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Pro-Government Analysts: Russia Indends To Replace Lukashenka This Year

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Pro-Government Analysts: Russia Indends To Replace Lukashenka This Year

Discrepancies on fundamental issues seem to be taking place between the “fraternal” regimes.

The center for political and foreign policy studies has published the new report on the Belarusian-Russian relations in the beginning of this year. It is called “One-sided Actions of the Russian Federation with Regard to the Republic of Belarus in 2017”.

Directors of the Center Arseniy Sivitskiy and Yuryi Tsarik have become the authors of the report. Their previous report “Belarus in the Context of Russia-NATO Contradiction” made a lot of noise in the Russian media-space, and the authors were accused of Russophobia and threatened with jail, nn.by writes.

The new report appears as sharp in assessments as the previous one. From the very start, the experts raise the issue that Russia will try to secure total military and political control over Belarus in the first ten months of the year 2017.

“At present moment, the Belarusian-Russian relations can be characterized as a full-fledged complex crisis, which includes both discrepancies on specific economic issues and contradictions on fundamental problems of strategic and military-political character,” — Sivitskiy and Tsarik think.

The authors list the following sorest issues of the Belarusian –Russian relations: 1) pressure on Belarus aimed at placement of the Russian troops at the territory of the country on a constant basis. 2) The plan for sending 4162 wagons with military cargo to Belarus, which was not coordinated with the Belarusian side. 3) The non-consent of the Belarusian side to pay for the Russian gas under the contract price in connection with the sharp decrease of world prices for energy resources compared to the level recorded in the contract, and a number of other issues.

“In the conditions of the complex crisis of the Belarusian-Russian relations, given the process of the development of the international situation and Russia’s domestic policy, the Russian side is getting more and more impulses for solving the situation which seems to be developing in a one-sided way.

Such solving of the situation lies in securing total single-sided military and political control over the Republic of Belarus by the Russian Federation, either by changing the regime or implementation of the extreme forms of pressure on the current leaders of the Republic of Belarus,” – the analysts say.

In fact, the issue is raised that Russia may attempt at dethroning Aliaksandr Lukashenka this year to replace him with a leader who would be more loyal to Russia.

“From the perspective of the Russian public opinion, legitimacy can be secured in the framework of the narratives of two types. The first type narrative may presume that the current leaders of Belarus allegedly became victims of the actions of the “pro-Western nationalist opposition”, and the Russian Federation, by meddling into the situation, “facilitates reinstatement of the legal government and constitutional order”.

The second type narrative may be that the current authorities of the Republic of Belarus turned away from Russia by themselves and united with the West against Moscow. In such case, the Russian Federation will just protect its national interests,” — the experts presume.

“The Russian side suddenly activated its work with the ultra-right elements in Belarus. The controversial policy of the Belarusian force structures with regard to the fans groups also contributes to this,” — Sivitskiy and Tsarik write about the instruments the Russian side may use to fulfill its plan.

They call working with the secret services another advantage of Russia. “This advantage lies in a higher level of resourcing, the greater personnel potential of the corresponding Russian institutions (which have been recently joined by the Russian Guard , in the structure of which own intelligence service was created), as well as in their ability to influence the work of the Belarusian counter-agents both by official channels and non-officially.”

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