When the European Union officially imposed another round of restrictive measures on Belarus on August 3, it put an end to one of the longest-running sanctions sagas in the bloc in recent years.
The new measures were the first targeting the regime of Alyaksandr Lukashenka since the summer of 2022. While early sanctions on Russia following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 were to a large degree imposed on Belarus as well, further EU sanctions on Moscow were not applied to Minsk. That was largely due to the belief in Brussels that Belarus's role in the Ukraine war couldn't be compared to Russia's.
Then a new problem appeared: Many of the sanctioned components that Russia requires for its war effort -- in particular, dual-use goods that can be used for both civilian and military purposes -- were being rerouted via Belarus. The latest round of sanctions on Belarus is partly meant to address this problem.
The original proposal from the European Commission, seen by RFE/RL, suggested measures such as a ban on EU companies providing IT, consulting, and polling services to Belarus; a ban on the export of luxury goods to the country; and a prohibition on the import of Belarusian gold and steel.
The final agreed-upon package, though, was a good deal watered down, with EU export bans on firearms, ammunition, and materials used in the aviation and space industries, along with restrictions on potential dual-use items, such as drones, semiconductors, and computer hardware. The rest from the original proposal was left out.
To understand why the final sanctions were weaker than originally envisioned, and why they took so long to come to fruition, it is helpful to understand two considerable drivers of EU policy. The first is the importance of the so-called Global South -- countries with growing political and economic clout in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The second is classic Brussels horse-trading on political issues that are, at best, only tangentially linked.
Deep Background: The main reason for the delay in agreeing a new round of sanctions on Belarus -- apart from all the loopholes that needed to be closed -- was a proposed derogation, or exception, that would allow for the import of Belarusian potash, a key ingredient in fertilizers that the EU had already sanctioned as it is one of Minsk's main sources of income. A derogation on Russian potash exports had been agreed by the EU in December 2022, but a similar exception for Belarus was seen as being a little trickier.
Allowing the import of Belarusian potash would mean unfreezing the assets of the Belarusian tycoon Ivan Halavaty -- the CEO of Belaruskali, one of the biggest fertilizer producers in the world -- and those of Russian billionaire Mikhail Gutseriyev, who is building a potassium-chloride mining and processing plant in Belarus.
Crucially, allowing Belarusian exports of potash would mean the shipments being transported via Lithuanian ports, something which is deeply unpalatable to most Lithuanian politicians who tend to be the fiercest critics of the Lukashenka regime.
While Vilnius's refusal to agree on any potash derogations was backed by Estonia, Latvia, and Poland, there was a bigger group within the EU -- led by Portugal and other European countries with large ports -- that was pushing for the potash derogations.
This wasn't just a case of countries looking to secure vital income streams but also concerned issues of food security and allegations -- often stoked by the Kremlin -- that EU sanctions have led to food shortages in the developing world.
Drilling Down
By RFE/RL
RFE/RL journalists report the news in 21 countries where a free press is banned by the government or not fully established. We provide what many… More
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