Has the USA finally discovered Lukashenka’s foreign bank accounts?

The Belarusian government is holding emergency discussions on the new US sanctions imposed recently against the concern Belneftekhim. The officials don’t comment on possible economic consequences. Nevertheless, the Belarusian administration is likely to be panic-stricken, “Nezavisimaya Gazeta” reports.

And the Belarusian Foreign Ministry’s nervous reaction is an evidence of the panic. “Belarus will have to come up with a corresponding reaction to the unfriendly acts performed by the USA,” MFA press-secretary Andrei Papou said. “Bush’s administration violated the Memorandum of security guarantees in view of Belarus’ joining the Treaty on non-proliferation of nuclear weapons of 5 December 1994. In the treaty, the USA pledges not to implement economic sanctions to bring Belarus under its control, in exchange for Belarus’ refusal to dislocate nuclear weapons,” Popov announced the official Minsk’s reaction. According to him, the Belarusian administration believes the USA violated the trade bilateral agreement which implies that the USA promotes commercially Belarusian goods and services into the US market. The MFA press-secretary said the government was elaborating a corresponding reply.

At the same time, economists believe problems with payments for the Russian oil can be avoided only in case the assets are transferred from the US to European banks immediately. All oil payments are effected in dollars; they are made via the USA and hence can be blocked. If transferred to the European banks they can only be delayed.

It is also proposed to effect oil payments in EURO. The weak point here is, however, that EURO is not used at the oil market and so foreign partners can abrupt contacts with Belarus.

The uncertainty about the range of those affected by the US sanctions makes it harder to count the amount of the losses. On the one hand, oil refinery plants that act as the buyers of the Russian oil and sellers of the Belarusian oil products are not included to the list compiled by the Office for Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and edited on the web-page of the US Ministry of Finance. On the other, the concern doesn’t exist as a management unity: according to the Belarusian legislation, a concern is formed by enterprises. As for Belneftekhim, it includes 50 enterprises, 120 thousand employees and 25 percent of the Belarusian exports. It’s highly probable that the overseas authorities are unaware of these facts, and they will reconsider the target audience of the sanctions as soon as they learn the details. And in this case payment problems can become real.

The economically active public discusses one more reason for the government’s panic. “Perhaps, the USA has finally discovered the foreign bank accounts that Aliaksandar Lukashenka owns,” a well-informed expert made an assumption in an interview to “NG.”