Belarus’s oscillating foreign policy toward the EU: from engagement to retrenchment (1994–2021)

ABSTRACT

Belarusian foreign policy toward the EU has been variable under President Aliaksandr Lukashenka. It has oscillated between periods of engagement, aimed at improving/deepening relations with the bloc, and periods of retrenchment in response to EU sanctions for violations of human rights. In this article the author applies Elena Gnedina’s concept of “multi-vector” foreign policy to explain attempts to improve relations with the EU from 2007 to 2010 and from 2013 to 2020. The author analyzes these attempts by focusing on actors, objectives, and instruments. Changes in these variables help us periodize Belarusian “multi-vector” foreign policy and discern its implicit meanings, with the ultimate goals of (1) understanding what motivated Belarusian political elites to change their foreign policy toward the EU, and (2) building an analytical framework that weighs different institutional constraints on the formulation of foreign policy toward the EU.

RÉSUMÉ

La politique étrangère du Bélarus envers l’UE est variable sous le régime du président Aliaksandr Loukachenka. Elle fluctue entre les périodes d’engagement avec pour objectif l’amélioration ou l’intensification des relations avec l’UE, et les périodes de retranchement en réponse aux sanctions européennes imposées en raison des violations des droits humains. L’auteure applique le concept de la politique étrangère « multi-vectorielle » d’Elena Gnedina afin d’expliquer les tentatives d’améliorer les relations avec l’UE dans les années 2007–10 et 2013–20. L’auteure analyse ces tentatives en se concentrant sur les acteurs, les objectifs et les instruments. Les changements dans ces variables nous aident à périodiser la politique étrangère « multi-vectorielle » bélarusse et à distinguer ses significations implicites dans le but de (1) comprendre les motivations des élites bélarusses à changer leur politique étrangère envers l’UE, et (2) construire une structure analytique afin d’évaluer les contraintes institutionnelles liées à la formulation de la politique étrangère envers l’UE.

KEYWORDS:

• Multi-vector foreign policy
• Belarus
• European Union
• engagement
• retrenchment

Acknowledgments

I am thankful to two anonymous reviewers and the editorial staff of Canadian Slavonic Papers for their contributions to the article. The article is largely based on PhD research, so I would like to express gratitude to people who accompanied me on this long journey, to family and advisors. And of course, I am grateful to all the Belarusians who gave me interviews and discussed Belarusian foreign policy informally.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. See Usov, “Neo-Authoritarian Regime”; Silitski, “Contagion Deterred: Preemptive Authoritarianism”; Marples, “Europe’s Last Dictatorship”; Goujon, “Le ‘loukachisme’”; and Rouda, “Belarus: Transformation from Authoritarianism.”

2. See Hervouet, “Le ‘socialisme de marché’”; and Shukan, “La Biélorussie: Stratégies.”

3. The relative weight of these institutions has varied in the decision-making process depending on the period of foreign policy. After 2007, when a “multi-vector” strategy was adopted, the roles of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Parliament increased. However, the Presidential Administration, which is much smaller, was still the main structure assisting the president. Currently, in the context of the political crisis since 2020, the influence of the Security Council is stronger. See Pierson-Lyzhina, “Actors of Belarusian ‘Multivector’.”

4. Marin, “Reconstructing a Post-Bipolar Europe.”

5. In April 1998, the Belarusian authorities announced their intention to renovate the residential diplomatic complex Drazdy near Minsk. At the time the president, several state officials, and approximately 20 foreign diplomats with families lived in the area. After the work, the complex would become the private residence of President Lukashenka. To protest the expulsion, viewed as forced and illegal, the ambassadors of several EU countries left Belarus. On 9 July 1998, the Council of the EU applied visa sanctions against 131 representatives of the Belarusian regime, which were only lifted on 22 February 1999 after the resolution of the diplomatic conflict and the return of European ambassadors to Minsk.

6. It also elaborated the “Concept of Responsible ‘Neighbourhood’ with the EU” (Kontseptsiia otvetstvennogo sosedstva s ES). Ulahovich, “Otnosheniia mezhdu Respublikoi Belarus'”; Snapkovskii, “Vneshniaia politika Respubliki Belarus′.”

7. Marin, “Bélarus: Les prisonniers politiques”; Smolar, “Biélorussie: ‘Ce fut la campagne’.”

8. In December 2001, on the eve of the presidential election in Belarus, the authorities accused Ambassador Hans-Georg Wieck, head of the OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group in Belarus since 1997, of espionage because of his role “in both an attempted dialogue between the authorities and the opposition, and his part in promoting opposition parties to choose a common candidate in the 2001 presidential elections.” Marples, “Between EU and Russia,” 41; Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, “Disappeared Persons in Belarus.” The referendum of 2004 opened the possibility for President Aliaksandr Lukashenka to run for an unlimited number of mandates.

9. In March and November 2007, the EU High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy was welcomed in Minsk. In January 2008, President Lukashenka met German Ambassador Gebhardt Weiss.

10. Aliaksandr Kazulin, Andrei Kim, and Siarhei Parsiukevich.

11. Union Européenne, “Règlement d’exécution (UE) 84/2011,” 17–29.

12. It is ambiguous because, on one hand, the Belarusian authorities underlined the territorial integrity of Ukraine, recognized the legitimacy of new authorities, declined to send observers to the referendum in Crimea, and refused to join the Russian economic embargo against Ukraine, yet they voted against all resolutions by international organizations criticizing Russia for its actions and accused the West of staging the Maidan.

13. This policy combined the reopening of official relations with Minsk, preservation of democratic conditionality, and engagement with Belarusian society. See Hansbury, “Toward a New European.”

14. Lukashenka, “Poslanie belorusskomu narodu.”

15. Lukashenka, “Ukaz Prezidenta Respubliki Belarus′ ot 17.07.2001,” §3.3.6; Lukashenka, “Ukaz Prezidenta Respubliki Belarus′ 9 noiabria 2010 g.,” Article 9; Palata predstavitelei Natsional′nogo sobraniia Respubliki Belarus′, “Zakon Respubliki Belarus′,” Article 27.

16. Lukashenka, “Interv′iu Prezidenta Respubliki Belarus′.”

17. Ibid.

18. Lukashenka, “Poslanie Prezidenta Respubliki Belarus′.”

19. Gnedina, “‘Multi-Vector’ Foreign Policies,” 1007.

20. Ibid., 1008.

21. Ibid., 1024.

22. “Vozmozhnye posledstviia dlia Respubliki Belarus′,” 54–62.

23. Pierson-Lyzhina, “Actors of Belarusian ‘Multivector’”; Gromadzki, “Belarusian Foreign Policy”; and Liakhovich, “Belarusian Elites.”

24. Liakhovich, “Belarusian Elites,” 46.

25. Ibid., 48.

26. Lallemand, “Minsk: Les liaisons dangereuses,” 100.

27. Hansbury, “Domestic Constraints,” 33–34.

28. Bohdan and Isaeu, “Elementy neitralitetu.”

29. From 1996 to 1999, he worked as a representative to the Council of Europe and a counselor at the embassy in France, and in 1999–2000 he worked as the head of the Directorate for General European Cooperation in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

30. Pierson-Lyzhina, “Actors of Belarusian ‘Multivector’.”

31. I understand “energy subsidies” to cover all measures that keep energy resource prices below market levels for certain customers. They can be calculated by identifying the difference in price between the world market price and the price paid by the country multiplied by export volumes. Kastrychnitski ekanamichny forum, “Vygoda ot raznitsy.”

32. Feduta, Lukashenko: Politicheskaia biografiia, 628.

33. As far back as May 2000, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kas′ianov declared that Russian businessmen wanted to purchase 30 big Belarusian companies. Liakhovich, “Belarus Resists Privatization.”

34. Shukan, “La Biélorussie: stratégies,” 38.

35. Zen′kovich, Putinskaia entsiklopediia, 282.

36. In 2007–10, Gazprom purchased 50% of Beltransgaz, and in 2011–13 it acquired the remaining stake.

37. Liakhovich, “Belarusian Elites,” 40.

38. Iaskevich, Osnovy ideologii belorusskogo gosudarstva; and Lallemand, “Biélorussie: Un régime autoritaire.”

39. In 2007, Belarus saw pricing for Russian gas supplies more than double, following Gazprom’s revision a year earlier of prices to other post-Soviet countries that had received preferential treatment. According to the five-year gas agreement, the price for gas paid by Belarus was supposed to rise gradually until it reached the world market price in 2011. In reality, in 2011 the price Belarus paid reached only about 80% of Russia’s average export price, but it was high if compared with 30% of the average Russian export price that Belarus paid in 2005.

40. Kastrychnitski ekanamichny forum, “Vygoda ot raznitsy.”

41. Chubrik, “Neft′ v obmen na vse.”

42. Natsional′nyi statisticheskii komitet Respubliki Belarus′, “Eksport vazhneishih vidov produktsii.”

43. European Commission, “New EU Support to Private Sector.”

44. Council of the European Union, “Outcome of the Council Meeting.”

45. Brighi and Hill, “Implementation and Behavior,” 131.

46. Morin, La politique étrangère, 34.

47. Korovenkova, “Belorusskie vlasti zakryvaiut predstavitel′stvo.”

48. For instance, in the autumn of 2011, they criminalized keeping foreign financial assistance for political parties and civil society organizations in foreign banks. Tsentr pravovoi transformatsii and Assambleia demokraticheskikh nepravitel′stvennykh organizatsii, “Svoboda assotsiatsii.”

49. Popov, “Otvety nachal′nika upravleniia informatsii”; Savinykh, “Press Secretary Andrei Savinykh”; and Ministerstvo inostrannykh del Respubliki Belarus’, “Zaiavlenie MID.”

50. Lukashenka, “Stenogramma press-konferentsii.”

51. “Televersiia press-konferentsii Aleksandra Lukashenko”; Lukashenka, “Poslanie belorusskomu narodu.”

52. “Makei: Belarus gotova k dialogu”; Makei, “Stenogramma podkhoda k presse”; Makei, “Stenogramma interv′iu.”

53. Lukashenka, “Lektsiia ‘Istoricheskii vybor’.”

54. Lukashenka, “Aleksandr Lukashenko dal interv′iu”; Lukashenka, “Interv′iu informatsionnomu agentstvu ‘Frans-Press’”; Martynau, “Interv′iu Ministra inostrannykh del S. Martynova dlia gazety ‘Frankfurter Al′gemaine Tsaitung’.”

55. Bosse and Korosteleva-Polglase, “Changing Belarus?”

56. Lukashenka, “Aleksandr Lukashenko dal interv′iu.”

57. Rettman, “Belarus Ends Work.”

58. Lukashenka, “Interv′iu Prezidenta Respubliki Belarus′”; Martynau, “Interv′iu Ministra inostrannykh del S. Martynova gazete ‘Financial Times’”; Martynau, “Interv′iu Ministra inostrannykh del S. Martynova dlia gazety ‘Frankfurter Al′gemaine Tsaitung’.”

59. The conference was organized by the Belarusian–German Society, and it gathered many members of the Belarusian opposition and civil society, foreign researchers, and European politicians.

60. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus, “Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs.”

61. It involved an air drop of teddy bears with pro-democracy messages on Belarusian territory.

62. Hansbury, “Agency of Smaller Powers,” 241.

63. Ibid., 170.

64. Bohdan, “Why Belarus Sides.”

65. See Marin, “Belarusian Nationalism”; Mozheiko, “Chto takoe ‘miagkaia belarusizatsiia’”; Shukan, “La Biélorussie après la crise,” 54–55; and Rudkouski, “Soft Belarusianisation.”

66. “Polkovnik Dmitrii Pavlichenko uvolen”; Conseil de l’Union Européenne, “Position commune 2004/661/PESC.”

67. Khalip, “‘Karatel′ po vyzovu.”

68. Plaschinsky, “Grazhdanskoe obshchestvo pri Administratsii.”

69. Pravaabaronchy tsentr “Viasna,” “Konsul′tatsii o vypolnenii Natsional′nogo plana.”

70. Shraibman, “New Repressions in Belarus.”

71. Hanna Kanapatskaya of the United Civic Party and Yelena Anisim of the Belarusian Language Society. Bedford and Vinatier, “Resisting the Irresistible.”

72. Besides energy subsidies, there is also preferential access to the Russian market, loans, outsourcing of military expenditures, etc.

73. Bykovskii, “Malovektornost′.”

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Ekaterina Pierson-Lyzhina

Ekaterina Pierson-Lyzhina obtained a PhD in political and social sciences from the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB) in 2020. Earlier she obtained her bachelor’s degree in international relations from the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia and her master’s degree in political science (orientation international relations) from the ULB. She is currently an associated researcher at the Centre d’étude de la vie politique (Cevipol) at the ULB and at the Eurasian States in Transition Research Centre (EAST Centre), Warsaw. Among her interests are Belarusian foreign policy, alternative foreign policies of non-state actors, Belarus–EU relations, Belarus–Russia energy relations, and Eastern Partnership countries.