“Belarusian ruling power got more from Europe…”



“Belarus and European Union have great expectations from the interrelations: our partners in Brussels are not completely satisfied, but, what is also important, the main expectations of Belarus haven’t been met by European Union” – this opinion of Belarusian ambassador in Belgium Vladimir Senko was published by the internet portal European Voice. Political analyst Valery KARBALIEVICH tells in the interview to Euramost.org what “expectations haven’t been met” both by Belarus and Europe.


Valery Karbalievich:
Quoting Senko, “Such situation is usual for almost all areas of interrelations – starting from politics and economics and ending with contacts with people”. “We still count on the results to see”, - says the ambassador. He notes that Belarus “wants to develop relations with EU but united Europe doesn’t always respond correspondingly”. Thus this aim “is not a tactic to win time but a principal position which totally corresponds national interests of the country”. Senko told that Minsk “agreed to start the dialog with EU about human rights, in spite the fact that EU still haven’t met one of the terms of this dialog – the plan of actions for development of double-sided relations”. – When Belarusian-European dialog started, the sides understood different CV of these relations, - says Valery Karbalievich. – It means that every side had a different CV and now it appears to be clearer. Belarusian ruling power first of all expected from Europe financial and material help. It means credits, an opened European market for Belarusian goods and returning of the country to the system of trade preferences of the European Union. It was the economic expectations. But, of course, there also were political expectations: legalization of Belarusian regime, acknowledgement of the nowadays political system, possibility for the president to tour around Europe with official visits and invite major European politicians to Belarus. And, of course, support of the country during its argues with Russia. Europe in its turn expected from Belarus democratic changes within the country and keeping distance with Russia. And the time has passed and the both sides see that mostly the expectations haven’t been met. – For example? – Belarus, form the materiel point haven’t got everything it wanted. The program of the partnership is so far in the framework of declarations. The critics of authorities from the side of European structures for violating human rights don’t stop. European Union hasn’t supported Belarus during oil war with Russia, and the official Minsk was probably counting on it. But form the other side, Europe is also disappointed. It is dissapointed with the absence of democratization in Belarus and strengthening of pressure on democratic society. The situation with the Union of Poles proves this again. So, there is a certain disappointment at the both sides. – Which side in your opinion got more profits during the dialog? – Belarusian side got more. First of all, there were credits of IMF which wouldn’t be possible without new relations. Aleksandr Lukashenko broke diplomatic blockade – he visited Rome, Vilnius and European officials came to Minsk. This gave an opportunity to shoe that isolation is over and the country is making a step towards European this gave the reason to speak more bravely to Moscow. So, maybe Belarusian power got not all what it wanted from the beginning, but it got enough. And we can’t talk about profits of European Union, because it didn’t manage to drag Belarus from the geo-political Russian field completely and the processes of democratization are at the same place. And we can even say that now democratization is moving backwards. Democratic forces didn’t have any profits from the cooperation of Belarus and Europe at all. Of course, there is some democratization of economics; Electoral legislation is changes someway… But there are no system changes. If a step forwards are made now, tomorrow a step backwards is made.

Victor PAVLOV