Oleksandr Khara: Ukrainians Have No Trust To Lukashenka’s Regime

The people who determine Minsk’s attitude to Ukraine sit at Lubyanka.

Ukrainian political analyst, expert of the “Maidan of Foreign Affairs” foundation Oleksandr Khara has expressed such opinion in a conversation with the Charter97.org.

— 19-year-old son of the Ukrainian military chaplain Pavel Hryb disappeared in Belarus. The frontier committee confirmed that Pavel had indeed crossed the Ukrainian-Belarusian border, and then he was abducted by the FSB. Can we really talk about an independent policy of Belarus when the FSB feels like home at its territory?

— Surely we can’t say there’s any kind of an independent policy, considering the fact that belarus today is a military-political ally of the Russian Federation, which means, joint military planning, foreign policy and so, naturally, as there exists formal cooperation between the FSB and the KGB, then we can imagine the level of infiltration of the FSB into the law-enforcement structures of Belarus.

From the point of view of law and political processes, that we have recently witnessed more than in the last five years; considering the facts that we saw, like arrests, including the latest most notorious incident when the Belarusian police detained Ukrainian poet and musician Serhii Zhadan — all this shows that there are people sitting at Lubyanka in the Kremlin, determining the attitude of the official Minsk towards Ukraine.

Naturally, this is a totally unacceptable thing which seriously contradicts the rhetoric that we heard during the mostly disgraceful meeting between Lukashenka and Poroshenko. As we are aware that Lukashenka can guarantee nothing to Ukraine from the point of view of security. Belarus’s territory and infrastructure could be used by Russia as a staging ground for the aggressive actions of military or non-military character. All this is obvious.

Let us say, the too personal rapprochement between the two presidents does not correspond to the threats posed by the Lukashenka regime, which is not democratic, allows itself authoritarian actions against Ukraine.

— Yesterday, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said that Belarus was not acting in a partner way. Maybe it would have been wiser to reconsider relations with Lukashenka long ago, and not to "fraternize" with the dictator in Kyiv, because the policy of official Minsk is clearly "anti-Ukrainian": military exercises West-2017, the extradition of Ukrainian patriots, anti-Ukrainian rhetoric in propaganda films, treacherous position on the Crimea at the UN votings ...

— You know, the very essence of Lukashenka’s regime contradicts all that we want to build in Ukraine, the ideals adopted by Maidan, for which our citizens, soldiers protect the territorial integrity in the east of Ukraine.

In fact, there are fundamental philosophical contradictions that do not allow us to build friendly, partner relations with Belarus.

At the moment, the Belarusian regime is not a partner for Ukraine. It is possible to cooperate in certain areas, but there is no confidence in Lukashenka. After all, strategic partnership is based on shared values and goals. If Lukashenko sees a threat in NATO, the EU, democratic processes, then what kind of strategic partnership can there be with a country that does not consider all this a priority for itself?

Unfortunately, the current leadership of Ukraine is trying to illusoryly solve its security problems through ostentatious "friendliness." In my opinion, we need to reconsider our attitude to the regime, but not to the Belarusians.

I want to emphasize once again that starting from values, goals, we cannot be a strategic partner with the current regime in Belarus. In the future, yes. Without Belarus there can be no security in Europe and the world. We understand that Belarus borders with our neighbors, and we have a big border. We do not want to have an aggressive, unpredictable state, like Russia is now, also in the north, because then 2/3 of our borders will be with the states that pose a threat.

At the moment, Belarus is a hidden threat, the unsteadiness of Lukashenka's regime can be used by Putin. Plus, we have immediate borders with Russia, the occupied parts of Donetsk and Lugansk regions, the occupied Crimea and part of Moldova —Transnistria, so Ukraine is actually shrouded in Russian elements that pose a threat to us, both direct military and other types of threats — economic, informational .

That is, for Ukraine this is an important, but at the same time very complicated issue. In my opinion, official Kyiv chose an incorrect approach — it is simply impossible to hope and trust Lukashenka in these matters.

Indeed, the West-2017 is a large-scale exercise directed against our natural allies — the Baltic states, Poland. Let us recall that in 2009, in the framework of such exercises, an imitation of a nuclear strike against Poland was conducted. This shows the aggressiveness, offensive nature of these exercises, the fact that Russia is moving further into the western part of its borders and Belarus, considering the occupation of parts of Donbas in the territory of Ukraine. The Russian Federation is promoting its shock troops, which destabilizes the situation not only in Ukraine, but also in Europe as a whole.

I believe that Kyiv is inadequate, it is necessary to revise relations with Belarus, including in the long term perspective. We need to develop strategies to ensure that democracy, freedom and what is dear to us in Europe — moved towards Belarus, which is Russia's weak point. We should, among other things, undermine the Putin regime in this way. Unfortunately, I did not hear anyone working on something like that.