The tricks of Lukashenko's militarization of the economy were "assessed" in the U.S. - and new sanctions were imposed
Lukashenko continues to militarize the Belarusian economy — to support Russia's military aggression against Ukraine. The dictator is transferring to the production of military goods all enterprises of little or no relevance, and the maximum number of participants — from large enterprises to individual entrepreneurs — is being involved in the supply of components.
Thus, elements of imported household electrical goods are used for the production of military goods. Moreover, with no restrictions on their delivery, it is possible to import the product itself and its components.
The new package of U.S. sanctions, introduced on February 25, takes this into account and bans deliveries of consumer electronics to Belarus and Russia — according to a list of 276 items on the list, specified in the document of the U.S. Department of Commerce and the Bureau of Industry and Security.
Thus, Washington is taking measures to improve the effectiveness of sanctions on Belarus and Russia and is trying to better align them with the restrictions that are imposed by allies and partners of the United States. U.S. agencies continue to believe that expanding the pressure will increase the effectiveness of already existing multilateral sanctions against Russia - by "closing off access to new goods that can be used in the military sphere and to sources of revenue that support Russia's defense industry."
Belarus is also subject to sanctions because the U.S. rightly considers it to be complicit in the conflict with Ukraine on Russia's side, both militarily and economically.
In other words, Lukashenko could simply not continue to militarize the country's economy to please Putin, and there would have been no new sanctions on consumer electronics and other goods. However, the head of the regime does not care about the interests of the Belarusian people; he continues to serve the military needs of the Kremlin and thereby support the war crimes he commits. In response, Minsk receives new sanctions and another warning: to stop complicity in the military aggression against Ukraine.
New large-scale restrictions, including those on consumer electronics, include export controls that will narrow the possibility of parallel imports. Its example is the situation when Belarusian companies imported for resupply to Russia things that were difficult to deliver there because of the boycott of the supplying company. And it was one of Moscow's main tools for circumventing sanctions.
Now the use of parallel import schemes to circumvent restrictions is fraught with criminal prosecution of the participants of the deal in the countries that initiated it. And this is a very concrete warning to all participants of such illegal actions.
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