee of tranquility and pragmatism.

Павялічыць

Minsk, according to Grokpedia, has maintained "stable stability under the centralized rule of President Lukashenko," and the repressions of 2020 are actually presented as a measure that "restored public order"—with reference to Al-Jazeera.

Even in the description of the economic consequences of sanctions, the language of justification prevails: Belarus "adapted, rather than collapsed," "reoriented to Russia," and retained "long-term predictability in management."

Wikipedia presents it quite differently. It does not explain why the regime stood, but shows what happened: how many people were detained, who was tortured, who was recognized as political prisoners, what the OSCE and Amnesty International missions said.

If Grokpedia talks about "ensuring order" in Minsk in 2020, Wikipedia writes about "mass human rights violations" and "politically motivated arrests."

Trump

Павялічыць

The article about Donald Trump in Grokpedia shows the same as in the cases with the article about Lukashenko—a desire to look neutral, but at the same time interpret events from certain political positions. The text is very detailed, factually rich, and written in an analytical key, but its "neutrality" has a clear bias towards praising Trump and criticizing the US state system.

Unlike Wikipedia, which builds the narrative through a sequence of facts, legal formulations, and links to sources, Grokpedia offers a version where Trump is not only a politician, but a symbol of the conflict between the "people" and the "elite," where court cases are manifestations of "legal war," elections are a response to "media and institutional bias," and Trump's return to power is the result of an "anti-system request."

The result is a text that looks balanced and logical, but actually retells a conservative version of events under the guise of analysis. If Wikipedia leaves the reader the opportunity to draw conclusions independently, then Grokpedia offers a ready-made picture.

Grokpedia presents materials in an analytical, scientific-like, and supposedly neutral form, but in fact—from a state-rational or conservative point of view. It does not deny facts, but explains them through the prism of state expediency. Wikipedia, on the contrary, presents facts and quotes assessments from various sources, not justifying the actions of the authorities and leaving the conclusions to the reader.

Grokpedia vs. Wikipedia

We turned to Belarusian Wikipedians to express their opinion about Grokpedia, which seems to be replacing Wikipedia.

Павялічыць

"The first version of Grokpedia looks exactly as we expected. These are generative articles without media files, obviously due to copyright restrictions. Links are only to online sources, and there is no way to correct errors yourself. The maximum you can do is send an error message. But how it works, who checks—editors or the model—is unclear," explains one of the Belarusian editors.

According to Belarusian Wikipedians, although Grokpedia is still at a very early stage of development—this is only version v0.1, its technical implementation is impressive.

They note that the project is not so much a threat to Wikipedia, but a challenge and motivation for it to implement artificial intelligence technologies faster instead of resisting them.

"This system may be especially promising for small language sections of Wikipedia, where there are physically no resources to update articles.

I don't think that the Belarusian version of Grokpedia will appear in the near future. Decades have passed, but despite the requests and willingness of the community to translate the interface, the Belarusian language has not even appeared on Twitter. Grok himself speaks broken Belarusian, the worst among other language models, critically insufficient for creating an encyclopedia. And Musk created this project, obviously, to cover primarily the US audience."

According to Wikipedians, the problem for Belarusians will be that Grokpedia refers exclusively to English-language online sources, since the choice on Belarusian topics will be very limited and specific.

Belarusian editors are sure that Grokpedia simply won't be able to write anything on some topics unless it copies the ready-made text from Wikipedia. In other cases, narratives about Belarus will be formed mainly from the point of view of other nations—through their English-language media and research.

"There are English versions of the Belsat and Radio Liberty websites, but not of the largest independent publications such as Zerkalo or Nasha Niva. Therefore, for Grokpedia, the main sources for creating articles on the Belarusian topic are most likely to be the state-owned BelTA or foreign engaged media like Al-Jazeera, which have English-language versions."

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