Latest Articles about Belarus
THE RUSSIA-BELARUS GAS DEAL: LUKASHENKA SUFFERS A DEFEAT
Two minutes before midnight on December 31, Russia's Gazprom and the Belarusian government signed a contract to supply Russian gas to Belarus for the next five years. Had the agreement not been signed, Gazprom had threatened to cut off gas supplies to its smaller neighbor,... MORE
LUKASHENKA OPTS FOR NUCLEAR POWER
Belarus, the Soviet republic most heavily affected by fallout from the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl, has decided to develop its own nuclear power industry. On December 1, Mikhail Myasnikovich, chairman of the National Academy of Sciences, made the announcement at a meeting concerning the... MORE
LUKASHENKA SEEKS NEW ALLIES TO END THE RUSSIAN GAS IMPASSE
Over the past few days Belarusian officials have held several high-level meetings involving Russia, Ukraine, and Azerbaijan, and Minsk played host to a summit of Commonwealth of Independent States leaders. President Alexander Lukashenka has used the period constructively, in an apparent quest to stave off... MORE
MILINKEVICH FACES NEW TASKS
The leader of the United Democratic Forces of Belarus (UDF), Alyaksandr Milinkevich, has signed an agreement with the Party of the Belarusian Popular Front. According to the leader of the initiative group for the formation of the movement "For Freedom," Viktar Karnienka, the agreement is... MORE
OFFICIAL MINSK OUTRAGED BY MOSCOW’S POLITICAL USE OF THE ENERGY LEVERAGE
Belarus President Alexander Lukashenka’s visit to the Kremlin, scheduled for Friday, November 10, “will obviously be a rather difficult meeting,” according to Russia’s Ambassador in Minsk, Alexander Surikov, at a stage-setting news conference. Russia will not offer low-priced energy to Belarus, he warned, because “Russia... MORE
WILL THE OPPOSITION BOYCOTT LOCAL ELECTIONS IN BELARUS?
On January 14, 2007, voters in Belarus will again go to the polls to elect local governments. The opposition, including the United Democratic Forces (UDF) movement, is debating the wisdom of participating in another election that is little more than a façade. A majority, encouraged... MORE
LUKASHENKA: WHY THE UNION STATE DOES NOT EXIST
In the past week, 83 journalists from 73 different Russian media outlets visited Belarus. They hailed from 48 regions of Russia and were given a tour of enterprises and collective farms in Hrodna and Mahileu oblasts. At the end of the tour they were invited... MORE
CHANGES PROPOSED TO BELARUSIAN LANGUAGE
The newspaper Belarusy i rynok recently ran a series of articles on education, devoted first to the new school year, but second to proposed changes to orthography and punctuation in the Belarusian language. These new rules are anticipated to move from draft to law in... MORE
BELARUS CREATES NEW SCANDAL WITH LATVIA
On July 25 the Belarusian militia searched the apartment of the Second Secretary of the Latvian Embassy, Reimo Smits, ostensibly as part of a campaign to uncover the distribution of pornographic materials in the Savetski district of Minsk. The incident sparked a diplomatic scandal that... MORE
HOW SECURE IS LUKASHENKA?
Having attained through dubious means another overwhelming election victory last March, and having amended the Belarusian constitution yet again so that there are no limits to his term in office, President Alexander Lukashenka appears to be more firmly in power than ever before. Yet there... MORE