As a part of lectures with prominent experts, AUK students of Global Management program had the opportunity to discuss the issues around Belarus and its role in russia's war against Ukraine with Glen Howard, President of The Jamestown Foundation, one of the world's leading research and analysis organizations on Eurasia, on topic “Belarus as a Frontline State in Russia's War on Ukraine”.
While explaining the Belarussian identity, its position in this war and what a Ukrainian victory would mean for Belarus, Mr. Howard outlined: “Belarussians have very weak state identity, not like Ukrainians. The idea of Belarusians identity is very slow moving. But it is developing.
Belarussians don't want to be a part of NATO. They realize that the reality is that russia would never accept them being a part of NATO. When moscow says, “we want you to invade Ukraine”, then Lukashenko says, “I'm sorry, I really would like to join the invasion, but we gave you all of our ammunition”. This is a very clever cat and mouse game that Lukashenko is playing. He's been around almost 30 years, so he keeps surviving playing this game”.
Describing the future opportunities for Belarus, Glen Howard noticed: “I think that Belarus would suddenly gravitate more to the West because russia wouldn't be able to deal with Ukraine or Belarus very effectively.”
We are highly thankful to Glen Howard for his candid discussion with AUK students, as well as to Mark Voyger, Program Director for the MSc in Global Management for organizing this meeting.
Dnipro
