Belarus downgrades its status in Eastern Partnership initiative to expert level

29 ноября 2020

And again, this week, the project, or rather a tool used by the West for influencing the post-Soviet countries, is on the agenda. Mutually beneficial and built for collaboration. This is how the Eastern Partnership was initially positioned. According to the declared official goals, there was only one interest - the development of integration ties. In fact, it turned out a mechanism to manipulate and, to politicize a number of infrastructure and interregional projects when the West wants it.

An adequate response of Belarus to the rhetoric of European politicians will open the eyes of those who have not yet fully understood our country is not an arena for a political bacchanalia. Belarus has downgraded its status in the Eastern Partnership initiative to an expert level. This will allow us to preserve international ties, openness to new constructive dialogues with European neighbors, but at the same time to give a clear understanding that we are not playing the game of civilizers, especially according to someone else's rules.

What is really behind the EU project? And did the participating countries, integrated into the Eastern European space achieve any results?

The Eastern Partnership unites six countries-participants of the post-Soviet space. The initiative itself was born in the early 2000s. The main lobbyist for the creation of the Eastern Partnership was Poland (right before the country's entry into the EU). Today, ex-Prime Minister of Poland Radoslaw Sikorski has been promoting the long-standing imperialist concept of Intermarium - a federation of Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus and the Baltic countries. The idea, by the way, dates back to the last century. Even then, many politicians dreamed of Polish Lviv and Vilnius, and did not hesitate to talk about Polish Minsk and Kiev.

Aleksey Ilyashevich, political observer (Donetsk): "Poland, indeed, claims a special role. Today, it seeks to become the beloved wife of the Sultan - that is, to become the main conductor of American interests in the European Union as a whole. Poland, using its membership in the European Union, tries to impose its own geopolitical concepts on its neighbors, to spread its influence on them."

The position of the countries participating in the Eastern Partnership, however, differed from each other. Local elites of Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia saw their European integration as a way for the development of political and economic ties with the European Union, which, in their opinion, should subsequently lead to the prospect of membership. The European Union did not intend to expand, but decided not to upset them and keep them on the threshold of the European home, in the hope that they will someday cross this threshold.

The position of Belarus is that "Eastern Partnership" should have "an equal and non-discriminatory character in relation to all its potential participants." Our President also insisted on this.

A. Lukashenko: "Our wish is for the Eastern Partnership to be practical, so that we, within the framework of the Eastern Partnership, could solve the problems facing Europe and promote those projects that are very relevant now: energy, transport , logistics, other issues including people's lives, visa issues. The Eastern Partnership must not be allowed to become a purely politicized organization, and, God forbid, set a goal for the Eastern Partnership countries to make this belt a dividing zone between the EU and East: Russia, China".

In general, Belarus has always looked at the Eastern Partnership with caution. The principled position of Belarus is that we do not play these games.

Petr Petrovsky, political scientist (Minsk): "Belarus has never participated in the Eastern Partnership program at a high level. The maximum level is the Minister of Foreign Affairs. We have always participated at this level. Belarus has always said that its pragmatic goal for its participation in the Eastern Partnership is increasing trade and economic cooperation, investment. However, our partners from the European Union saw the program as a tool to promote their values, and not as an equal cooperation."

11 controversial years of the program's work have shown that the Eastern Partnership needs to be reformatted. The social and economic tasks that the ideologists of the program initially set themselves have receded into the background, giving way to the geopolitical ambitions of individual European countries. By the way, the Eastern Partnership Summit in Vilnius was the trigger for the events of 2014. Ukraine was supposed to sign an integration agreement. European officials faced a choice - either the EU or the Customs Union with its tariff preferences. The signing of the document, in the form in which it existed, meant the collapse of the Ukrainian economy - in fact, it was necessary to abandon the Russian, Belarusian and Kazakh sales markets.

Mykola Azarov, Prime Minister of Ukraine (2010-2014): "Ukraine will be excluded from the free trade regime that is currently in force between our countries. This means that high customs duties will be added. Our products will become non-competitive. This means, according to our calculations, the loss up to 400 thousand jobs."

Aleksey Ilyashevich, political observer (Donetsk): "You have to understand that the association agreement is part of this program. Yanukovych refused to sign it, and it ended up in Maidan."

The result is an economic disaster, loss of population, rising unemployment and tariffs. After turning to the West, Ukraine became a raw material appendage of Europe. It managed to lose competence in a number of industries and lost millions of hands. And according to the forecasts of the Ukrainian Minister of Economic Development Timofey Mylovanov, Ukraine will need 50 years and $ 100 billion to catch up with Belarus.

24 million dollars will be spent within the program "EU4Belarus: Solidarity with the people of Belarus". This is help for telegram bloggers, media, civil activists. In the EU, by the way, the support is openly called "intervention" that will be "effective" with the direct support of local democratic initiatives. And the task of the lured fighters for democracy is to attract newcomers from the Belarusian people to the process. In the future, they even promised that foreign countries will help more.

€ 15 billion for democratic Belarus was promised by the head of the European Commission. A very dubious prospect.

Petr Petrovsky, political scientist (Minsk): "Any funding from the so-called civil society is interference in the internal affairs of the Republic of Belarus, which contradicts the legislation of our country. Any such funding should be suppressed by state authorities. Those forces that will be financed from outside, their activities should be prohibited, because their activities pose a threat to the sovereignty and independence of our country."

Possible scenarios for the European integration of the Eastern Partnership countries were presented in Warsaw by Western speakers. And this scenario is suspiciously reminiscent of what is happening in Minsk and is most in line with the interests of the EU. It envisages a global wave of protests in all countries of the Eastern Partnership until 2030 for a closer entry into the European Union. In Belarus, "new leaders" appear supposedly spontaneously, gradually demonizing the current government in order to completely replace it later.

Alexander Nosovich, political scientist (Kaliningrad): "A color revolution in Minsk by agents of Western influence pursues two goals: overthrow of Lukashenko and rupture of relations with Russia".

NATO's activity on the eastern flank of the Alliance, by the way, miraculously coincides with the borders of the six Eastern Partnership countries, and even more on the flanks of countries that dream of being in the European Union and NATO. And the deeper the country integrates into the Eastern European environment, the more it plunges into its internal chaos - territorial disputes, incessant protests and bloodshed. A zone of instability is being created along the perimeter or buffer zone, a sanitary corridor between the European Union (NATO countries) and Russia. Only Belarus, keeping itself apart in the political intrigues of the West with its neighbors, somehow lives peacefully, and this does not correspond to the further ambitions of its European neighbor.