Regardless of whether Russia launches another major offensive against Ukraine, Belarus’s territory will increasingly become a source of military threats to all its western neighbours – not just Ukraine
Before the January 2022 riots, Kazakhstan was a model for managing transitions of power in the post-Soviet world. The leaders of Russia and Belarus will be furiously taking notes on how to avoid a similar fate.
Germany’s new government could defuse the conflict between Poland and Belarus by demonstrating greater toughness on Lukashenka and showing willingness to accept a limited number of migrants. And the EU should be ready to use its most effective weapon: trade.
The EU should show the Lukashenka regime that it will no longer tolerate the weaponisation of migration. As with any form of blackmail, it would be senseless and dangerous to make concessions – because the aggressor will only demand more.
The EU is currently assembling its fifth package of sanctions on Belarus. Here is what European governments and the Belarusian opposition should draw from how things have gone so far.
A year on from the falsified presidential election, two Belaruses now occupy the international arena. Neither the West nor Russia will be able to change this reality, but each will have to learn to live with both.
The arrest of Raman Pratasevich changed the calculus for EU capitals, which agreed new sanctions with real bite. The EU could finally be succeeding in its search for strategic sovereignty.
Belarus will continue to cause problems on the EU’s doorstep – so it is now time for a firmer, longer-term approach
The EU’s success is mixed in generating reform among Eastern Partnership countries. But patience and self-confidence remain its best bet for the future.
Aliaksandr Lukashenka rewrote the rules to keep himself in power. But it did not succeed in 2020 – and the EU will not be able to remain a spectator to Belarus’s problems forever