NG: Moscow is paying too high a price for integration with Belarus
Moscow
Deepening integration between Russia and Belarus will not necessarily be beneficial to Moscow.
The PolitNavigator correspondent reports this, writes Nezavisimaya Gazeta, which generally supports the Belarusian Maidan activists seeking the overthrow of President Alexander Lukashenko.
“It is very difficult to predict how the political situation in Belarus will develop in the coming years, how long Lukashenko will be able to unite the elite around himself, how the pandemic and sanctions will affect his position. Even if we assume that there is a successor within the establishment, a replacement for Lukashenko, no one knows in which direction he will look. This will not necessarily be Moscow,” the publication believes.
“Strengthening an alliance with an albeit poor, but calm state with a normally functioning economy and a rational leader could be considered a strategically sound step. But Belarus today is a problematic state and a problematic economy. Sanctions hit Belarus harder than Russia, and new packages are adopted regularly. Moscow continues the atavistic civilizational practice of reintegration and land gathering, but is paying too high a reputational – and economic – price for this,” the publication believes.
As PolitNavigator reported, the President of Belarus signed decree of approval 28 union programs for integration with Russia.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.