I came across an article by Andrei Yahorau, who is probably already well-known to many Belarusians who are involved in the democratic forces’ agenda
This article was recently published in the journal “IPG International Politics and Society”, which is published by the German Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Foundation. Quite an authoritative journal, which, however, has repeatedly published another, shall we say, ambiguous character — Yauheni Preiherman, known for his pseudo-neutral and, in fact, pro-regime “analytics”. Last October, we already drew attention to him and analyzed his article published on the platform “Minsk Dialog”. You can watch this video on our channel, it is called “Lukashenko is flirting with the West”.
Preiherman also talked about the need for the West to change its strategy with regard to Lukashenko's regime, to abandon sanctions and resume cooperation with him. Now the former speaker of the Coordination Council Andrei Yahorau made almost identical proposals. The same one who recently proposed to recognize Lukashenko's legitimacy and send European ambassadors to him. Yahorau's article is called “Time to change the strategy”. And what does Mr. Yahorau suggest in it?
Yahorau, as they call it, immediately comes up trumps. He declares that the Belarusian democratic forces (apparently, he doesn't include himself to them any more) apply insufficient diplomatic efforts to solve the issue with the release of political prisoners.
Well, that is, he is blatantly lying. Because not a single meeting, not a single international conference, not a single speech of representatives of democratic forces, the Coordination Council, the United Transitional Cabinet, personally Sviatlana Tsihanouskaya at a high level, including the European Parliament, the Consultative Group with the European Union, the Strategic Dialogue with the USA — not a single such event ignores the topic of Belarusian political prisoners. On the contrary, the issue of their release is always a priority topic, the number one issue.
However, Andrei Yahorau argues, the democratic forces do not give the West, as he puts it, “pragmatic tools”. What he understands by them, in general, he outlined at the New Belarus conference — it is the recognition of the legitimacy of Lukashenko's regime.
Yahorau considers “non-pragmatic” tools to be “pressure and international isolation of the Belarusian regime, deprivation of its international recognition, bringing it to international legal responsibility for violation of human rights, limitation of diplomatic contacts, expansion of sanctions, including harmonization of the sanctions regime with Russia”. Let me remind you that these are sanctions for the military aggression against Ukraine, in which the Lukashenko regime is a coaggressor.
So, developing his thought, Yahorau unhesitatingly states that
“The general strategy of the Office of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya and her Cabinet, relying on the fact that the pressure of the West would collapse the political regime in Belarus, did not bring the desired results”
And this is interesting. However, for some reason Yahorau ignores the fact that nobody ever said that the pressure of the West would bring down the regime by itself. It is impossible to abolish the Lukashenko regime without the participation of the Belarusian society, and we always emphasize this. But at the same time, the pressure of the West weakens it, deprives it of resources, markets, subjectivity, status, authority, if you want. All the things that Yahorau proposes, on the contrary, to return to the regime.
Yahorau also ignores the obvious fact that the pressure of the West, in particular sanctions, is a punishment of the Lukashenko regime for its massive crimes, for violation of international law, for the seizure of the airplane, for the migration crisis, for the war against Ukraine. And this is the main result of the pressure - the criminal actions of the regime do not go unpunished, they are not ignored.
But Mr. Yahorau suggests “ to change the strategy”. How? Start doing the opposite?
Election fraud. Mass repression. Several hundred thousand crimes against humanity, murder, torture, rape. Co-aggression, war crimes. What are you talking about? It's nothing, it's insignificant, it's not a big deal. Let's not punish the regime for it, but encourage it!
Let's send ambassadors to him, lift sanctions, cancel all international documents, where it is stated that it is necessary to apply the instruments of criminal and legal accountability. Let's cancel all the proposals of democratic forces, for example, two-part communication to the ICC with the justification of the need to issue an arrest warrant for Lukashenko and the evidence of the war crime committed by him — deportation of Ukrainian children. Let's cancel the issuance of international arrest warrants, including in relation to the leadership of “Okrestino” and “Zhodino”, etc. This is not pragmatic and does not work, as Yahorau claims.
Perhaps the West doesn't need to put pressure on Russia either. So what if Russia started a war? It happens to everybody.
Moreover, as Yahorau claims, “economic sanctions did not undermine the regime's resources” and “it has not yet been brought to justice”. I only wonder what the first statement is based on. Yahorau does not give any facts, figures, or anything of the sort. Simply — sanctions do not work. Just like they say on Belarusian TV. Why then is it important for the regime to lift them? Or is it not important? You have to make up your mind, Mr. Yahorau. You're confused.
As for “the regime has not yet been brought to justice” — this is a strange indicator of the “ineffectiveness” of pressure. Yes, there is no warrant for Lukashenko personally yet. But there are already European warrants for a number of his henchmen. There are hundreds of personal sanctions. For crimes against Belarusians. For war crimes against Ukrainians. The other day I also testified in a criminal case brought by the Prosecutor General's Office of Lithuania, related to the deportation of Ukrainian children from the temporarily occupied territories to Belarus.
Yahorau was not engaged in the formation of a dossier for the imposition of these sanctions, prosecution, collection of evidence, legal justification. What for? It is easier to just talk.
In addition, our team, the National Anti-Crisis Management, is preparing a third addendum to the Communication on the deportation of Ukrainian children, which we have already submitted to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. And this already concerns Lukashenko personally. At the same time, we are also working on his prosecution for crimes against humanity against Belarusians: for murders, for torture of women, men, children, for deaths of political prisoners, for political sentences, for deportation of hundreds of thousands of Belarusians, for robberies, deprivation of property, for the most large-scale repressions in Europe for the last 50 years.
Yes, it is time consuming, hard and even life-threatening work. But it is not hanging in the air. Communication with the justice system is ongoing and the dynamics are encouraging. Yes, I wish it was faster. But to say that there is still no result — and therefore everything is lost — is irresponsible, and maybe immoral to the victims of numerous crimes. There will be no result if you don't do this difficult, meticulous work. And instead, for example, write unsubstantiated articles like Andrei Yahorau.
Crimes have been committed. And accountability for them is a matter of principle. Pages in such cases are not turned. They are folded into volumes, put into the basis of criminal cases, and the criminal is put on the wanted list. Lukashenko will not be an exception.
I have no idea what “pragmatic interests” Mr. Yahorau is suggesting that we should proceed from when he says that this strategy should be changed. That is, in essence, he proposes to leave the most serious crimes in the understanding of international law - crimes against humanity and war crimes — unpunished.
The only thing that can be achieved by lifting responsibility from Lukashenko, lifting sanctions against him, recognizing his legitimacy is not a “thaw”, as Mr. Yahorau writes in his article, but the loss of all instruments of counteraction to further crimes. Further repression and terror.
A sane person, and Andrei Yahorau is such a person, analyzing the current situation, can't help but see that in parallel with pardoning several dozens of political prisoners (although the term “pardon” is inappropriate here — you can't pardon people whom you yourself imprisoned for nothing), Lukashenko's regime, again, imprisons dozens of others for nothing.
The level of repression that we observe today, which is confirmed by researchers, for example, Henadz Korshunau, author of the third report “Barometer of Repression in Belarus”, has not simply NOT decreased or reached a plateau. It has increased.
By all indications, Lukashenko's regime is not just NOT moving towards “liberalization”, it is actively transforming from authoritarian to totalitarian. And mass repressions are the basis of the existence of such a regime, the basis of its power.
To recognize the legitimacy of such a regime is to recognize its right to function in this way, and not to create the prerequisites for a “thaw”, which is the main threat to it. The regime has learned the lesson of 2020 perfectly well. Yes, it would gladly return to 2019 — to those comfortable conditions for ITSELF. But NOT for Belarusians. He will not return 2019 to Belarusians for anything. He is returning Belarusians to 1937.
Therefore, the proposal expressed in Mr. Yahorau's article is a proposal to accept the status quo. And not to influence it. And it fully meets the interests of the regime. To recognize it, to recognize the legitimacy of what is happening in Belarus, to send ambassadors, to lift sanctions, to stop the international law machine that has already been launched - it means to return the regime's subjectivity, resources and to agree that it will use them to build totalitarianism. It means to agree to the destruction of civil rights and freedoms in Belarus even at the level of an idea, just the very thought of them.
Because this is a question of the regime's survival. And yes, as Mr. Yahorau points out, this survival really depends on whether the West will recognize the regime’s subjectivity, whether it will recognize its independence from Russia (all signs of which Lukashenko himself has destroyed), whether it will be included in independent international relations, whether the West will resume these relations with it.
Here is the answer. This is the change of strategy that Andrei Yahorau proposes in his article. Democratic forces must step aside. And the West must ensure the survival of Lukashenko's regime. That is — not just to allow, but to assist, to contribute to the survival, construction and strengthening of totalitarian dictatorship in Europe. Ignoring mass repressions and terror and being content with the fact that the regime simply shuffles political prisoners from time to time, as if they were not living people, but a deck of 1,500 playing cards.
Yahorau claims that political prisoners are not a priority for anyone. But with his own speculative article he only confirms that they are not a priority for him. He suggests changing the strategy from pressure on Lukashenko's regime and its collapse — to its survival.
“It's time to look at things soberly,” Yahorau says. Indeed, it is high time. It is time to take a sober look at the activity of such “Yahoraus” and give it a sober assessment. This is not pragmatism. This, Mr. Yahorau, is cynicism and collaborationism.
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