MINSK, 15 November (BelTA) - So far, the only party that is helping refugees are Belarusian public associations and the government, political analyst Aleksandr Shpakovsky said on the air of Alfa Radio, BelTA learned from sb.by.
"Our task is to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe in the refugee camp on the border, to save people's lives," he said. “So far the only ones who are helping refugees are Belarusian public associations and the government. Our country really helps these people. Our goal is not to play games. But the point is very simple: they thought Belarus was an insignificant country they would strangle with economic sanctions, mock and lecture on how to hold elections... This small Belarus has turned out to be a significant factor in the pan-European security system. This is what we have been telling the West for years. We would constantly highlight the importance of cross-border cooperation, would tell them that we stand in the way of drug trafficking, illegal migration to Europe. It seemed that up to some point there was an understanding of this. Then, probably, due to the degradation of the EU political elite or due to the excessive attention to the opinion of countries such as Lithuania, which claim expertise on Belarus and the region as a whole, this understanding has gone. They destroyed the mechanism of cooperation in border security, which prompted refugees to use Belarus as a transit country.”
According to Aleksandr Shpakovsky, it is important to prevent the violations of the rights of people who go via Belarus to the European Union. "We are coping with this task. But how do we restrain this flow? Should we send refugees to Iraq for our money? Should we, theoretically speaking, take money away from our pensioners, hire aircraft and send refugees to Iraq while being under an air blockade by the West? That's absurd! We don't play win-win, we don't want to prevail over anyone. But things are as follows: if these people are accepted in the West it is interpreted as a win for Aleksandr Lukashenko. If they are not accepted and the whole world sees, as they say, the bloody grin of capitalism, the collapse of the European values, this is again a win for Lukashenko. Direct contacts with the Belarusian government are a win for Lukashenko too," the political analyst summed up.
