141–150 of 422 posts
I am surprised Hungary agreed. And Poland. The governments in those nations are not shy to touch on the freedoms of their population, and often disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out. Also Poland being directly next to Belarus will affect their relations.
I am surprised Hungary agreed. And Poland. The governments in those nations are not shy to touch on the freedoms of their population, and often disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out. Also Poland being directly next to Belarus will affect their relations.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure if Belarussians having to cancel their holidays to the West and going to Crimea instead is going to have the desired effect of driving sympathies among Belarussians toward the west. Moreover the people who actually like Lukashenko will probably be pretty indifferent to this. They weren't planning on flying to Berlin any time soon. I'm almost certain Putin will jump on the chance to have alternate routes…
The desired effect is to increase pressure on Lukashenko and I'm sure every holidaymaker with a ruined trip knows very well whose stupid stunt is to blame for it.
I don't think he's losing out that badly here. Indeed, increased isolation from the West may have been a goal from the outset. Having the West do it for him is even better.
I am surprised Hungary agreed. And Poland. The governments in those nations are not shy to touch on the freedoms of their population, and often disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out. Also Poland being directly next to Belarus will affect their relations.
As others have said these sanctions will likely do more to harm the repressed citizens of the regime than Lukashenko
[1] https://www.bnt.eu/cs/zpravy/pravni-novinky/3137-belarus-int...
EU gets to appear "tough" while, unfortunately, this is only going to hurt people of Belarus. This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus.
This is how sanctions usually work. The leaders of the country should be representing interests of the people. > This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus. This narrative only works short-term. Sooner or later people realize it is not what is happening no matter how much propaganda is being produced.
I am surprised Hungary agreed. And Poland. The governments in those nations are not shy to touch on the freedoms of their population, and often disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out. Also Poland being directly next to Belarus will affect their relations.
Disagreeing with the EU != equivalent to an authoritarian regime. Politics is more complicated than Good Guys vs. Bad Guys.
Your parent said: "disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out". And that definitely happened, the EU has been saying "we're concerned about that" for a while now, and the only response has been "nah, it's fine".
Worth noting in all of this that Belarus recently closed their land borders to citizens [1], under the guise of COVID, but in reality to stop people leaving. The only way out was flying from Minsk, which is now even less of an option if there are no flights to the EU. As others have said these sanctions will likely do more to harm the repressed citizens of the regime than Lukashenko [1] https://www.bnt.eu/cs/zpravy/p…
I feel that that is true for almost all sanctions everywhere sadly. The Russians love their children too. In fact we have to really think hard on who they benefit, short and long term. Making markets more independent of each other is only making a war more likely. If goods don't cross borders armies will.
What is a better alternative? I don't know, but perhaps targeted educational pieces, like scientific papers to educate populations? Yeah it sounds like propaganda, but perhaps one can add methods to verify claims or something? Show how exactly a policy is detrimental to the population in question? It's a hard problem, I'm not claiming otherwise.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's probably going to be both ways, though. I can't imagine Belarus not retaliating (though the EU has already decided to avoid their airspace, anyway).
For an airline, it's much easier to fly around Belarus and not land in Belarus, than to fly around the EU and not land in the EU.
EU gets to appear "tough" while, unfortunately, this is only going to hurt people of Belarus. This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus.
This is how sanctions usually work. The leaders of the country should be representing interests of the people. > This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus. This narrative only works short-term. Sooner or later people realize it is not what is happening no matter how much propaganda is being produced.