Yesterday Aliaksandr Lukashenka asked officials to make sure that foreign journalists would face no restrictions on media coverage of the Ice hockey World Championship in May. Next month Minsk will host a major international sports event for the first time in the history of independent Belarus.
The Crimean crisis stirred up a number of comments on the probability of Russian annexation of Belarus. The topic is not completely new. Since the 1990s, fears of Russia taking over Belarus – under pretext of integration process - were one of...
20 years ago, Alexander Lukashenka won the presidential elections in Belarus thanks to his anti-corruption slogans. Today he returns the issue into an item of public discourse - last month Lukashenka proclaimed that Ukraine had a revolution because of corruption. Over the last...
The presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia plan to sign the founding treaty of the Eurasian Economic Union in May 2014. With the signing less than two months ahead, the parties cannot reach a compromise on a number of contested issues, such...
On 23 March, Alexander Lukashenka asked journalists to send him their suggestions for a candidate for a new prime minister of Belarus. For a long time the leader of the Belarusian has been intensifying his rhetoric about his dissatisfaction with the economic results of...
On 23 March, Belarus held elections for its local councils. During Lukashenka's rule the local elections have turned into little more than a procedural administrative task for the authorities and a minor holiday with alcohol and music for voters. The nation's legislative bodies do not pretend to...
On 10 March the EU Delegation to Belarus organised a conference entitled 'EU-Belarus Sectoral Cooperation: Looking Back and Looking Forward' in Minsk. Belarusian and European diplomats in attendance agreed that the crisis in Ukraine would not affect EU-Belarus relations as they are...
On 10 April the Belarus Reality Check took place, hosted by the European Endowment for Democracy in Brussels. This is the third event of this series which involves a number of Western and Belarusian analysts and policy-makers. Previous events took place in
On 7 March, Ukrainian espreso.tv reported that Belarus refused to send observers to the Crimean referendum. This is not the first time that the Belarusian authorities have disobeyed Russia, because the interests of...
At a meeting of presidents of the Customs Union on 5 March, Putin desperately tried to gain support on for Russia's invasion of Ukraine from his closest allies, Belarus and Kazakstan. All his efforts, it would seem, appear to be in...
On 24 February the coordinator of the "Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections" initiative Valiantsin Stefanovich called the upcoming 23 March 2014 local elections in Belarus "an invisible campaign." His point is not without merit, when considering the total passiveness, apathy...
The Russian Parliament has approved the Russian president's request to use military forces in Ukraine. People sneer in social networks: he asked to approve the bringing of troops, which are already there. But actually there...
On March 23 votes will be cast for over 20,000 seats in regional and local councils in Belarus. These elections are unlikely to be any more free, fair or competitive than recent parliamentary...
Earlier this month Belarusian ambassador to Paris Pavel Latushka harshly criticised Belarusian producers for their alleged low reliability and problems with selling their goods abroad on a state TV channel. Latushka with his sophisticated background and behaviour always remained flamboyant and never...
