BPR Rada Urges Belarusians To Plan Actions On Defense Of Their Country’s Independence

The “Union State” with Russia contradicts the interests of the Belarusian nation.

This is voiced in the statement of the Rada of the Belarusian People's Republic, published on the website radabnr.org.

The Rada of the Belarusian People’s Republic expresses concern over the negotiations between the authoritarian regimes in Russia and Belarus regarding the deepening of mutual integration within the framework of the so-called “union state”. The negotiations are traditionally held in a non-transparent format for the public and pose a direct threat to the sovereignty and national security of Belarus.

For the authoritarian regime that reigns in Russia, integration with Belarus has an obvious goal: to maintain its popularity through nationalist mobilization and, possibly, give President Vladimir Putin the legal opportunity to remain in charge of the state after 2024, when his current term ends.

President of Russia Putin in his public statements has repeatedly unambiguously denied the right of the Belarusian people to independence and humiliated the value of the Belarusian statehood. This is an insult to the Belarusian people, and negotiations on the development of relations with Russia cannot be held while the Russian side speaks with frankly chauvinistic and imperial positions.

The BPR Rada notes the following:

The integration between Belarus and Russia cannot be carried out on an equal footing due to the different sizes of countries: population, economy, military potential. The development of the so-called “union state” de facto means the incorporation of Belarus into Russia and the nullification of the independent achievements that the Belarusian people have gained over the past hundred years. The loss of independence of Belarus will mean the impossibility for Belarusians to independently manage their own lives, to independently build relations with the world, since Moscow will again do this on behalf of Belarus.

After the military aggression against Ukraine and the illegal occupation and annexation of part of the sovereign territory of Ukraine, Russia is moving towards deepening its international isolation. The Russian regime imposes limitations on its own citizens, restricts trade, and gradually isolates the Russian segment of the Internet from the global Internet. Integration with such a country will inevitably mean extending to Belarus both international sanctions against the Russian regime, and the restrictive measures that the Russian regime imposes on its citizens.

Russia remains in an economic crisis and Belarus’s accession will spread the crisis to our country, limiting Belarus’s ability to reform its own economy, attract investors, and establish cooperation with other countries of the world. Joining Russia will only worsen the economic situation and well-being of Belarusians.

An authoritarian regime has been built in Russia, which in many respects has become tougher than the Lukashenka regime in Belarus. In present-day Russia, there are no free elections and freedom of speech, repressions are being conducted against the civil society, independent journalists and dissenters. The murders of political opponents, which have ceased to be everyday life in Belarus, have become a routine in Putin's Russia.

Joining Russia will mean for Belarusians the prospect of fighting for the interests of the local corrupt nationalist regime in the framework of illegal military operations in remote regions - Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Donbas and Syria, not to mention participation in a new arms race, a new hopeless confrontation for Russia with everything else the world.

The Belarusian people want to have good relations with all their neighbors, including Ukraine, Poland, the Baltic countries, other countries of the European Union, the United States of America. Belarusians want Belarus to be a rich European country, where everyone is guaranteed democratic rights. The annexation of Belarus by authoritarian and poor Putin's Russia would put an end to these goals.

The BPR Rada resolutely denies any accusations of the Belarusian democratic movement of the so-called “Russophobia” that are voiced by the Russian nationalist propaganda. We value the Russian culture and the Russian people. We wish the Russian people good and liberation from the aggressive authoritarian regime, which is causing enormous damage, including to its own country. Like the whole Belarusian people, we stand for mutually respectful, good-neighborly relations between democratic Belarus and democratic Russia.

The BPR Rada confirms its proposals, voiced in a statement dated January 16, 2019, and calls on:

- Politically active citizens and democratic forces to plan their actions in case of a worsening threat to the independence of Belarus. At the same time, the goals of democratizing political life and achieving the full status of the Belarusian language and culture must remain in force, which the authorities of the Republic of Belarus must ensure;

-The Belarusian diaspora in democratic countries - to appeal to the governments of their countries of residence on the danger of the annexation of Belarus by Putin’s

Russia, its deliberate illegality, as well as the inadmissibility of recognition or neglect of such annexation by the international community;

-The authorities of the Republic of Belarus - to democratize the political system of the country, as well as hold parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for 2019 and 2020, in full accordance with international democratic standards. The BPR Rada declares that the authorities of the Republic of Belarus need to end the confrontation and persecution of Belarusian patriots from the ranks of the democratic opposition, to take steps to compromise among the political forces of Belarus in the interests of unconditional social consolidation around the values of independence of Belarus.

The BPR Rada draws attention to the fact that the legal force of the documents on the creation of the so-called “union state”, signed earlier or planned for signing in the future, should be called into question if they are signed on the part of Belarus by the person holding the post of “president” of the Republic of Belarus not as a result of democratic elections.

The BPR Rada declares that democratic elections, respect for human rights and freedom of speech are the only possible way to national consolidation of Belarusians and to getting out of the international isolation in which Belarus has remained in the recent decades.