Tanks roll from Belarus to Ukraine – Lukashenko seeks solidarity with Russia

Created: 02/24/2022, 12:14 p.m

By: Sonja Thomaser

A squad of tanks in southern Belarus, near the Ukrainian border.

© dpa

Lukashenko could benefit if he sides with Putin.

But experts warn that this friendship can also backfire.

Minsk - "The implementation of the Minsk agreements" is the phrase that one hears quite often these days when politicians and experts discuss the spiral of confrontation between Russia* and Ukraine*.

Minsk I and II are two peace agreements signed in 2014 and 2015 between Moscow and Kiev in the eponymous capital of neighboring Belarus.

But the nation of 10 million people, which to many outsiders looks like a mini-USSR preserved in amber, is much more than just a convenient site for Russia-Ukraine summits.

Its authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko* has been involved in the political games between Moscow, its main supporter and sponsor, and Kiev for years - and has reaped enormous political and economic gains.

Ukraine conflict: Lukashenko with anti-Western rhetoric

On Tuesday (02/22/2022), a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin* recognized Ukraine's breakaway provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states, Lukashenko called on Ukraine to "end" its confrontation with Russia - and its US " Gentlemen" to let you down.

"To stop!

Scare these masters away across the ocean.

They will bring you no luck.

As soon as they can no longer use you, they throw you into the junkyard of history," said Lukashenko.

On Saturday (02/19/2022) Lukashenko sat next to Putin and watched military exercises and the launch of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles from the huge screens at the headquarters of the Russian Defense Ministry in Moscow.

On Sunday (February 20, 2022), around 30,000 Russian soldiers extended their exercises with Belarusian soldiers, which had begun on February 10, 2022 in southern Belarus near the Ukrainian border.

The troops stand near the poorly guarded Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in Ukraine, a 2600 square kilometer area contaminated by the 1986 nuclear disaster.

And just 100 km south of the zone is Kiev, the capital of Ukraine and home to two million people.

Lukashenko and the Ukraine conflict: power and money

But what does Lukashenko get out of it?

"It's a question of money.

When he talks about the dangers [of war], he can always negotiate some money, either for modernizing the military or just for financial support,” Ihar Tyshkevich, a Kiev-based Belarusian expert, told Al Jazeera.

And it's also about staying in power.

In the late 1990s, Lukashenko, dubbed "Europe's last dictator," and Russian President Boris Yeltsin agreed to establish a union state - a union of Russia and Belarus.

Lukashenko hoped to replace the ailing and alcoholic Yeltsin, but Yeltsin chose Putin.

Lukashenko blocked the merger, but used it for more than 20 years to trick the Kremlin out of billions in loans*, trade preferences and perks for hundreds of thousands of Belarusian migrant workers toiling in Russia.

Belarus uses the Ukraine-Russia conflict for economic gain

He also used Ukraine's dispute with Russia to fill his coffers.

After the 2014 Maidan protests that ousted pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Kiev restricted trade with Moscow — and Belarus began repackaging and reselling Ukrainian and Russian goods to both sides.

While Moscow repeatedly raised prices for natural gas sold to Ukraine, Lukashenko encouraged the export of electricity and gasoline to Kiev.

So far, the current escalation, which may develop into a full-blown war, is a boon for Lukashenko - as long as there is no solution or peace in sight.

"In the current situation, talking about the war is extremely beneficial for Lukashenko, [but he] would face disaster if there was a war - an immediate peace settlement," analyst Tyshkevich said.

Belarus: Referendum on constitutional amendment on Sunday

The main reason why Lukashenko needs the crisis alongside Belarus is the planned “complete transformation” of his politics, which he will conclude this Sunday (February 27, 2022) with a referendum in which the regime wants to approve constitutional changes.

In 2020, Lukashenko weathered the biggest political crisis of his presidency – weeks of protests following the August 20, 2020 presidential election he claimed to have won but the result of which has been ruled rigged.

Large numbers of demonstrators were arrested and many left Belarus for Poland, Lithuania and Ukraine.

In order to consolidate his claim to power, Lukashenko is now using the referendum to amend the constitution – and also remove the concept of “neutrality” from it – to allow Belarusian troops to be deployed abroad.

Belarusians report in online media how they are being pressured to vote and threatened with losing their jobs.

You get told who is for the “bright future of the country”, vote for the changes.

Anyone who votes against wants conditions “like in Ukraine.” The presence of Russian troops means that Lukashenko could try to keep the protests to a minimum in the event of rallies during and after the referendum.

Lukashenko's battle cries help him rally his key supporters - the workers of the state-owned enterprises and factories and the peasants of the Soviet-era kolkhozes.

"Mobilizing his constituency through war rhetoric is good for him," says Tyshkevich.

Is Russia planning to annex Belarus?

But siding with Russia could backfire economically, observers warn.

“The [Belarusian] economy is slowing down, as are sales of potassium, the main Belarusian export, and the Ukrainian market could be lost due to the possible sanctions from Kiev,” Ukrainian analyst Aleksey Kushch tells Al Jazeera.

"It would take several years to diversify these risks - to look for new markets and to develop the logistics of potassium trade via Russia." He further explains that the "mobilization" of the Belarusian economy on a war base stabilized by Russian funds is Lukashenko's only way out.

The current crisis could also be an opportunity for Russia to further subjugate Belarus - and possibly annex it according to the Union State's specifications.

"Behind the concentration of troops along Ukraine's borders, the escalation in Donbass and harsh rhetoric on all sides, no one questions the extent to which Russia plans to increase its military presence in Belarus," said Pavel Luzin, a Russia-based Jamestown analyst Foundation, a Washington DC think tank, across from Al Jazeera.

(sot)