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Lukashenka’s Way Of “Making Friends” With Poland

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Lukashenka’s Way Of “Making Friends” With Poland
PHOTO: AFP

The dictator seems to have forgotten how he persecuted the Poles in Belarus, at the meeting with Mateusz Morawiecki.

During the meeting with Poland’s Vice-PM, Aliaksandr Lukashenka spoke about “close relations between our countries” and mentioned political “losses”. Solidarity decided to recall how Lukashenka conflicted with Poland.

Meeting with Minister for Finance and Development of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki, Lukashenka noted that, in economic terms, the two countries “haven’t lost contacts, unlike they did in politics.”

— Speaking about the current stage of our cooperation, there emerged a certain tendency to establish closer relations between our countries. I think it will depend on the position of your country rather than on Belarus. You see our longing to set good relations not only with our neighbours, but with the Western European countries and the whole EU as well,” — the ruler said.

The journalists have recalled the relatively recent notorious scandals which stood in the way of development of the Belarus-Poland relations.

The “Union of Poles” and the diplomatic scandal

Perhaps, the relations between Belarus and Poland were the tensest in 2005, when the Belarusian officials refused to recognize the results of the Congress of the Union of Poles. They did not like that "pro-Polish activist" Anzelika Borys was elected its head. Later, the Ministry of Justice of Belarus refused to re-register the organization.

That conflict had an extremely negative impact on the Belarusian-Polish relations and ended in not only the mutual accusations, but also in the expulsion of diplomats.

Sanctions against Belarusian officials

In 2010, Poland threatened to impose one-sided sanctions against the Belarusian authorities in response to the persecution of the members of the unregistered Union of Poles of Belarus. The conflict reached the higher level then – President of Poland Lech Kaczynski addressed to Lukashenka with a private letter. The then MFA Radoslaw Sikorski went even further by claiming that they "began the stopwatch count down to the start of a negative scenario" for Belarus.

At midnight of February 16, the sanctions against the Belarusians involved in persecution of the Union of Poles of Belarus were imposed.

Loud accusations

One of the biggest scandals between Belarus and Poland broke out in January 2011, when Lukashenka suddenly accused the Polish authorities in a coup attempt. In particular, he stated that "the programs to overthrow the constitutional order in Belarus were written in Germany and Poland."

— A conspiracy was organized against our country. It was sponsored by the foreign intelligence services, and they left the role of executors to the local renegades and rogues from politics,” — he said then.

In its turn, the Polish Foreign Ministry interpreted the statement of Lukashenka as "stepping out on the path of confrontation."

Weapons trade and the “ticket” to the Hague

In Summer 2011, the Belarusian-Polish relations were all agog again — this time it was about the embargo for the weapons trade and strengthening of sanctions from the side of Poland and the EU.

— We approved the weapons trade embargo and froze the assets of the companies which financed Lukashenka. He should choose his path ¬— to democracy or to the Hague,” — the then Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said.

The fights regarding the “Pole card” and shipment of Polish products to the Belarusian market added up to the whole picture of the Belarus-Poland conflicts.

However, starting from 2014, the relations between the two countries have begun to get back to normal — for example, after introduction of the Russian food sanctions against Poland, Belarus offered to organize “reprocessing” of the Polish food products in Belarus. Later on, Poland supported abolishment of the EU sanctions against the Belarusian authorities.

Such political thaw immediately reflected in the economy — for example, since the beginning of the year the Belarusian-Polish trade turnover amounted to almost $ 1,4 billion and grew by 10,6%!

Against this background, it is difficult to imagine how much money has been lost over the years of the crisis in the Belarusian-Polish relations, during which the Belarusian authorities demonstrated their bad temper.

We remind, Deputy Chairman of the Polish Council of Ministers, the Minister of Development and Finance Mateusz Morawiecki arrived in Belarus today, and discussed the problematic issues in the development of economic cooperation with the governor.

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