The history of disintegration between Belarus and Russia

In the last days of July, the potash industry in Belarus suffered a severe blow dealt by its Russian partner. Siarhei Bohdan dwells upon the issues of Belarus-Russia relations.

The Russian company Uralkalij refused to work anymore with the Belarusan Potash Company (BKK), a joint enterprise of Uralkalij and Belaruskalij authorised to sell their products throughout the world.

These developments have seriously weakened the global position of Belaruskalij. The “potash collapse” is just one more illustration of the problematic relations between Belarus and Russia.

Both Russian private business and the government do not perceive their Belarusan counterparts as equal partners. Additionally, Belarusans have to work with Russian business without a sufficient legal framework. In these circumstances, integration between the two countries has had no real chance from the very beginning.

Some bigger agreements simply failed or fell apart like the joint companies in the potash or oil industry. Other projects were implemented many years behind the schedule - whether it were military cooperation or the sale of Belarusan pipelines to Russia.

Younger brother is always wrong

Russian Uralkalij, of course, immediately blamed Belarus for the failures of the joint business venture. The Director of Uralkalij said to the “Vedomosti” daily newspaper that it was Lukashenka who allowed the national mining company Belaruskalij to sell potash without involving the Belarusan Potash Company and violated thus the previous agreement to work through this company. Yet the Uralkalij itself has sold a bulk of its own goods without the Belarusan Potash Company. In the least, the Russian position looks dubious.

An information war followed soon afterwards. “This situation confirms only one truth – Belarusans, as always, are incapable of working with partners in a civilised way,” said the well-known Russian political commentator Andrei Suzdaltsev Radio of Liberty.

Yet the background of this story indicates that something different might have happened. Suleiman Kerimov, the Russian owner of Uralkalij, wanted to acquire Belaruskalij as he previously acquired another competitor of Uralkalij – Silvinit. If he only managed to add Belaruskalij to its business empire, he could control up to 43% of global potash market. Kiryl Koktysh of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations says that Uralkalij's actions may indicate Kerimov's attempt to force Minsk into selling Belaruskalij.

With all of its problems, the Belarusan Potash Company was, according to Belarusan economic web-portal zautra.by “probably, one of the most successful strategic Belarusan-Russian economic alliances to have existed since the moment of the Soviet Union's demise”. This begs a question: if this was the best, how exactly have the other projects? 

Belarusan-Russian integration: history of the decline and fall

The chronicle of Belarusan-Russian integration looks like a tug-of-war between Minsk and Moscow. Pompous rhetoric are dismissed by the reality of trade wars and agreements' delayed implementation. The list of failed major projects between the two countries is another skeleton in the closet of bilateral relations.

It is more to the point at this time to talk about Belarus-Russian disintegration rather than integration. Some experts admit that the problems in Belarus-Russian relations exist yet believe that some areas are integrating smoothly, defence cooperation in particular.

Anaïs Marin of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs argues in a publication of the Polish Centre for Eastern Studies that defence cooperation is “unfold[ing] regardless of the disputes that sporadically sour relations between Minsk and Moscow, standing out as the main achievement of the Union State [of Belarus and Russia] – if not the only one”. Yet, Minsk has delayed the implementation of every military agreement with Moscow, sometimes for years – as happened with the Single System of Air Defence.

On the other hand, Moscow failed to equip its closest ally with adequate arms – only now, has Belarus finally replaced its remaining old air defence systems, the S-200, with the S-300. The Russian army meanwhile is already replacing the S-300 with S-400. Belarus has no real prospects to get any S-400 in coming years. It is no wonder, then, that the Kremlin does not care about its Belarusan allies. Despite the rhetoric of Belarusans defending Moscow, Belarus pursues its own military policy and enters military agreements with Russia when it wants Moscow to foot the bill.

No friends in Moscow

There are numerous reasons explain the failure of individual projects in Belarus-Russian relations. Yet there is one fundamental factor. Russia does not perceive Belarus as an independent state with its own needs and interests. "Russia believes that Belarus is its property," said once in Belsat TV Belarusan analyst Paval Usau. Actually Moscow looks in the same patrimonial way on all post-Soviet nations. The latest Russian-Ukrainian trade war proved this point once more.

Partly, Belarus itself is guilty of the discriminatory behaviour that has been coming from Russia. First, Belarus is still failing to consolidate its own nation and to draw a dividing line with Russia. After all, good fences - both physical and mental - make good neighbours. The very close alliance between the US and Israel is a model proposed by Lukashenka for Belarus-Russia relations. Yet Washington looks on Tel-Aviv as an independent nation not as a breakaway territory. In particular, this means that Washington wishes for Israel to be robust and powerful. It is better to have a stronger ally.

On the contrary, Moscow considers any Belarusan success as a threat. Thus, in recent years it did not welcome attempts by Minsk to diversify its sources of imported oil. Russia actively counteracted Belarus' policy of buying Venezuelan oil, which is quite logical from the Kremlin's perspective. If the Kremlin considers Belarus not as an ally but simply a breakaway territory, then this territory should not become strong. The reasons that Moscow does not give Belarus new military equipment become clearer when this is considered. As Anais Marin put it, the Russian establishment sees Belarus as a territory, and not real ally.

Second factor between Russian dismissive stance towards Belarus is lack of a Belarusan lobby in Russia. The Belarusan government has done a lot to find such support in Russia. Minsk tried – rather successfully to present itself as the last island of sunk empire and to mobilise Russian right-wing political groups. The Belarusan regime clearly could find some support among Soviet-time generals, right-wing intellectuals and regional industrial bosses. Yet this support appears rather unorganised and gives Belarus little leverage in disputes with the Kremlin.

A civilised divorce

In last decade, Russian officials have effectively renounced earlier rhetoric of integration with Russia. They apparently had no illusions that what Lukashenka has done – at least in the last decade – resembles a gradual separation from Russia. Furthermore, Minsk is not Russia's marionette. For all its services, the Belarusan state received from Russia subsidies which last year amounted to ca. USD10 billion (16 per cent of GDP).

Oddly enough, it is often Western policies which drives Belarus into the Kremlin's hands. So, for example, the problems of the Belarusan Potash Company began last year when the EU threatened to impose sanctions on Belarus. It created a favourable atmosphere for Russians to put pressure on Minsk to sell Belaruskalij to Russian potash magnate Kerimov. The media then reported about plans to found a new Russian-dominated potash company – Soyuzkali – whose office had to move from Belarus to Switzerland, i.e., under control of Kerimov. It did not happen, yet contributed to a crisis inside the Belarusan Potash Company.

The Russian option for Belarus remains elusive. Objective opportunities which exist for Belarusan business and individual Belarusans in Russia are offset by huge biases against them that are regularly demonstrated by Russia. Moreover, aggressive Russian attempts to take over Belarusan assets leave little space for integration and cooperation between two countries. In a word, Belarus is not as close to Russia as frequently assumed and the West should never dismiss Belarus as an active actor.

BelarusDigest