MOSCOW, 25 August (BelTA) - Belarus is one of the most economically sound countries in the region, and it is this well-being that is the source of people's support of the authorities, well-known intellectual and publicist Anatoly Wasserman said in an interview with BelTA.
“Belarus is one of the most economically sound countries of the former Soviet Union,” Anatoly Wasserman said. “Before the Orange Revolution Ukraine's GDP per capita was a little higher than that of Belarus. Now this figure in Ukraine is twice as low as in Belarus. In the Baltic countries, the gross domestic product is formally higher. At first this figure included the revenues from the sale of the Soviet heritage. Now they live simply on subsidies from the European Union which are quite generous to make them an example to follow for Belarus, Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia, etc. But when you look at real production figures, Belarus is one of the most advanced countries in the region. In terms of real production per capita, it is behind only Russia, and not that much behind. If we discard all financial games and trade in air, the difference is small,” the expert noted.
The publicist is sure that the calls for strikes have not found mass support in Belarus precisely because of the economic situation in the country. “There is this general rule in politics: as long as people see that they live more or less well, at least better than their neighbors, they vote for the current government,” he said. “Belarusians see this especially clearly. Russia's Smolensk Oblast, which directly borders on Belarus, is one of the most depressed regions in the country. It produces much less than Russia's average and is a very clear example,” Anatoly Wasserman noted.
Anatoly Wasserman stressed that the opposition in Belarus is trying to use all kinds of methods: riots, strikes, anything. “These people have already got too involved in riots. They understand that many of them are facing court trials and serious sentences, and so they have the choice facing Comrade Saakhov, a protagonist of the famous Soviet movie Kidnapping, Caucasian Style. This choice is: ‘Either I take her to a marriage registration office or she takes me to a prosecutor'. As far as I can judge, the opposition began to lose steam at the first signs indicating that Aleksandr Lukashenko can gather larger rallies. The situation was similar to the one in Russia at the turn of 2011-2012,” he said.
Anatoly Wasserman noted that the technology of riots was used during color revolutions in many countries. It was used in such a way as to force law enforcement to detain many innocent people, onlookers. “When a scumbag runs into a crowd of onlookers and throws Molotov cocktails from this crowd, the police detain him, together with another dozen or two people. Such situations are quickly dealt with, and as far as I know, almost all detainees in Belarus have been released,” he said.
According to Anatoly Wasserman, the organizers of mass riots in Belarus began to play by the color revolution playbook from the end. They started with violent ugliness, Molotov cocktails, car attacks on policemen,” he recalled. “From the very start they showed what they were preparing the country for in a very convincing way. When they got back to their senses and returned to the first pages of the playbook, they were already losing people's trust. As far as I know, some of those who were against Lukashenko decided that these people [opposition] are even worse,” he said.
“These are all parts of the well-known, well-documented and even publicized technology - the so-called Gene Sharp's Playbook. Everything that is happening in Belarus follows this playbook,” Anatoly Wasserman concluded.
