BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

29/04/2009

Belarusian Opposition Sees Economic Collapse Soon

By Katya Andrusz

April 29 (Bloomberg) -- The Belarusian economy, battered by the global financial crisis and falling energy prices, will collapse within six months if the European Union fails to come to its aid, opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich said.

"The only thing that can help us now is the EU," Milinkevich said yesterday in an interview in Warsaw. "We just have to reform, even in this period of crisis."

Belarus, a former Soviet republic of 10 million wedged between Russia and the 27-nation EU, has indicated it wants to open up to the West after President Alexander Lukashenko was dubbed "Europe's last dictator" in 2005 by the former U.S. administration of George W. Bush. While Belarus and Russia discussed a formal union for more than a decade, relations between the two nations cooled because of fuel-pricing disputes.

In a speech to European Christian Democrats meeting in Warsaw, European Parliament President Hans-Gert Poettering today echoed Milinkevich's words.

"We have to fight for the Belarusians, so they, too, can live in democracy and freedom," he said.

Milinkevich lost 2006 presidential elections to Lukashenko in a vote the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe said fell short of democratic standards. He said it would be dangerous to leave Belarus in the lurch to force a collapse of the regime.

"Maybe there would be a revolution then, if people lost all they had," he said. "But I've never heard of a revolution that started on the streets that has led to greater democracy -- it's more likely to lead to a 'back to the USSR' sentiment."

Falling Exports

Exports to Russia, Belarus' biggest trading partner, have plummeted as the powerful eastern neighbor struggles with imploding revenue from gas and oil sales and investors flee emerging Europe. The Belarusian ruble was devalued by 20 percent earlier this year in a bid to increase exports, Foreign Minister Sergei Martynov said in February.

"The Belarusian economy is ineffective and not at all competitive," Milinkevich said. "And what we do produce is getting harder and harder to sell."

The current situation could be advantageous to the Belarusian opposition in the longer term, as the regime will be forced to seek a compromise with the EU and open up further towards the West, Milinkevich said.

"The EU has to make its help conditional -- the authorities won't change of their own accord," he said. "But I think the EU understands the situation we have in Belarus."

To contact the reporter on this story: Katya Andrusz in Warsaw

Source:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601095&sid=avii19AP2sm4

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