Because life isn't black or white. Someone can be a leader in the dissident movement and also part of other cultural groups. You will find people who join things are more likely to join other things.
I find it funny how every time a dissident angers a dictator, suddenly a bunch of contextless statements like that start circulating all over the internet, like clockwork.
Meta comment - I am a bit sad that a question like this always disappears in hn's voting mechanism. I would really like to understand how the supporter's for Belarus' current government understand the situation and forcing down of the ryan air plane.
I don't have a horse in this conflict. But I sense it is a part a bigger conflict between the remains of the Soviet Union and the west. Much like Ukraine or ex-Yugoslavia.
I will not deny that people with despicable views have joined those volunteer paramilitary groups when Russia invasion started. But it is quite natural and very different from what is implied by saying “Azov is neo nazi”.
Ukraine struggles with a sense of national identity because for the most of history it was a buffer region of roving cossack bands up until the 18th century. The concept of Ukraine as a national entity is still very new.
Ukrainians in Azov super-hate communism because of what happened in WW2 so they adopt the opposite stance from WW2. In the grand scheme of "history of Ukraine" they don't have much else to draw from.
You're worried to much about the symbols they use and are arguing "well, what really even IS a neo-nazi" when you should be asking questions like "Why does Azov run military training camps for children" Western journalists from Vice even covered them. Associated Press did as well, before editing the article to take out the part about the camps being funded not by the united states, but the Ukraine national guard (US gives money to the Ukraine national guard, not Azov directly so it's Kosher)
I always criticize Azov or any other organization for doing crap like that (militarizing kids, nazi-ish symbols, etc), but I don’t want to throw the baby away with the bath water. Azov is a volunteer battalion of people that decided to risk their lives to defend Ukrainian borders from Russian invasion when internal politics and military were in disarray. Only a certain kind of people will volunteer to do that and I’m thankful for their service. I also think that crimes perpetrated by Azov members should not go unpunished and it’s weird and stupid that I even should say that out loud, as if it’s not a default position.
Western Governments have done the same thing to their own citizenry for over a year... Melbourne, Australia is now in its 4th lockdown, a city of 5 million people, based on 50 positive PCR test results over the past week.
Australian citizens generally cannot leave their country either, for over a year.
Given that Belarus had no COVID lockdowns or restrictions, people there have enjoyed comparatively more freedom over the past year compared to the average Western citizen.
The West also takes down airliners in attempts to apprehend journalists. If you have the wrong political opinions, you can lose your job, and be unpersoned by corporate groups with ties to the Government.
The West no longer has the moral high ground and we should be aware of the propaganda levels of the world we are now living in.
I'm not defending Russia or Belarus. They are mafia states. They are just less sophisticated operators without the global media on their side.
Travel restrictions in the west enjoy wide support and are in response to a global health emergency, not spurious political reasons put in place by someone who appears to be an illegitimate leader.
Lukashenko and Putin enjoy widespread support. Belarus has essentially zero poverty and zero unemployment. He has been in power for 27 years. Does popular support justify tyranny, be it from COVID lockdown or to preserve a dictatorship?
What has changed in the last year to prompt these protests against him anyway?
The obvious answer is nothing, that the agitation is stirred up by the West, perhaps since he didn't bend the knee and agree to COVID lockdowns despite being offered $940 million:
And deaths are only up 6% YoY in Sweden and Ukraine, basically in line with the aging of the population and the effects of a once-a-decade flu variant (similar in mortality to Swine Flu wave in 2009).
The West is trying to start another color revolution in Belarus, as they did in Ukraine, where the US Government officials were on the street handing out sandwiches to protestors.
Is Ukraine better off since their revolution? Yes, I think so (I live here). Would Belarus be better off without Lukashenko? Possibly. However, since 2014, several million Ukrainians have fled the country to work in the EU, and a large chunk of territory has been lost.
I'm suggest that there are layers of deception and propaganda at work here that we, as intelligent IT personnel, should be aware of if we want to comment on these articles.
Yeah, no. Australia is not Belarus. The comparison is absurd. Just, stop.
Scroll through the timeline of these Belarusians, who are literally risking their lives by exposing and combating these situations. Really take some time to grasp the situation there.
Well the girl who got arrested from that plane had a telegram channel which exposed home addresses of families of cops. And she advocated to lynch their wives and children. In western media she is called "opposition journalist". But in my book it's basically a classic terrorism.
Oh, dear! Nobody cares about covid here. Everything works as usual and we have no idea how many people died. Funeral tax profits increased by more than 50%. Government closed the border because we want to escape. The state takes revenge for our protests. And it’s impossible to describe the whole situation but political prisoners die in prison or commit suicide. Today, for example, one guy tried to cut his throat right in court https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591
Juan Guaidó wasn't elected. He and his US backers keep shouting "no, I'm the president" and "yes you are" respectively doesn't make it so. It's gangster capitalism Monroe doctrine to install another Pinochet or Branco.
The US calls Maduro a "dictator" despite being elected. The reason the US does is simple: money (which uses US ideological politics as a means-to-an-end), since he specifically stated his purpose after the death of Chávez: "Compatriots, I am not here out of personal ambition, out of vanity, or because my surname Maduro is a part of the rancid oligarchy of this country. I am not here because I represent financial groups, neither of the oligarchy nor of American imperialism ... I am not here to protect mafias nor groups nor factions. IOW, because he wouldn't sell-out his own people or his own country, so he's been marked for death/removal, his people marked for sanctions, and Fox News leads the charge smearing the man and the country to make some vampiric rich Americans more money.
I stated that Venzuala was another example where "It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity."
In Venezuala's case: poor people would rather support unsustainable state subsidies and industries, at the long term cost of running their economy and currency into the ground.
Venezuela is a dictatorship, not because Chavez wasn't elected, but because once elected, he put his finger more and more on the scales of the elections. He arrested opposition leaders so that they couldn't run effective campaigns. When Chavez died and Maduro came to power, he did more of the same, destroying the independence of the judiciary, and shutting down the opposition legislature.
Venezuela is a dictatorship whether or not Guaido won the last election. It's a dictatorship because the government took enough steps that it was impossible for anyone but Maduro to win.
Godwin's law exception: Hitler and Mussolini were voted-in.
Masses of gullible idiots take much longer to realize (if ever because of ego protection) it was a bad idea after-the-fact, while students of history saw it coming. This is why direct "democracy" is a terrible idea. Governance by popularity is stupid. Ask Socrates.
While Lukashenko had some support prior to Aug 2020 election, it dropped to <5% at very best following his ruthless attack and torture of citizens and peaceful protestors.
The only people supporting him now are siloviki, i.e. military and police heads who directly benefit from him remaining in power. Although many within the police elites wish him out as well.
It is generally hard to reason about public support in an authoritarian state, because such states largely control the access to information. So yes, people do hold opinions, but how do they go about forming these opinions? How many are in a position to make an informed decision?
> How many are in a position to make an informed decision?
State TV was not very popular even when I lived there some 20ish years ago, and now everyone and their grandma gets their news from Telegram. Telegram usage dropped a bit because many are afraid of having it on their devices, but it is still by far the most popular way of getting news.
It's really hard to estimate the number of those who continue watching state TV. The least educated and people with disabilities watch easy-to-reach Russian propaganda channels as much if not more. Those are at least captivating ;-).
This is an interesting topic btw. As someone who grew up in USSR I would have to note that nobody took soviet propaganda seriously. People knew media is lying and took all information with a HUGE grain of salt.
Meanwhile information is interpreted, silenced and manipulated in (at least mainstream) media all around the world. But people there often take that information for granted because they have trust in there media and believe they live in a free world. And cmon I watch western news a lot and it's full of NLP stamps and very strong opinions which you wouldn't expect from professional journalism but it's just there.
The sad truth is that we all live in dystopia. Especially with modern technologies. No KGB or stasi ever dreamed of such having information about peoples lives as some facebook(or government agencies) now have. The scary thing is not surveillance it's mass surveillance. When some opposition can be detected until even they did something wrong just by some patterns like books they read or visiting hackers news.
Civil war is impossible, the nation is united and doesn't want violence (all protests so far have been peaceful).
Coup would've already happened if it could, there is very little chance for it now. Lukashenko has spent decades surrounding himself with loyalist.
With silence and little pressure from Europe and the US towards both Belarus and Russia (apart from symbolic "concerns"), things are unlikely to change.
As long as Putin is in power, Lukashenko will remain in power.
There are many political points for Putin to gain within Russia by annexing Belarus, so that's something that could very well happen in the next few months.
Putin and Lukashenko have had several meetings in regards to Belarus integration over the last few months, with Lukashenko getting $1.5B in donations to support his regime after these meetings. So this seems like the likely scenario. And the time frame is much shorter <12mo.
> There are many political points for Putin to gain within Russia by annexing Belarus, so that's something that could very well happen in the next few months.
But it won't happen until Lukashenko thinks there is benefit for Lukashenko. On the bottom line, he doesn't care if it benefits Putin or not.
I do wonder, and apologies if this is naive, but with Russian being the de facto official language in Belarus, is it clear that the siloviki are even Belarusian, not Russian? Would you know if the row of riot police were Russian?
I heard this narrative before, and it strikes me as odd that you would find enough people to bully its own nation into submission - physically in the streets.
But of course that happened in Poland too, where Russian was never a widely spoken language, so clearly it’s possible.
Oh yes, it's totally possible, and happened in Ukraine as well. Generally, a person is not inclined to think what they're doing is wrong, if their paycheck depends on it.
Where do you get that number? 5%? From Belsat tv? I'm not from Belarus but I think you are detached from reality. Go to some village or factory where people drink CHERNILA. They all would support Lukashenko. And for a good reason - many would lose their jobs. Because their factory producing some military electronics for Russian tanks would close after losing access to Russian market.
By all reasonable measures, he got 3% support in the recent elections. Around 5mln people voted, which gives 150,000 who voted for him. This is pretty much the current "elite", that is, people with a slightly higher than average life quality: local officials, school heads, upper management at state-owned organisations, security services, high-ranking officers... and their families.
> It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity.
I would like you to pause there for a moment and suspend what you already know to be true and factual. Just consider that this analysis does not explain the popularity of Republicans among the rural poor, but it does allow Democrats to explain this inconvenient fact away.
The sad reality is that neither party actually cares for the poor and working class, but at least the Republicans are honest about it. The rural poor generally know this, and this is why Clinton lost. They did not feel her to be an honest person.
Oh, please! I'm from Belarus. It hurts me to hear such words. I know people who support Lukashenko but I'd say it's truly just 3%. We have a lot of evidence that he doesn't have support but they are Junta. And it's not just words. I could go to jail for this message... Read it https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591
Belarusians had a good chance to overthrow these maniacs just a few months ago. Instead, they chose to protest softly and not make it a fierce standoff "like it was in Ukraine". Now they pay a price. I'm not judging Belarusians. Freedom is hard.
> And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.
-- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Apropos to nothing, but it feels like mainstream Western media shut up pretty quick about Myanmar when it became evident that peaceful protest wasn't a viable strategy.
It is very hard to understand why anyone would support Putin and what is going in Ukraine and Belarus, if all your understanding comes western media. However if you talk to these people, you get a different and oddly fascinating perspective.
Last time I spoke with a person from Ukraine. He was saying that they are at war with Russia. In situation where on frontline they cannot shoot back because Russia would paint them as offenders in media. Propaganda machine is so strong that Ukrainian people living in Russia would believe that Ukraine is now a fascist country and would gladly support even more intervention. In the meantime the country is economically struggling, people are leaving the west for work.
If all sources of information are feeding you with propaganda, public institutions are deeply corrupt and your wages/retirement is propped by petro dollar you get people supporting Putin.
What the West should be doing is to support Ukraine defending their territory. Instead, they freeze conflict for 5+ years without resolution.
Well, In Italy we still have a huge number of people who would put fascism in power again if only they could, however all it takes is a 10 minutes chat with any of them to realize they're a bunch of racist bigot idiots. Being a huge number makes them just more dangerous, not more enlightened.
This shouldn't be downvoted as Putin is indeed quite popular, it's weird.
A Russian dev I knew mildly supported Putin, but he was in Canada to do dev work due to limited opportunities back home. We talked about Putin grabbing VKontakte and corruption etc..
They guy was very smart but the cognitive dissonance of him not realizing that Putin is literally the 'King of Corruption' that essentially supports and enables all of those terrible things is literally why he had to leave Russia.
But as long as 'Putin is Strong' (or appears to be) - they like him.
I've lost a lot of respect for Russians since 2010, in much the same way I lost a big chunk of respect for many Americans during the Trump era. It's one thing to be 'pragmatic' and accept Putin as the 'lesser of other evils' or to not understand business and therefore believe that Trump is a 'genius businessman' ... but it takes just a tiny bit of self-awareness to see past the stupidity.
Putin is extremely corrupt, not directly tied to the Mafia but essentially it's under his umbrella because he enables it.
If Putin was an actual 'Patriot' he would be viciously going after corruption, instead of just mouthy oligarchs and murdering journalists, he'd be putting top corrupt officials in jail and trying to transform the dour expectation that Russians have that their 'Leaders are Corrupt and That's The Way It Is'.
The fact that a leader can almost openly murder opposition opponents and journalists, and intelligent, educated people just believe the propaganda is staggering.
I had dinner with a nice, educated Russian girl who seemed surprised when I illustrated to her all of the shenanigans of corruption at the Sochi Olympics, as if it was the first she had heard of it.
It's understandable that uneducated rural people with no access to information buy into propaganda. But it's unacceptable that urbane, educated, Russians support that guy. They'll reap what they sew - the same goes for everyone else.
I have team members stuck in Belarus, they're pragmatic about it. Lukashenko doesn't have hugely popular support but I'm feeling that Belarussians are more chill than Russians. They're also pretty much ethnically Russian, so there's that and the economy is naturally tied to Russia.
I'm a Russian immigrant to US and very much anti-Putin, but in order to understand the Russian perspective you have to understand the psyche and history of a country, not just facts. And that's a lot harder to do - there are some metaphysical manifestations of that collective psyche that will be opaque to any outsider looking in.
You have to realize that lots of Russians still remember gangs of actual criminals roaming around in the 1990s and being afraid for their physical safety; food shortages and everything else from the late 80s through to the end of the 90s; inflation that made your savings disappear before your eyes (and shortages/limits of all physical goods which meant there was no way to escape it). My grandparents had enough savings to buy four cars at the start of inflation (quite a bit of savings at the time), and after the inflation they ended up being able to only afford two couches with that money. And that's just the 80s/90s.
Historically, Russia has a very bloody history and suffered greatly in WWII (and generally has suffered the highest percentage of losses in any violent conflict); the attitude a lot of people have there is "better the devil you know than the one you don't". And it checks out historically - the Revolutions that have historically been attempted in Russia didn't exactly lead to anything good for the average person.
So while yes, all of the things you outlined are evidence of a cancer in the system, a lot of people still see it as better than the alternative(s) that they tasted in the 90s - which is why the situation persists. You're starting to see pushback from the generation(s) that grew up after the Union collapsed and that have no memories of the 90s, but otherwise the collective pain & memories are quite strong.
If Belarus does not have a tight control over international money transfers.
Moving will be easier if citizens will be able to carry some savings.
E.g.: people moving from HK to the UK are usually converting their HK$ to a cashier of foreign and crypto currencies.. Belarus and Hong Kong do not have the economy of North Korea
There were multiple reports of Lithuanian citizens with Belarusian residence permits being denied passage by Belarusian border guards. So yes, the situation is that bad. And I wonder why NATO says nothing about it. After all, it's their citizens.
Also check this summary if you want more details [0]
The "whole world" in the GP comment is nowhere near accurate. That being said, for starters, Australia still has restrictions on residents leaving without requesting special permission and at least at one point had a ban on re-entry of certain citizens, and the UK previously had a ban on non-essential travel abroad.
Australians have been banned from leaving for over a year, and there are entry restrictions (low rate of people allowed to enter) that make it infeasible for citizens to return unless you pay a lot of money
Granted - last year (and honestly, still most places that haven't seized large quantities of vaccines) that was for the good reason of preventing a pandemic.
In fairness, I think those "different reasons" are pretty significant (preventing people from fleeing oppression vs controlling the spread of a disease). You can criticize Australian COVID controls as heavy handed without comparing them so directly with a repressive dictatorship.
Australia requires people to get a government permit to leave the country and they deny most of the requests! I don't care if they say it's medical, it's a major problem and means Australia has fucked up policies.
So if it's medical and not at all like Belarus's policy, why discuss it here? Post a submission on Australia's travel ban and discuss it in context there?
There is broad public support for COVID-related travel bans. In particular, the majority of people who are voluntarily staying home don't want the commons that is public health spoiled by a handful of selfish individuals who have decided that this is the personal liberties hill they want to die on.
The situation in Australia is particularly poignant because of just how effective the short, strict lockdowns have been— well, surprise, they're effective and therefore short because they're strict. When you take half-measures and pander to people who don't want to cooperate, that's when it drags on for months leaving those who cooperated feeling frustrated and exhausted (see: most of the US and Canada).
Examples? (Presumably there's some browse history that you're referring to which we may not be experiencing the same way. So citing sources is critical.)
I second this. I appreciate having access to foreign language primary sources even if they are not my native language since there's less of a bias filter other than sterile translation software
Is there any way to prove that they're real comments from actual thinking people and not bots (Kremlin boiler room ops) or people who have been brainwashed watching too much network news or pro-everything-Kremlin? (Bots watching network news might be a thing too.)
As much as I believe Putin to be a crackpot totalitarian, they will not keep it closed for too long. It seems more like a one time "look what we can do to you people" show of force.
It's much harder to enforce policy on those who leave, compared to enforcing policy on those who enter, is it not? If the reason for the policy was sincerely due to pandemic concerns, couldn't they have just stopped people from entering, regardless of nationality?
Right of return is a relatively bedrock principle in international law. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_return In principle a pandemic would seem an obvious exception, easily analogous to exceptions like war, but too many are in denial about it. Moreover, even if you nominally had a law preventing return, what do you do when a foreign country puts your citizens on a plane bound for your country?
As a practical matter, it seems much easier, IMO, to restrict persons leaving than returning. It's also more flexible. Some number of people will leave, either illegally or via legal exceptions. So the policy has a pressure relief value. Conversely, a useful entry restriction demands much stricter application, which is likely to quickly crumble when your own citizens are trying to re-enter, especially in larger numbers as compared to a regime where they were restricted from leaving in the first place.
Airlines really do not want an entire aircraft refused landing because of one person. All the pre-departure paperwork procedures exist to prevent this from happening. Airlines won't go along with "just board them anyways" schemes unless forced to do so under threat. If they do cooperate (or are forced to) it gives the destination country cause to void that airline's licenses without risk of reciprocal sanctions against its own airlines. Dragging commercial airlines into a political dispute like this won't work.
I realize nations do this, but do nations like Australia or the U.S., which fancy themselves more in harmony with the rule of law, want to be put in that position?
Which reminds me, many nations, such as the U.S., have domestic laws which would prevent denying re-entry to citizens. The airplane example isn't the best because there are many technical ways to stop inbound air traffic[1]; ports of entry at land borders, not so much.
[1] Stopping outbound air traffic is even easier as a technical matter.
So why do we think this is terrible for Belarus but don't care that Australia has the same rules?
So downvotes because you think Australia's rules don't count because they're nicer and speak english? I'd venture to guess the official reasons behind both bans 'public good'. By which we mean the state.
They're banning most people from leaving. Before this, Australia for more than a century banned a large portion of the population from even raising their own children.
It's the same severe violation of human rights, regardless of differences or claimed intentions. Especially since it has been this way for over a year in Australia
No, it’s really not, it’s vastly different. Australia is not under control by someone who appears to be a dictator, closing borders as part of a wider crackdown on dissent, and what looks like it could be a precursor to mass violence.
Australia and other nations have implemented travel restrictions based on a global health emergency, restrictions which enjoy wide popular support. This is not a severe violation of human rights, and to try to call the two equivalent is really quite dishonest.
Belarus has a worse covid situation than Australia. So Lukashenko just has to say he did it because of corona, then how is it not fair and justified, since that is apparently an acceptable reason? If your country has less stable politics then you arent allowed to manage your public health emergency?
This makes no more sense than that. A dictator is closing borders as part of a program of suppression of dissent. This is materially different to health-related travel restrictions.
1) In Belarus, "The border committee blamed the measures on the coronavirus pandemic."
2) The covid situation is worse in Belarus than Australia
3) The covid situation in Australia is apparently enough to justify a multi-year ban on citizens leaving
I still don't see how it is not justifiable to ban citizens from leaving in Belarus because of the pandemic. Less stable politics means you have to morally let people die by having no measures against the pandemic?
Your argument seems to be based in guessing intentions within the politician's mind
At the least, it is a genuine public health measure AND a crackdown on dissent. Therefore it is not so simple to argue that it is a reprehensible move, if you are in favour of restrictions to prevent covid: you are saying that facilitating dissent is more important than "saving lives" from covid. It doesnt matter what the intention is: you believe that travel restrictions save lives. You must be subconsciously doing some sort of calculation between human rights and mitigating the pandemic
Note that this has been happening since at least May 30th as reported by people working in Poland and Lithuania who had gone to visit their family in Belarus for the weekend.
seems like a desperation move. It's been a long while since I read "The Dictator's Handbook", but I'm guessing Lukashenko won't be free/alive too much longer?
Sadly, regimes can hold on to power way beyond the point where the whole society is hostile to them. Poland had major protests against the communist regime in 1956, 1968 and throughout 1980s (plus various inbetween), but really the regime fell when (a) it literally went bankrupt, (b) USSR was not in a position to invade, like it did with Czechoslovakia before. And even then it was touch-and-go.
So here I was wondering, why there is not a single article about this in Russian info-sphere. Apparently these restrictions were in action for quite some time [0].
“Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in.” JFK, Berlin.
Obviously this situation in Belarus is a simple legal restriction and not a wall, but I’ve long thought that a sensible constitutional guarantee would be the right to leave the country at any time.
The border between Belarus and Poland is the former border between Soviet Union and Poland, its infrastructure beats whatever Trump wanted to do with the Wall. Crossing it illegally is close to impossible.
Borders with Lithuania, Russia and Ukraine are a bit more leaky, but one has to be physically fit and logistically prepared to cross, and there is still a risk of being caught. And then what about kids and elders?
So, this is not a legal restriction, but a real ban.
> The border between Belarus and Poland is the former border between Soviet Union and Poland, its infrastructure beats whatever Trump wanted to do with the Wall. Crossing it illegally is close to impossible.
Interesting, it mostly runs along arbitrary forest paths etc, not major rivers or mountain ranges - not naturally easy to police.
I once stayed in a cottage in the Bialowieza forest (one of few bits of primeval forest in Europe). The cottage was at a clearing, and the other side of the clearing was in Belarus.
We never got any trouble for it, but it wasn’t rare to have border patrol appear out of nowhere and kindly enquire what you’re doing.
Border with Russia? There is no border control at all. We have a union state with Belarus. Belarusian citizens can live here, work, get free education and healthcare without any restrictions or special permits they have same rights as Russian citizens.
And on topic I don't know what's happening but it was the west first which closed it's airports for Belarusian planes. What's even the point of such sanctions? Officials are not affected by that at all. To punish commercial companies? Ordinary citizens? If anything such sanctions only make authoritarian leaders even more popular(at least among the kind of people which already supported them) and consolidate society against western hypocrisy.
I'm in not a supporter of such leaders but the whole European reaction to that incident can be easily turned into propaganda against the west and you know they do have a point. Because there were several similar situations and there were no reaction AT ALL.
And I don't live in Belarus but I have impression that Lukashenko is really popular there. Not among youth or some educated people, but among workers and farmers. When other ex-ussr countries seen total collapse of industry and social guaranties factories continued to work. I consume products they produce daily, I even have some clothes made there. Yes it's an authoritarian country but it's not some dystopia. It's a nice clean country with functioning institutions and very nice polite and hardworking people. Maybe it would be better with other kind of government idk. And btw from Russian state perspective Lukashenko is not the best "partner" he is very sneaky and two-faced and often "betrays" Russian state on important issues. And as a Russian taxpayer I don't like much that my taxes would go again to fund his little authoritarian paradise.
You are spreading disinformation here, maybe, unintentionally. I lived for 25 years in Belarus and have a lot of connections in Belarus.
These days Lukashenko is very unpopular in the country. He falsified elections, his people committed a lot of violence against the innocent. He is putting people in prison, denied the entrance to Belarus for the citizens. It is a very bad time for the country now - many people and businesses are leaving the country for Lithuania, Poland, etc.
He did not do any economical reforms either, and most state companies are almost dead and cannot compete on the market. He totally relies on donations from Russia. Thanks to him Belarus is not attractive to investors. IT businesses, his golden goose, are leaving.
> I’ve long thought that a sensible constitutional guarantee would be the right to leave the country at any time.
In totalitarian regimes, constitutions aren't worth the pixels they are printed on. Rights guaranteed by laws must be enforced by the judiciary and the executive. But that only happens if (1) cases actually reach a court, (2) that court is independent, and (3) the executive is willing to enforce the court's decisions.
I am from Belarus and I've always been impressed by the story of the Berlin Wall. And it's my dream that our wall will fall too. It is impossible to take it anymore...
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