Media: Lukashenka wants Russian troops to defend his regime
- 31.08.2011, 10:08
Suggestions to use the CSTO military forces to suppress rebellions were called futile.
Alyaksandr Lukashenka suggested that the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) consisting of Belarus, Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Armenia, use its military forces to suppress revolts in the organization member states. Lukashenka says the idea has already been agreed and approved by Moscow.
Experts find Lukashenka's proposals to use CSTO military forces to suppress inner rebellions predictable, but prospectless. “The so called ochlos revolutions in a number of Arab countries show that rebels are hard to crush without serious armed forces. Leadership of Moscow and especially Minsk seems to extremely worry about this. They try to launch something that would be able to respond to internal threats. The CSTO legislation is to answer this task,” Doctor of Historical Studies Col. Vladimir Popov, a military expert, thinks.
The CSTO has not yet invented an exact mechanism to suppress internal revolts. The CSTO press service preferred not to comment on Lukashenka's statement to Gazeta.Ru. However, a source close to the organization supposes that the organization is not yet ready for such interferences reminding that even last year's ethnic conflict in Kyrgyzstan puzzled the union members and a decision on bringing in peacekeeping forces was not made.
A member of the Russian Duma and member of the committee in CIS affairs, Tatyana Moskaltsova, said categorically that Lukashenka's proposal “contradicts the aims, the charter and tasks of the collective rapid response forces”. “Inconsistency of the Belarusian president again gives a reason to surprise. Last year, he refused to take over CSTO chairmanship and hosted Bakiyev (the ousted president of Kyrgyzstan) in his country. In spite of CSTO general statements on Georgia's aggression towards South Ossetia in 2008, Lukashenka meets with Georgian president Mekheil Saakashvili,” Moskaltsova notes.
Lukashenka proposed another radical idea at the meeting with the CSTO Secretary General. He offered to gain control over foreign military bases in CSTO member states: deployment will be allowed only upon approval of the Council of the CSTO head of states.