6 October 2020, NIICE Commentary 6091
Sabyasachi Biswal
The recent electoral crisis in Belarus is not an exceptional political phenomenon. Regardless of being constitutionally democratic, Belarus’s incumbent leader Lukashenko has extracted eerie pleasure in being addressed as “Europe’s last dictator. This former Soviet satellite state has been a poster child of controversies surrounding its presidential elections since 1994. However, a rigged election added with undying economic woes, and Belarus’ dwindling COVID-19 response created an unexpected wave of protests in August 2020. Considered as a tipping point in Belarusian politics after over a decade, the protest group, frustrated with a lack of political change, were met with violent police engagement, detention, raids, and torture.
EU’s Belarusian Headache
The trend of mass protests and equally stringent state reaction came as a shock to many, who considered it as a devastating chain of events amidst a global pandemic. However, a moderate reaction from major international communities functioning around the region also drew considerable ire. Amongst these supranational communities, a lack of stringent reaction from the European Union (EU) stands out. EU held a rare virtual emergency session on 19 August 2020, headed by EU Council President James Michel. The Council, thereafter, unanimously called the elections rigged, and directed the EU External Action to draw up a list of sanctions against Lukashenko’s strongmen. However, it is not yet certain if these sanctions will also be directed towards Lukashenko. Furthermore, in a surprising turn of events, EU declined to call Belarus a geopolitical crisis, even though its spill-over had considerable ramifications for Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland, who now collectively are providing asylum to a lot of Belarusian opposition including the opposition Presidential candidate Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.
Analysts around the world pivot EU’s lack of stern actions in Belarus to two major factors. First, Belarus’ relationship with the EU has taken an upward surge since 2016. After the events of Ukraine, EU categorises Belarus as a peaceful geopolitical neighbour san any major territorial dispute. For this, they also accredited Belarus as one of the most stable Eastern Partners (EaP), and a credible buffer between the EU and Russia. Moreover, EU’s intervention in the Belarusian economic, education and social integration system has been largely successful, where EU’s exports to Belarus in terms of goods, and services have increased to EUR6.7 billion, and EUR2.3 billion in 2018 respectively. EU signed a VISA re-admission agreement with Belarus, which came into force a month before the Belarusian elections. Secondly, Russia’s influence in Belarus is not a clandestine event, Russia has been looking at a Soviet-style unification with pro-Soviet Lukashenko for over a decade now. Therefore, the EU’s direct involvement in Belarus does threaten to trigger a military response from Russia. Furthermore, the EU also has a direct interest in Russia in terms of oil and gas, which they at any cost will prevent to slide down into jeopardy. Gazprom’s Nord Stream and Nord Stream II pipeline promise to deliver at least 55 billion cubic meters of LNG to the EU via the Baltic Sea, and vis-à-vis Germany. This project aims to strengthen EU’s commitment to the 2015 Paris Agreement and its futuristic energy security, whose reins for the time being lie in the hands of Moscow.
Beijing’s Gains from EU’s Lack of Strategy
Nevertheless, beyond the understanding of the usual, there is a third factor which also is extremely important in influencing EU’s response to Belarus and can have a considerable impact on EU’s policy in the Balkans – China. China’s foreign investments in Belarus are one of its biggest interventions in the last decade or so. Last year, the Chinese Development Bank gave a loan of USD 500 million to Belarus to boost the latter’s economy. A year before that, in 2018, China rose as a prominent trade partner in Minsk. Both the countries closed annual trade at USD 3.5 billion, a 17.1 percent increase than the previous year. On top of that, Beijing considers Belarus as a ‘pearl’ of BRI, for its ability to act as a strategic route between Europe, the Balkans and Asia. Apropos to that prospect, Beijing helped Belarus set up the Green Stone Industrial Park, attracting an investment of USD 1 billion from 56 foreign companies, including the Chinese giants Huawei and ZTE for the up-gradation of 5G pilot projects. Furthermore, the industrial park will be an important point of contact between Beijing and Minsk through the Trans-European Railways, where the free flow of goods processed and manufactured in Belarus with raw materials procured from China will flood European markets. Fortunately for Belarus, China’s prospect of economic help does not come with a clause on violation of its national sovereignty, unlike Russia.
China has also been extremely successful in gaining a positive trajectory in the good books of the EU. Overcoming the Euro-scepticism in a COVID-19 infested world and gaining from the breaches in EU’s fragile legal commitments to human rights, Sino-European relations have finally gained reciprocity, whose interests incline towards China. EU has always been wary of China’s state-owned enterprise system, and Beijing’s extreme percolation into EU markets for critical goods. Nonetheless, the EU finds it difficult to shun China in its strategic sectors, if not completely. EU members states remain divided on the geopolitical ramifications of engaging with China as a long-term partner, with a majority looking at it as a pragmatic strategic partner, with a minor reminiscence of rivalry. Furthermore, China has also been successful in keeping EU’s most influential member – Germany, as a profitable partner, registering almost USD 27,000 million in trade in 2018. On top of that, the EU in its bid to increase its global footprint looks at China as an important partner in the Comprehensive Agreement for Investment (CAI). In the EU-China summit which concluded in 2020, EU re-iterated its assessment of China as an important strategic partner. As a result, the EU asked for greater Chinese intervention in the post-COVID-19 global order, including technology transfer, improving market access in agriculture, finance and digital sector. Moreover, EU decided to remain moderate on China’s role in furthering the COVID-19 crisis, and its massive human rights violation in Hong Kong and Xinjiang, which is sure to build Beijing’s interest in furthering trade with EU in a cooperation plan scheduled between 2021 to 2025.
Beijing’s Move to Surround the EU’s Eastern Periphery
It seems that China has been successful in creating a symbiotic cycle in Europe and the Balkan states. China needs Belarus in furthering its trade influence on the European periphery through BRI, as much as the EU needs China to categorically expand its trade in Asia and beyond. China has found a stable friend in Lukashenko, and to maintain the status quo will act to deny any change in the political leadership, that might see the reinstatement of a pro-West leader. Furthermore, Belarus also looks at China as a partner of utmost convenience. Torn between the coercive inclination between the US and Russia, China for Belarus is a boon, who can surely keep the investment flowing without conditions, unlike the former parties. China on the other hand gains massively by being Belarus’s go-to replacement of Russia, and a possible deterrent to the rising US influence cemented in February 2020. The expansion of BRI into uncharted Balkan and Baltic territories also act as icing on a cake for Beijing. In the end, to put words into action, China influencing EU’s rhetoric around Belarus will be the most obvious pathway for Beijing’s European dominance. In a post-COVID-19 world, contrary to what was believed, the lure of cheap goods will only attract EU closer to China. Much before the pandemic, China was already EU’s largest source of imports. Furthermore, the Chinese are now heavily investing in debt-ridden European companies at lucrative prices to save them from the economic downfall of the pandemic, while upgrading their R&D facilities in the EU’s single market. This entrenchment will further bend Europe’s chronic problem of dealing with authoritarian leaders, and the rule of European unanimity in the EU, where some influential EU members will always look towards China for trade and investment, therefore, vetoing aggressive actions to reduce China’s influence.
