Belarusian diplomat: Our country is between a rock and a hard place

The member of Belarusian Embassy in Washington asks the USA for money.

Pavel Shydlouski, the Chargé d'Affaires of Belarus in the United States, made a number of loud statements on January 30 during his speech at the conference of the Atlantic Council on issues of the Eastern Partnership. In particular, the head of the Belarusian Embassy recognized problems with democracy in Belarus, but asked "to give a helping hand" because the independence of the country was under threat, Nasha Niva reports.

Štefan Füle, the former European Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy, Ana de Palacio, the Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs of Spain, Elmar Brok, the current Chairman of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Hryhoriy Nemyria, the Chairman of the Human Rights Committee of the Verkhovna Rada, were among those present at the conference.

Pavel Shydlouski, the Chargé d'Affaires of Belarus, was in the auditorium and after panellists' speeches he took the microphone, introduced himself and thanked the organizers for the invitation, as well as for "useful exchange of views."

"Again everyone criticizes Belarus for human rights problems. Yes, we have problems both with human rights and democracy. Everything is not as perfect as it could be. We do our best to improve the situation with human rights. But in current situation our freedom and sovereignty are at stake", Shydlouski said.

In such a situation, he continued, Belarus needs to cooperate both with the EU and Russia. "Therefore, I offer every speaker to recognize a special place of Belarus, its specific role at the moment and extend a helping hand in the economic situation, it turned to be involved in due to economic problems in Russia", the Belarusian diplomat said.

He stated that Belarus appreciated the respect shown to its sovereignty and called on to resume cooperation with Belarus.

After a while, one of the participants of the Conference, the Ukrainian Deputy Hryhoriy Nemyria asked Belarusian diplomat who was threatening the Belarusian independence. While Shydlouski was passed a microphone, a pause appeared and someone said: "Lithuania". This aroused a general laugh.

In his turn, the Belarusian diplomat said that the country was between a rock and a hard place. As Aliaksandr Lukashenka said, the war was waging next to the very our borders and arms race began to the west of Belarus. Therefore, Belarus, Shydlouski repeated, has a threat to its sovereignty and independence.

He was again asked what exactly had caused such concern: instability or specific country. The Belarusian diplomat said: "Instability, but not a country. I will not name specific countries. Instability, unpredictability, arms race to the west of us. We must understand it is not directed against us, our country will not be the coins to exchange in this geopolitical game and we will hold ourselves independent".

That is why, Shydlouski emphasized, Belarus has amended the law on the military situation, which should come into force on February 1. "This law defines special grounds for the announcement of martial law in the country", the head of the Belarusian Embassy added.