Andrei Sannikov: Lukashenka’s presence in Kyiv discredits Ukraine’s new authorities

Why did president Poroshenko invite dictator Lukashenka to the inauguration?

The charter97.org asked the leader of the European Belarus civic campaign and a candidate for president in 2010 Andrei Sannikov to answer this question.

- First of all, I want to congratulate the Ukrainian people with the official accession to the office of the lawfully elected president of Ukraine. Petro Poroshenko has taken an oath at most difficult time for Ukraine. I want to hope that Ukraine has acquired a leader able to guide the country out of the deepest crisis and lead it to freedom and democracy.

However, it is unclear why president Poroshenko invited dictator Lukashenka to his inauguration. By this he insults the memory of a Belarusian Mikhail Zhyznieuski, who died in the Maidan, hurts the feelings of millions of citizens of our country, who whole-heartedly supported Ukrainians in their fight for freedom. I am sure that he has also hurt the feelings of millions Ukrainians, who did not want to see a dictator beside their new president as he was taking the office.

The pathos of Poroshenko’s speech about the fight on dictatorship and victory over it looked, to put it mildly, awkward in the presence of an oppressor of freedom and democracy. Calls for preserving Ukraine’s unity looked ridiculous in the presence of the dictator, who had immediately recognized Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and who destroys Ukrainian flags in Belarus and throws Belarusians in prisons for solidarity with Ukraine.

The dictatorial regimes of Putin, Lukashenka and Yanukovych are of the same nature, which is why it is impossible to fight dictatorship by imposing yourself as a friend to one of the dictators. The presence of the tyrant’s pleased face at the inauguration of Ukraine’s president will not change his anti-national policy and will not contribute to our joint task of fighting dictatorship.

Lukashenka’s invitation discredits president Poroshenko and Ukrainian authorities in him. I hope that the ideals of the Maidan and Maidan’s will not allow for new Ukrainian leaders to take the immoral and dangerous for Ukraine path of making friends with a dictator, Sannikov stated.