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EU - Belarus: No room for error

EU - Belarus: No room for error
Gregory Mesezhnikov

It is obvious that recent years of the European Union have not been the best times in its history.

There is hardly any sense to question the strength and potential of the most successful until now integration project in European history uniting the states with common system of values. However, when it comes to the practical use of its capacity to implement these very values, not only within the Union but also outside, it is easy to see that the EU is facing certain difficulties.

Overload should not justify inconsistency

The high concentration of events that the EU has to deal with (especially to create a new situation in many regions of the world and sometimes change the main vector of development in these regions), leads to explicit overload of the common structural units (bodies) of the EU, including those directly involved in the development and decision-making. The situation is additionally complicated by the fact that the case is often discussed by the representatives of individual countries, whose positions on specific issues do not always coincide. As a result, from time to time there are doubts regarding the consistency of the EU position.

We know that the EU has to constantly deal with many issues related to its relationship with other countries, while it evaluates their internal situation. Its approach to the issue is of great practical significance, affecting the character of the established relationship. This, in turn, puts specific requirements to the European Union, that it simply cannot ignore. If the European Union sets the bar at a certain height, which must be got over by all those who wish to deal with it, it supposedly should not allow anyone to crawl under that bar rather than to get over it in one high jump. It is an axiom which is no longer debatable in the EU.

Attractiveness of the European way

The European Union adopted its current organizational form, so attractive to the peoples of many countries, as a result of a number of years of systematic development. Expansion of the area of freedom, democracy, stability and prosperity in Europe has been a strategic goal of the authors of the united Europe project from the beginning.

Democratic revolutions in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe created the conditions for the connection of their people to the process of European integration.

The successful transformation of society, the introduction of democratic institutions, the development of market relations allowed the ten post-communist countries to enter the European Union as full members. After the most massive and layered waves of enlargement in the history of the EU and the deepening of the existing integration mechanisms, the EU did not turn away from Eastern Europe but continued to look in its direction, and several years ago it began to implement a program of the Eastern Partnership (EaP), which included six former Soviet republics.

And though it was a program of deepening cooperation with the EU with a slightly different version of conditionality than in the case of the Central European countries a decade ago, the fact that signing of the association agreement was one of the key elements of the CAP confirms that these countries have a real European perspective, the implementation of which in practice will depend on their ability to do their homework in time and without errors, and then successfully pass the entrance exam.

The main and most important thing, however, is that all the norms, principles and values that applied in relation to the countries that joined the EU in the framework of the latest wave of enlargement, still remain in force as the main instrument in the relationship between the countries of Eastern Europe with the EU.

Belarus in the spotlight

Belarus has a special place in the EaP. It is the only country included in the program, which is currently under the sanctions imposed by the EU in response to the repression of the regime of Aliaksandr Lukashenka towards the democratic opposition. In order to fully participate in the Eastern Partnership and develop normal economic and political relations with the EU, Belarus should first of all create the conditions for cancellation of the sanctions, that is to ensure free democratic elections on an alternative basis, to abolish all repressive laws, cease the practice of persecution of the regime opponents, in a word -- to carry out serious reforms that would put the country on a par with other EaP states successfully advancing on its European path (Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova).

After Aliaksandr Lukashenka decided to release six political prisoners, including former presidential candidate Mikalai Statkevich, the EU faced the need to take a step back. Motives of the Belarusian leader when he released the prisoners were obvious -- the country desperately needed funds to sustain its economy in a situation where its main external partner - Russia - was not able to provide it with all necessary assistance, and the economic aid of the European Union could be a serious help or simply a convenient way out of this unfortunate situation.

From the EU standpoint, a model situation arose. The main challenge facing Brussels and individual states - EU members - is to give an adequate assessment of what happened not so long ago in Minsk, that is, to answer the question of whether the release of Mikalai Statkevich and other political prisoners, representing undoubtedly a step in the right direction, is an event indicating the beginning of major changes in the political life of the country, or is it just a tactical maneuver in order to achieve change in the EU position, without changing anything in Belarus itself?

A good opportunity to test the real state of affairs was given by the October 11, 2015 presidential elections in Belarus. For a democratic Europe, given its experience in monitoring elections, including their legislative design and the accompanying election campaigns, there is nothing easier than to determine whether elections held in one country or another satisfy the criteria for fair, free and democratic will expression of its citizens. The answer in the case of the presidential election in Belarus is clear -- there is no match. The result of these elections was predetermined, which was due not to the objective indicators of support for individual candidates, but to the very essence of the political system of Belarus, the nature of its power structures.

Consideration of other elements of the political development in the country also does not give grounds to assert that something has begun to change for the better. This, by the way, in detail and with particular facts was discussed by the panelists of the OSCE Human Dimension meeting in Warsaw when they talked about the situation in Belarus. They also said that the EU must not derogate from the principles laid down as a cornerstone in the foundation of a common European home -- freedom, democracy, the rule of law, equality of citizens.

No room for error

The information about the temporary lifting of sanctions by the EU raises many questions, particularly about the deliberation and the reasonable nature of this decision.

Does the EU have confidence that Aliaksandr Lukashenka will actually make some significant changes, given that after the release of the prisoners he has not moved in this direction by one iota, despite the fact that the expectations of such movements are openly expressed by Europe? Wouldn't such a generous encouragement to Lukashenka, received essentially as an advance, be a confirmation of the "correctness" (of course, from his point of view) of his position in his long-lasting game with the EU? If things go that way, then all this could backfire and lead to the continuation of the previous authoritarian course.

In the difficult situation that EU found itself in recent years (financial crisis, economic collapse in Greece, problems of the eurozone, the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and economic sanctions against Russia, an unprecedented influx of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa), the desire of Brussels to remove or alleviate the problems in other areas, in particular in relations with Belarus, is understandable. However, the difficulties associated with the solution of these problems should not become an excuse for abandoning the principled positions of the EU. The European Union is a community based on values, it cannot and has no right to turn into a hybrid organization, use these values of choice, "pragmatic" in relation to short-term considerations.

It is in the interests of the people of Belarus and the European Union to have freedom, democracy and the European way of development coincide in uniform time frame in a single forward movement. The EU has done a lot for this in the previous years, and on its decision today depends whether positive changes in Belarus will be achieved in the coming years. The EU has no right to make a mistake, its price can be extremely high.

Gregory Mesezhnikov, Institute of Public Policy (Slovakia), specially for charter97.org

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