Moscow leaves Minsk on the brink of bankruptcy

Kremlin-controlled fund refuses loan to Lukashenko regime. Belarus has maturing debts of .3 billion. The Belarusian dictator fuels Russian-Ukrainian tensions to secure Putin's protection.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - The regime of Aleksandr Lukashenko's request to the Eurasian Stability and Development Fund for a loan of 3.5 billion dollars, has been rejected because "the Fund does not have the availability of such a sum". Belarus will have to pay USD 3.3 billion for its foreign debts this year, and is at serious risk of default.

Belarusian economist Lev Margolin, speaking on udf.by, identified the problem not in Russia's, the Fund's main manager, lack of reserve funds, but that "all the money invested in Belarus is being thrown to the wind with Lukashenko's current policy". Moscow needs more convincing political arguments to justify its economic efforts.

Putin has summoned Lukashenko to Moscow for the umpteenth time "to bring him to heel", according to the Russian expression, to force him to keep the promises he made in September 2020 to put the new Constitution to a referendum and then organise new presidential elections, in which he should step aside. The Belarusian "batka" (godfather), as usual, plays with circumstances, and the presence of Russian troops in Belarus for the conflict with Ukraine becomes for him a new "life insurance": as long as there is a war, it is not the case to arouse new emotions at the national level.

The Russians, however, will not be satisfied with the usual 'vassal sallies', as Margolin put it, and demand that Belarus start solving its own problems. Current debts can be covered by gold reserves and exports before they are completely blocked by Western sanctions. After scraping the bottom of the barrel, however, only the abyss of bankruptcy remains, and then the Kremlin will have to take definitive decisions.

This is one of the reasons why Lukashenko is trying to further inspire the Russian anti-Ukrainian offensive, which in itself does not directly benefit Belarus. In Moscow he raised the issue of 'joint exercises', stating that Russia should also have atomic and 'super-atomic' weapons on Belarusian territory. The Russians struggled to contain and deny the declarations of the cumbersome ally, who set himself up as the captain of the common army stating that 'as we decide, so it will be done'.

In Lukashenko's words, the Russian army becomes 'our armed forces, which are on our land, where we work, study and will continue to work... if our adversaries do something stupid, we will throw nuclear weapons at them'. Hence the political consequence: 'If the collective West, above all the US, continues to put Belarus in its sights and stir up unrest as it did in 2020, then I will have to stay in my place', with no deadline.

For the Belarusian president, the Ukrainian war is just one episode in the Western campaign against Russian institutions and traditions, and against his own regime. In his view, the popular protests against his re-election were part of a single plot. Putin allowed Lukashenko to attend the nuclear weapons exercises on condition that he stop making empty declarations for his own internal benefit.

French President Macron, in the famous six-metre table meeting, addressed his concern about Lukašenko's threats on nuclear weapons, and according to him, "Putin reassured me about this". Anything can be expected from the old Belarusian autocrat, however, especially when Moscow tries to keep him calm and resolve Belarusian issues for him: the batka could become the dreaded 'accident' that triggers conflict on both sides. Then he would no longer have to worry about paying his debts.

• belarus
• minsk
• russia
• moscow
• ukraine
• war
• economy
• debts
• vladimir putin
• aleksandr lukašenko