Why Does the Kremlin Change Its Ambassador to Minsk?

• Andrey Fedorov, Belorusskie Novosti
• 13.03.2021, 12:10

It is possible that the style of the new representative of the Russian Federation will be closer to the style of Mikhail Babich.

It seems that the main task of the now de facto former Russian ambassador to Belarus, Dmitry Mezentsev, was to hide Moscow's true intentions with soothing conversations. In the current situation, his successor may be instructed to take a tougher position.

The recent meeting between Putin and Lukashenka in Sochi prompted many comments. However, since official information about its content turned out to be very scarce, their authors were forced to be content with fragmentary information and could, in fact, only speculate about the outcome of the negotiations.

The informed persons either kept silent or got off with general reasoning.

Therefore, from a rather large interview of the Russian Ambassador to Belarus Dmitry Mezentsev to the RosBusinessConsulting company, it seemed, one could expect at least some concretization of the true state of the Belarusian-Russian relations and their prospects.

However, the matter boiled down to standard diplomatic avoidance of even the most acute topics. With rare exceptions, the answers sounded like "everything is fine, and if something is still not quite, it will be soon."

At the same time, there were some, to put it mildly, inaccuracies. Take, for example, the statement that “the Russian Federation has never allowed itself in relation to Belarus those steps that could be interpreted as some kind of pressure, threats, a reason for offense... By definition, this is impossible.”

To refute it, it is enough to recall that in December 2006, the chairman of the board of directors of Gazprom, Alexei Miller, threatened to cut off the gas supply to Belarus if the contract was not signed. And in 2010, then Russian President Dmitry Medvedev demanded to pay off the debt to the same Gazprom, threatening otherwise to reduce supplies.

Now Minsk is being twisted in several ways, in particular, through the tax maneuver in the Russian oil industry.

Sputnik is in an obscure orbit

The loud statement also raises questions that our country was the first with which Russia shared not only its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine but also its production technology. Yes, but in Belarus, it began at the end of February, however, a similar agreement with Brazil was reached on August 12, and the launch was given there on January 15.

In general, the situation with Sputnik is not entirely clear. In order to increase its influence, the Kremlin is doing its best to expand its production as widely as possible, including across the EU, but the companies there are behaving very restrainedly.

In particular, for some reason, even R-Pharm Germany GmbH, a 100% German subsidiary of the Moscow company R-Pharm, the largest manufacturer of Sputnik V in Russia, does not take on such a lucrative order.

Finally, in Russia itself, vaccination is developing very slowly. Although the vaccine is free and widely available, only 3.5% of Russians received their first injection. Western experts cite the too rapid development of Sputnik as one of the reasons why Russians are skeptical about the vaccine.

Great-State notes still broke through

Mezentsev's interview clearly had to show that there are no Russian encroachments on the sovereignty of our country.

In discussions about the "union state," the refrain was: no pressure is exerted on Minsk, in particular, there is no talk of implementing the roadmap, which provides for political integration and the creation of supranational bodies.

However, for a couple of moments, Mezentsev did not manage to stay within the diplomatic framework.

The Russian vision of the foreign policy of Belarus was presented in an almost ultimatum form: “The multi-vector approach must under no circumstances be a threat or an obstacle to our integration work.”

It is obvious that such statements are interference in the internal affairs of Belarus (which, by the way, Moscow does not tire of accusing the West of). Against this background, the assertion that Russia considers the "union state" as the fatherland from Vladivostok to Brest looks quite natural.

Lukyanov will arrive in Minsk soon

Thus, contrary to the well-known statement of Talleyrand, the Russian diplomat in this interview used language mainly to conceal the imperial designs of the Kremlin.

It is possible, however, that this "vegetarian" stage has already passed: literally the next day after the publication of this interview, the profile committee of the State Duma approved Yevgeny Lukyanov as Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Belarus, who until recently held a similar position in Latvia.

It can be assumed that with his experience of protecting the Russian-speaking population there, he will become more persistent in implementing the idea of the "Russian world." At the same time, under the current circumstances, the Belarusian authorities will find it much more difficult to resist Minsk, which is indirectly confirmed by the establishment in Minsk of the constituent congress of the pro-Russian party Union.

Observers also draw attention to the new ambassador's banking and economic background. This experience, according to the Moscow-based Kommersant, "will not be superfluous, given the place financial issues and the topic of loans occupy in relations between Russia and Belarus."

It is possible that the style of the new ambassador will be closer to the style of Mikhail Babich, who, while holding this position in 2018–2019, caused a lot of discomfort to the Belarusian authorities and earned them the nickname “accountant.”

Now is a convenient time for Moscow to squeeze Minsk on several issues of interest.

Andrey Fedorov, Belorusskiye Novosti