In recent years, the previously prosperous Belarusian economy has gone into decline, however, and the EU offer may be hard to resist for Lukashenko, despite the fact that few believe he would be able to stay in power if he held true democratic elections.
“Lukashenko is in a difficult situation because there is a lot of pressure from Russia, as well as a full economic crisis,” said Olga Stuzhinskaya, director of the Office for a Democratic Belarus, in a telephone interview. Based in Brussels, the EU capital, the organization works to bring Belarus closer to Europe and promote democratic reforms.
Stuzhinskaya indicated that Lukashenko is indeed looking for financial support, and that better relations with the EU would be beneficial. She also said she finds the EU position logical: for any serious talks to begin, Belarus needs to free its political prisoners and hold free, fair, and democratic elections. Along similar lines, the summit’s host, Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk, called the demands “the bare minimum that any European person expects,” in a statement.
Lukashenko Not Invited
The complexity of the situation with Belarus, the EU, and its European neighbors was aptly highlighted during the summit in Warsaw. First of all, Lukashenko himself was not invited because of the political prisoner situation; instead, his foreign minister was supposed to come. However, the ambassador who was sent in the foreign minister’s place was not allowed to participate in the dinner with the heads of state due to his rank, and this caused Belarus to refuse to participate entirely.
During the summit, an empty chair was left for Belarus, according to an article in the EU observer. Stuzhinskaya said Belarus has since declared that it will remain in the partnership. However, the EU and the partnership countries of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine could not agree on a declaration condemning the repression in Belarus.
“On one hand, I can understand it,” Stuzhinskaya said. “They all have their own relations with Belarus, and their national interests. Georgia for instance does not want Belarus to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia, (two regions that declared independence from Georgia following a brief war in 2008).
“On the other hand, these countries want deeper relations with the EU, and that is based on democratic values, so they should recognize that political prisoners are unacceptable,” she said, adding that perhaps they should have negotiated over a different text instead.
In the end, the EU leaders ended up issuing a statement of their own, where they “express their deep concern at the deteriorating human rights, democracy, and rule of law situation in Belarus; deplore the continuing deterioration of media freedom in Belarus; and call for the immediate release and rehabilitation of all political prisoners, an end to the repression of civil society and media, and the start of a political dialogue with the opposition.”
Stuzhinskaya said that she hopes Belarus takes the EU up on the offer so it can come out of its current state of nonparticipation in all European processes.
“For me, as a citizen of this country, I would want to see more progress and more movement toward the EU,” she said.
