Articles | Third Way

29 Сентября, Monday, 14:00 – We are back.

Belarus Opens Up To The FT
11/20/2008 - 16:26 / Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty
The "FT" has an interesting package on Belarus this week, spelling out that change is inevitable and on the way. It's a good read, focused mostly on how Belarus is privatizing its state-run enterprises and opening up to Western investment.
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Changing Priorities in Belarus
11/20/2008 - 16:12 / Eurasia Daily Monitor
Several recent events suggest that changes are underway in Belarus as it emerges from isolation and begins new dialogues with the countries of the European Union. According to sociological surveys, the electorate remains behind the president; and after a brief shock engendered by sharp price rises at the end of 2007, Belarusian society rapidly returned to apathy, which is described in the official media as “stability” (Belorusy i Rynok, November 17-24). That allowed the government of President Alyaksandr Lukashenka to enjoy a comfortable victory in the 2008 parliamentary elections, albeit in a restrictive environment.
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Belarus Responds Cautiously to Georgian Crisis
09/03/2008 - 22:01 / The Jamestown Foundation
One of the interesting features of the Russia-Georgia conflict has been the sluggish support Russia has received from its allies. Perhaps most notable has been the reaction in Minsk, where the government of President Alyaksandr Lukashenka has acted ambivalently and still appears to be vacillating over the wisest course of action.
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Boundary Issues
08/24/2008 - 16:59 / The New Yorker
On a bright September day in 1993, not long before he ended his two decades in exile, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn delivered a rare public address in Vaduz, the capital of Liechtenstein. Although Solzhenitsyn was energetic at the lectern, he was all but finished with his epic work as the chronicler of Soviet cruelty. With “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich,” “Cancer Ward,” “The First Circle,” and, above all, “The Gulag Archipelago,” Solzhenitsyn had not only exposed the secrets of Soviet oppression and ruin; he had also presaged the collapse of Communist ideology and Moscow’s empire.
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Lukashenko after the Georgian Invasion
08/19/2008 - 14:07 / The Financial
Like other Former Soviet countries, Belarus is reassessing its relationship with Russia and the West after Moscow ’s conflict with Georgia. While not long ago Minsk may have entertained the idea of gradually opening up to the West, the Georgian example will drive it back forcefully into the Kremlin’s orbit. Read analysis by STRATFOR.
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Looking Both Ways
08/18/2008 - 11:09 / The Guardian
Western politicians and commentators have been quick to seize on the conflict in South Ossetia as a defining moment in world history, or their careers. Some have been clambering to play peacemaker (Sarkozy, Kouchner), others want to boost their reputations for taking a strong line with Moscow (McCain, Miliband). But closer to Russia, in the neighbouring countries of Ukraine and Belarus, some politicians have been conspicuous by their silence.
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The National Future of Belarus
04/18/2008 - 12:10 / Foreign Policy in Focus
Last December Vladimir Putin of Russia paid a visit to Aleksandr Lukashenka of Belarus. This prompted local and international media to speculate on whether the visit was to clinch a deal between the two presidents for a (re)unification of Belarus with Russia. Belarusian nationalists bemoaned the prospect while tacitly admitting that they wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. Although nothing came of the meeting, the issue remains on the agenda.
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Dancing Around Dictatorship
04/12/2008 - 00:40 / The Prague Wanderer
In the middle of the documentary “Belarusian Waltz,” director Andrzej Fidyk moves the camera from his hero, Alexander Pushkin, to his wife. She smiles sweetly and recites a popular joke: A Belarusian man is hanged, and his body is left dangling from the noose for two days, until officials take him down and lay him on the grass. The man comes to and starts coughing. The shocked officials ask him, "How is it possible?" The man replies, "You know, it was hard – but I got used to it."
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Dark Dance
04/11/2008 - 00:42 / Economist
America calls it the “last dictatorship in Europe”. It has political prisoners, police crackdowns, state-run media and a security service called the KGB. So Belarus's image could do with polishing. Its irascible president, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, seems to accept this: Tim Bell, one of Britain's top public-relations men, was recently seen in Minsk, where he was in talks about a consultancy contract. As a Tory spin-doctor, he helped turn Margaret Thatcher into an election-winner. As Lord Bell he represents rich eastern Europeans such as Boris Berezovsky, an émigré Russian oligarch.
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Belarus: Political Draft
04/10/2008 - 17:35 / ISN Security Watch
NATO should respond forcefully to Belarus over indications of a new trend to use the military draft for political ends, Jeremy Druker comments for ISN Security Watch.
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