Carl Bildt: "Lukashenka asks for help. Europe will lay down its conditions”

Trial against two more presidential candidates started on May 5 - Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu and Vital Rymasheuski. Experts, politicians and diplomats met on that very day in the Polish Institute of International Affairs in Warsaw in order to discuss European policy of good neigbourliness.

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt was the main guest of the event. Naturally, Belarus issues were in the center of attention.

Bildt: “It is essential that we should hold on to the principle "more for more" and "less for less" in the Eastern Partnership, I mean, when someone goes for reforms, he should have more support and opportunities, and vice versa. Speaking about "less for less", we have an obvious example - Belarus. A person who takes decisions in Minsk chose another direction, he decided to go down, even fall down. This naturally reflected in our ability to help Belarus with reforms and to integrate it into the European community. This is a European county which has an authoritarian regime - and this cannot be combined. I think this will change - and our proposal lies on the table in Minsk. At the same time we clearly state that political prisoners and political harassment which we see at the moment are unacceptable for us”.

The Minister underlined that although a considerable part of the Europeans' attention is paid to the events in the South after revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, it doesn’t mean that the Eastern neighbours' issue will go to the background. As for Belarus, the Minister does not think it is reasonable to impose economic sanctions.

Bildt: “Targeted economic sanctions - yes. However, the main problem which Belarus is facing is a very, very big economic chaos. It wouldn't be so bad if Belarus had investors, foreign partners, if it had been a reliable country for credits and could get money with a reasonable interest rate.

Photo: pinchukfund.org