To read Part One, please click here.To read Part Two, please click here.To read Part Three, please click here. To help lessen Belarus’s economic dependence on Russia, and reach out to mainstream Belarusian society, the European Union has a range of non-political instruments available. The... MORE

To read Part One, please click here.To read Part Two, please click here. President Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s policy is one of benevolent neutrality sympathetic toward Ukraine in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war. Belarus’s diplomacy and its trade policies tilt in Ukraine’s favor to the extent possible without... MORE

In his lengthy and informative May 19 interview to the Washington Post, Foreign Minister of Belarus Uadzimir Makei responded to four variations of one and the same persistent question: Should Belarus develop its relations more with the West or with Russia? Makei stood his ground,... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here. Its membership in the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) serves Belarus, to some extent, as a form of political insurance vis-à-vis Russia. This involves stable supplies of Russian oil and natural gas at discounted prices, anti-crisis and currency... MORE

At the European Union’s Eastern Partnership summit in Riga (May 21–22), the EU’s neighborhood and enlargement policies came to a grinding halt. To some extent this is an effect of Russia’s war against Ukraine, the centerpiece country of the EU’s Eastern Partnership. But, irrespective of... MORE

Prior to its start, the European Union’s May 21–22 Eastern Partnership (EaP) summit in Riga was widely anticipated, given that the previous summit in Vilnius had been overshadowed by the war in Ukraine and newly evident Russian expansionism. Russia’s aggressive policies caused concerns in those... MORE

At the May 21–22 Riga summit of the European Union’s Eastern Partnership (EaP), Belarus was represented by Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei. Nothing groundbreaking was achieved at Riga with regard to Belarus. The country refused to sign the summit declaration’s first version, which had condemned Russia... MORE

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Belarus on May 10-12, following his visit to Russia to join President Vladimir Putin in the military parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, has led to new questions in Taiwan about Xi’s... MORE

On May 9, Belarus celebrated the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. According to Emmanuel Ioffe, an authoritative Minsk historian (no relation to this author), the overall number of Belarus’s casualties in that war amounted to 3,074,000, whereas the country’s population on... MORE

On May 7, Belarus’s national ice hockey team beat the United States for the first time, netting a 5–2 win at the world championship in Prague (BELTA, May 8). Hardly any piece of news pleased Belarusians more than this one. Yet, one may also recall... MORE