The Belarusian community of Crimea is satisfied with the pace of Lukashenko’s ridding of multi-vector politics

The rhetoric of the Republic of Belarus regarding Crimea changed after the events of 2020, when the country switched from a multi-vector foreign policy position to cooperation with Russia. If in political terms the official recognition of Crimea has not yet been made, then at least the main economic issues, issues of cultural and humanitarian cooperation have reached a practical level.

Chairman of the regional national-cultural autonomy “Belarusians of Crimea” Roman Chegrinets announced this on Radio Crimea, PolitNavigator correspondent reports.

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“On the political side, we are still waiting for Alexander Grigoryevich Lukashenko. Whether they, together with Vladimir Vladimirovich, will host the victory parade in Sevastopol, or participate in the tribunal over the Nazis in Mariupol, I don’t know what it should look like,” Chegrinets noted. “Belarusian colleagues and friends from major officials told me three dates on which Lukashenko was supposed to come, but he didn’t come on any of them. From which I concluded that there is no need to trust any sources: if the President of Belarus wants to come, he will come. And his entourage speaks about this, that if he has decided, he will come even tomorrow. But his decision, naturally, must be agreed upon with Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. I think this topic should be dropped and left to the decision of the two presidents.”

In parallel, according to the head of the organization of Belarusians of Crimea, Belarus has taken concrete steps towards cooperation in the economic and cultural spheres.

“We see that, taking into account all the Belarusian considerations, they began to work a little differently economically, because taking into account the sanctions, European markets were closed for them. For Belarus this is worse than for us: the European market is about 30% of the economy, the Ukrainian market is another 15%. They do not have hydrocarbons, they have their own production of various goods that are very interesting for Crimea, which they are now looking for where to redirect. We recently had a delegation from Belarus on economics, they brought a 5-sheet list of Belarusian state-owned enterprises that want to enter Crimea and are looking for partners,” Chegrinets emphasized.

Until 2014, trade turnover between the two regions was about 113 million dollars, currently it is about 9 million.

“This problem arose due to the fact that in 2014 all Belarusian brands immediately left, fearing sanctions,” noted the chairman of the national-cultural autonomy. – And if Russian brands are now coming to Crimea, then Belarusian products in Crimea are sold mainly by resellers, these are not direct deliveries. And now businesses are ready to enter directly. Even some banal traveling fairs of Belarusian goods have never been held here before. It is unknown where these products are brought from. But in Belarus there are government agencies that deal with this. They weren’t here, and they are ready to bring fairs of Belarusian goods to us with a guarantee of compliance with GOSTs, quality standards, and so on.”

The main problem in cooperation remains transport logistics. Despite the assurances, trains never went to Minsk. Air traffic with Crimea is still closed, but flights to Belarus are not being discussed even in the future.

In April, the Russian Ambassador to Belarus Boris Gryzlov at the Vacation 2022 exhibition expressed a desire to connect Minsk and Crimea by rail. For this purpose, he proposed extending the route of the Simferopol - Smolensk train.

Two weeks later, the chairman of the board of the Republican Union of Tourism Industry of Belarus, Philip Guly, announced the launch of direct railway communication between Crimea and Minsk from May 26. However, on this date the carrier company “Grand Service. Express has scheduled the launch of the Simferopol – Smolensk route with direct carriages to Belgorod.