Belarus – European Union: Coming full circle

Denis Melyantsov

Summary

The 2020 presidential campaign broke the long-standing process of normalizing relations between Belarus and the European Union, as a result of which political contacts were frozen, sanctions were re-imposed, and the sides returned to their usual accusatory rhetoric. At the same time, at the beginning of the year, it was possible to complete a long and complex process of negotiations on agreements on visa facilitation and readmission.

The COVID-19 pandemic also left a negative mark on bilateral relations even before the election campaign began, radically limiting diplomatic contacts and opportunities for informal communication.

Trends:

Active start

The year 2020 started very dynamically in the Belarusian-European relations. Already on January 8, there was an event that could be called historical. After almost six years of difficult negotiations, Minsk and Brussels concluded the visa facilitation and readmission agreements included in the package. For other “Eastern Partnership” countries, these agreements were a long-passed stage, so they did not look like a special achievement in the regional context. However, in the case of Minsk, this was the first politically significant agreement with the European Union in many years. The signing of the documents creates a kind of precedent: despite all the fundamental contradictions, Minsk and Brussels were able to reach a documented compromise on mutually beneficial issues.

On February 14–15, Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei took part in the Munich Security Conference, on the sidelines of which he held meetings with the European Commissioner for Budget, the Latvian Foreign Minister, members of the Bundestag, the chairperson of the Eastern Committee of the German Economy, and also spoke at a high-level round table for investors.

In the German direction, another event should be highlighted – the start of the work of the bilateral strategic advisory group, the idea of which was agreed upon by the Foreign Ministers of Belarus and Germany in October 2019.

In early February, President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Sir Suma Chakrabarti visited Minsk. The next visit reflected the fast-growing dynamics of cooperation: in 2019, Belarus ranked ninth among all countries in terms of the annual volume of operations of the EBRD.

The pandemic effect

The coronavirus pandemic has made significant changes in the foreign policy activities of Minsk, reducing to a minimum the opportunities for traditional diplomatic contacts with the countries and institutions of the European Union, transferring them to the mode of telephone conversations and online conferences. In March-April, only one high-level visit took place: Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó visited Minsk.

On 23 April, Alexander Lukashenko had a conversation with President Gitanas Nausėda at the initiative of the Lithuanian president, who held similar conversations with the heads of all six EU “Eastern Partnership” partner countries on the eve of the initiative summit. This conversation was the first high-level bilateral contact between the two countries in a decade.

Minsk appealed to the European Union and its affiliated international financial institutions for financial assistance in overcoming the consequences of the pandemic. Belarus has requested a loan of USD 1 billion from the EBRD and has agreed that the bank will not apply penalties due to difficulties with the implementation of current projects due to quarantine measures.

The Belarusian authorities requested additional funds from Brussels in addition to those allocated by the European Union to the Eastern Partnership countries to finance urgent purchases for medical institutions and minimize the projected economic consequences. In general, this appeal received a positive reaction from the European Union, and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell, clarified during a telephone conversation with Vladimir Makei that it was the case of about more than EUR 60 million.

The impact of the election campaign and inertia

The presidential campaign in Belarus was a key factor in relations with the European Union. Unlike most of the previous ones, it began to have a sharply negative impact on Belarusian relations with the European Union already at the first stages, that is, after the forceful actions of law enforcement agencies in relation to the protests and after the arrest of Viktor Babariko and members of his team.

On 26 June, Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei said: “If there are undesirable events that will throw us back to 2010, there will be no third thaw. Restoring normal relations with other countries will take much longer than after 2010”.1 However, some of the contacts continued according to the inertia gained during the normalization.

On 18 June, an online summit of the Eastern Partnership heads of State and Governments was held. The newly appointed Prime Minister, Roman Golovchenko, spoke on behalf of Belarus.

Another significant event of the period was the visit of the Hungarian Prime Minister to Minsk on 5 June. The visit was notable for two things: firstly, this is the first official visit of the head of the Hungarian government to Belarus, which, secondly, took place in the context of the pandemic. Speaking with Viktor Orbán, Alexander Lukashenko called Hungary “the closest partner for Belarus in the European Union”. Viktor Orbán himself stressed this by publicly calling for the lifting of all existing EU sanctions against Belarus.

Finally, after many years of difficult negotiations that had begun in 2014, the topic of visa facilitation and readmission agreements reached its logical conclusion. Minsk held internal procedures for the ratification of the agreements made back in April, and now similar procedures were completed in the European Union: on 13 May, the European Parliament approved the agreements, and on 27 May, the Council of the European Union approved them. After the exchange of instruments of ratification, the agreements entered into force on 1 July 2020.

Elections and a return to the conflict cycle

From the start of the presidential campaign 2020, it was obvious that it would have a negative impact on relations between Belarus and the European Union. However, there was reason to believe that the extent of such influence would be limited. In many member states and institutions of the European Union, an informal opinion prevailed on the need to avoid a slide in relations to the level of 2011–2012, when, after the December 2010 presidential elections, Brussels imposed sanctions against a large number of Belarusian officials and effectively froze relations with Minsk at a minimum working level.

The reason for the EU’s unwillingness to repeat the experience of a decade ago was the fear that another breakdown in relations would lead to negative consequences for the sovereignty of Belarus. In this case, Minsk would again remain one-on-one with Moscow, unable to compensate for Russian pressure with relations with the European Union. As a result, the military and political risks and challenges for the European Union itself, especially for the member states neighboring Belarus, inevitably increase. Therefore, even despite the numerous negative statements of the European Union during the election campaign, in general, European capitals tried to take a cautious position on the future of relations with Belarus.

Despite the inevitability of the cooling of relations between Belarus and the European Union following the presidential campaign, something extremely serious had to happen for them to be fundamentally broken. In the end, according to the European Union, this is exactly what happened. The harsh actions of the Belarusian security forces and, especially, the footage of the beating of detainees during the protests shocked the European public. In such circumstances, it was difficult to expect anything other than extremely negative assessments and the introduction of sanctions from the European Union, which were announced on 19 August. Moreover, many observers, both in Belarus and in the European Union, came to the conclusion that the fall of the regime of Lukashenko was inevitable. Therefore, it was likely that the initial reaction on the part of the European Union was at least partially based on such expectations.

Official Minsk, for its part, also quickly began to make accusations against specific EU states in supporting attempts to unconstitutionally change the government in Belarus. In addition to Poland and Lithuania, the Czech Republic was also mentioned among such states. Moreover, Minsk escalated the situation by statements about possible aggression on the part of NATO and the strengthening of its own army group in Hrodna region on the border with Lithuania and Poland.

On 29 September, Belarus announced the introduction of retaliatory individual sanctions against officials from the three Baltic countries, which had previously been the first in the European Union to publish their sanctions lists for Belarus. Earlier, on 7 September, “Belneftekhim” confirmed that negotiations and preparations for redirecting the export flows of Belarusian oil products from Lithuania to Russian ports had begun. This work began after Alexander Lukashenko’s August order to review economic cooperation with Lithuania in response to the sanctions imposed by Vilnius.

On 1 October, the European Council approved the conclusions on the Belarusian situation, in which it did not recognize the official results of the elections and – for the first time – did not recognize Lukashenko as president. The European Union called on Minsk to stop the violence and violations of citizens’ rights and freedoms, as well as to start an inclusive national dialogue.2

The leaders of the EU member states instructed the Council of the European Union to immediately take restrictive measures against the Belarusian authorities, and the European Commission was called upon to prepare a comprehensive plan of economic support for a democratic Belarus. The very next day, on 2 October, the Council of the European Union imposed individual sanctions against 40 citizens of Belarus (without including Alexander Lukashenko in the list), who, according to the European Union, are responsible for falsifying the results of the presidential elections, as well as for reprisals against peaceful demonstrators, opposition representatives and journalists. The sanctions include a ban on entry into and transit through the territory of the European Union, the freezing of assets under the jurisdiction of EU states, and a ban on EU citizens and companies from providing financial resources to persons included in the specified list.

In response to the sanctions decisions of Brussels, the Belarusian Foreign Ministry issued a sharp statement, in which it stressed that by the decision “the European Union distanced its neighbor from itself.”3 The official Minsk announced the introduction of a retaliatory sanctions list. In addition, the statement of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry stressed that the further application of sanctions against Belarus “may lead to even more serious consequences, for example, the withdrawal of Belarus from joint programs and projects, the revision of the level and modality of the diplomatic presence, up to the decision on the expediency of maintaining diplomatic relations.” On 2 October, an announcement was made about the cancellation of the accreditation of foreign media operating in Belarus and the large-scale re-accreditation under the new rules.

On the same day, Minsk recalled the Belarusian ambassadors from Warsaw and Vilnius for consultations and invited Poland and Lithuania to do the same with their ambassadors in Belarus. To demonstrate unity and solidarity with Lithuania and Poland, most of the ambassadors accredited in Minsk from other EU member states also left Belarus. However, after two weeks, they began to return.

On 6 November, the Council of the European Union confirmed the second package of sanctions and added a sanctions list for 15 more high-ranking officials, including Lukashenko himself. Not including him for the first time was considered as a kind of invitation to negotiations with the opposition mediated either by representatives of the European Union or the OSCE.

On 17 November, a large meeting on foreign policy issues was held at the Palace of Independence, where decisions were made on Minsk’s response to the second EU sanctions package. Minsk announced that:

On 17 December, the Council of the European Union approved the third package of sanctions. The package includes 36 new positions: high-ranking officials, representatives of the business community and companies that, according to the European Union, “benefit from and/or support the regime of Alexander Lukashenko”. As before, Brussels stressed that the purpose of the sanctions is “to put pressure on the political leadership of Belarus in order to prevent further violence and repression, to release all political prisoners and other unjustly detained persons, as well as to initiate a real and inclusive national dialogue with the broad strata of society”.

In response, Minsk announced the expansion of its own personal list of officials from the European Union countries and its intention to take “a number of legal actions in response to the absolutely unjustified inclusion of a number of enterprises and individuals in the EU list”. In addition, according to Vladimir Makei, “a decision has been made to restrict the activities of a number of political foundations in the Republic of Belarus, as well as to review the implementation of a number of so-called humanitarian, educational, and cultural programs that are being implemented by the relevant political institutions in Belarus, including those operating under the auspices of foreign embassies.”4

Thus, the rhetoric and actions of official Minsk in response to the European Union sanctions packages indicate that the Belarusian authorities have an obvious political attitude to respond to each new restrictive decision of Brussels. Due to economic restrictions, Minsk can launch “counter-strikes” only in three directions:

  1. the introduction and expansion of its own list of persons prohibited from entering Belarus and the territory of the Union State;
  2. limiting or excluding the ability of European Union countries and institutions to work within the framework of political and humanitarian projects within Belarus;
  3. the most drastic measure possible is limiting or even terminating cooperation on the most sensitive issues of cross-border security. This may include, for example, illegal migration, drug and weapons trafficking, and international crime. But Minsk’s reaction is more likely to extend to cooperation in the field of peaceful nuclear energy.

Conclusion

In 2020, relations between Belarus and the European Union were significantly divided into two qualitatively different periods – before and after the August presidential elections. If the first half of the year was characterized by positive dynamics and even notable achievements (as in the case of visa facilitation), the events of August and the following months led to the actual curtailment of political relations, mutual sanctions and extremely harsh rhetoric on both sides. Thus, one can talk about the resumption of the conflict cycle in Belarusian-European relations, which was interrupted by the 2015 elections.

Judging by the dynamics of the protests in Belarus, as well as the changing international agenda, one can expect that in the near future the intensity of the development of the diplomatic conflict between Minsk and the European Union will weaken. At least, if some new event does not occur in Belarus, which may become another trigger of domestic and foreign policy escalation. Most European capitals have taken a wait-and-see attitude, assessing the behavior of Minsk, Moscow and the effect of the already imposed sanctions.

The likelihood of a fourth package of sanctions remains high, but the tightening of sanctions against Belarus will cause more and more lengthy discussions between European capitals.