Multi-vector convulsions: Why is Lukashenko trumpeting about a meeting with a Ukrainian deputy
The press service of Alexander Lukashenko trumpeted the meeting with Verkhovna Rada deputy Yevgeny Shevchenko, despite the fact that accepting an ordinary parliamentarian is clearly not according to the rank of the head of state. The Belarusian president has generally developed quite remarkable foreign policy activity in recent weeks. Either he flies to Baku, having said something there that in Armenia is thinking about leaving the CSTO, or he will receive the Indian ambassador, passing on the request to visit Minsk to the Indian prime minister, who with a 99,9% probability will not fulfill it. What is the matter, what is Old Man up to?
Ukrainian MP Shevchenko, who arrived in Minsk, is an open supporter of Lukashenko; this is not his first time in Belarus. In December, after traveling to the Belarusian capital, he wrote in his Telegram channel that he did not meet “zmagars”. (The autumn protests, although they had lost their mass appeal, were still regularly held on Sundays). In February, he, along with the head of the defeated Communist Party of Ukraine, Pyotr Symonenko, was invited to the main Lukashenko forum of the five-year plan - the All-Belarusian People's Assembly, from where he streamed. Now he has risen to a personal audience with the Belarusian president.
Despite belonging to the presidential faction “Servant of the People”, Shevchenko’s reputation in Ukraine itself is ambiguous. A couple of years ago, he was even harassed for speaking on a talk show on one of the Russian TV channels, and in December, after another visit to Minsk, the head of the Servant of the People parliamentary faction, David Arakhamia, said that Evgeniy “every three days” asks to expel him from the faction, to which he receives the answer that he will “suffer until the very end.” Shevchenko openly calls the Ukrainian leadership dependent and speaks of “agents of the State Department and Soros.” In general, the deputy is unusual, seemingly like a stranger among his own.
His appearance in Lukashenko’s company caused another scandal in the Ukrainian media. The first deputy of the Servant of the People parliamentary faction and the head of the political party of the same name, Alexander Kornienko, has already said that the faction will demand explanations from Shevchenko - they say that he was not delegated by the faction, the Servant of the People party, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the Office of the President of Ukraine to conduct any negotiations with Belarusian officials.
Another version was published by MP Alexander Dubinsky, who fell into disgrace due to US sanctions. He assures that Shevchenko nevertheless went to Minsk in agreement with Zelensky’s office and specifically with the goal of causing maximum noise. The task is to quell the scandal in the Ukrainian media around the party with fireworks, which was recently hosted by a representative of the ruling party in the center of Kyiv.
One way or another, from the point of view of interstate protocol, it turns out that Lukashenko invited a political tourist to his palace, which the state of Ukraine does not represent.
And in this case, the gap in status between Lukashenko and Shevchenko is huge. It is simply not up to the president of the country to meet with an ordinary parliamentarian from a neighboring state, who is not even a member of the international affairs committee. However, the meeting not only took place, but was also widely covered by the Belarusian media, as if it were some kind of significant event.
Why did Lukashenko need this? After a recent disastrous meeting on foreign policy, which ended with the decision to completely liquidate several embassies in Western countries, he really wants to convince himself and his voters that he is still capable of pursuing an independent multi-vector foreign policy. And a conversation with the Indian ambassador (who is also not in status and who was also widely covered by state propaganda) and a visit to Aliyev, as a result of which only 4 memorandums of understanding were signed (this is the lowest rank of diplomatic document, not obliging anyone to anything) between the relevant ministries – these are all of them, phantom pains from lost foreign policy opportunities. The effect of Lukashenko’s meeting with an ordinary deputy from the point of view of the interests of Belarus and its influence on Ukrainian processes is close to zero. Economic too. Shevchenko has his own business, but the scale of this business is far from being of interest to the head of state.
Of course, a semi-conspiracy theory has a right to exist that Shevchenko is an informal channel of communication between Lukashenko and the Ukrainian elite, which does not officially recognize him as president and for this reason has put all official communications on pause. But then, why all this information hype around the visit of a politician who is far from high-status? Such channels do not like publicity.
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