In the West, the recognition of Crimea by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko as Russian will have a greater resonance than in Ukraine, but in Ukraine they will also react to it by declaring Lukashenko an enemy of the Ukrainian people.
Political scientist Alexander Bulavin stated this in a comment to a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“Many Western media have already written about Lukashenko’s statement. It seems to me that it will have a greater resonance in the West than in Ukraine. Until now, it was expected that Lukashenko would, after all, continue to pursue some of his own lines. Now, after such a statement of his, there are fewer hopes of somehow “unlinking” Lukashenko from Putin through “cookies” and some other levers.
As for Ukraine, it seems to me that it has long been ready for Lukashenko to say something like this, especially since in some allegorical sense the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus spoke about this about a week ago.
It is unlikely that this statement will have any serious consequences other than changing media rhetoric. Moreover, now, after the migrant crisis and various statements from Kyiv in this regard, Ukraine had no prospects of maintaining any kind of relations with Lukashenko and Belarus. The only thing is that I expect that in the coming days Ukrainian officials will brand Lukashenko, declare him an enemy of Ukraine, etc.,” concluded Alexander Bulavin.