Bond: Belarusians Will Be Able To Protect Their Country From Putin

• 9.11.2023, 16:21

The British diplomat answered the question about the future of Belarus.

The political director of the European Reform Center and the former ambassador of Great Britain to Latvia Ian Bond expressed the opinion that Belarusians will be able to protect their country from Putin, writes bb.lv.

Answering the question about the future of Belarus, Bond emphasized the huge importance of mass demonstrations in 2020 against the regime of Aliaksandr Lukashenka. The expert does not believe that Putin's attempt to seize power in Belarus in one way or another will be unequivocally crowned with success.

“In the 1990s, we were worried that Belarus has a very weak national identity, that Belarusians feel Russian in many ways. However, over the past 30 years, Belarusians have developed as Belarusians. To some extent, we saw this clearly in 2020,” Bond said.

Although the protests failed to overthrow Lukashenka, they were extremely large-scale, continued for a long time and required great violence to suppress them, the expert noted.

“Belarusians confirmed that they are different from the Russians, who were much more passive. Even in 2011 and 2012, when there were also protests against the fabrication of election results in Russia, they were nowhere near as massive as in Minsk in the summer of 2020,” said Bond.

Therefore, Lukashenka realizes that his position is fragile. He obviously understands that it would be very dangerous to involve the army in hostilities in Ukraine without the support of the people, so he can only offer Putin rhetorical support and carry out harmful actions on the borders of NATO countries.

“However, if at the beginning of the war we were afraid that Belarus might become an active participant in the war, now it worries me much less,” Bond summarized.