The Belarusian authorities intend to scale back its diplomatic presence in Western Europe and increase its presence in the CIS, China, other countries, Foreign Minister Uladzimir Makey told journalists on the back of Monday’s meeting with Alyaksandr Lukashenka.
“We are significantly reducing the diplomatic presence in European countries. I do not mean that we are reducing the number of embassies and missions. We are cutting down on the number of diplomatic personnel. But we are redeploying them to other areas of work, to other countries where they will be needed, for example the CIS countries. We are increasing the number of personnel of a number of embassies and stepping up our diplomatic presence in the distant countries,” state-run news agency BelTA quotes the minister.
According to Makey, there will be more Belarusian diplomats in the countries that are ‘strategically important’, e.g. China and India. The officials are also mulling over opening new embassies in a number of ‘financially reliable’ African countries where the demand for Belarusian goods is pressing.
On December 2, the European Union adopted the 5th package of sanctions against the Lukashenka regime over its human rights abuses and fostering the migrant crisis on the borders of the EU. It is not rulled out that cutting down the staff of Belarusian embassies located in the EU countries is a response to that.
During last week’s press conference following the EaP summit in Brussels, Belsat TV journalist Alina Koushyk asked European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen whether Europe was ready to eliminate the loopholes in the sanctions imposed on the regime.
“There should be no loopholes in sanctions, we are trying to remove them. We are working [on it]. Sanctions should work. In the situation with Belarus, we have seen how effectively we can work if the EU acts in a quick and coordinated manner. We can achieve a lot in such case. We introduced immediate sanctions when there was a common position on Belarus, it changed the situation, and thousands of migrants returned home. Our joint sanctions do work,” she answered.
On December 16, the European Council stressed the need of ‘promptly implementing restrictive measures, following the adoption of the fifth package of listings’, and ‘being prepared to adopt further measures as necessary’. In its conclusions, the EU body also reiterated its call for the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners and for an end to the repression of civil society and independent media.
Belsat.eu
