Александр Лукашенко на Нежинском ГОК. 23 мая 2025 г. Фото: president.gov.by
Poland’s largest centre-right newspaper, Rzeczpospolita, has published an article on the prospects for Polish-Belarusian relations in connection with the negotiation track between the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump and the regime in Minsk. The author, Rusłan Szoszyn, concludes that Poland’s strategic interest lies not in transactional dealings with Aliaksandr Lukashenka, but in the deep transformation of Belarus into a democratic and predictable state.
We offer you a translation of this article:
Aliaksandr Lukashenka has released hundreds of political prisoners, including Andrzej Poczobut (Andrei Pachobut), hoping for a warming of relations with Europe. The United States is trying to help him achieve this. What should be done about it?
“Belarus is not a closed issue. Belarus is a specific task for the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, for Poland, Polish politicians, intelligence services, institutions and diplomacy. We must continue striving to ensure that Belarus becomes as independent a country as possible, with as much room for manoeuvre vis-à-vis Russia as possible,” recently said Piotr Krawczyk, who headed Poland’s Intelligence Agency from 2016 to 2022, on the Otwarty channel. He also argued that since 2010 the Polish state, “together with partners,” has continuously been “playing a game for Belarus” in order to increase its “freedom in relation to the Russian Federation.”
The former head of Polish intelligence explains all this in a recording entitled “Poland Must Conduct Dialogue With Belarus. The Big Game for Minsk.” He also suggests that the failed revolution and bloodshed after the 2020 election became “a success for Russia,” which, according to him, managed to halt Belarus’ several-year rapprochement with the West (before that Belarus had begun purchasing American oil and planned reverse deliveries of raw materials from Poland).
The fact is that a reset in Lukashenka’s Belarus’ relations with the West has already taken place, if we still regard the United States as the leader of the Western world. Numerous visits by U.S. representatives to Minsk, the mass release of the best-known political prisoners, and Washington’s lifting of sanctions indicate that President Donald Trump’s relationship with Lukashenka is entirely different from that of the overwhelming majority of European states. For a long time, a fundamental question has circulated behind the scenes of Belarusian politics: will the warming of U.S.-Belarus relations lead to a warming of EU relations with Minsk? A month ago, this would have seemed impossible, for several reasons.
The gateway to any thaw in relations with Belarus is Poland, because no other EU country (except Lithuania) knows, understands, or is interested in the fate of this nine-million-strong state. The release of journalist and one of the leaders of the Polish minority in Belarus, Andrzej Poczobut (Andrei Pachobut), removed the key obstacle in Warsaw’s relations with Minsk. Much indicates that certain forces are trying to open the way for Belarus toward a reset in relations with the EU, at least in the economic sphere.
Recently, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys, according to local media, admitted during one of the closed-door meetings that the United States is pressuring Vilnius over the issue of ensuring the transit of Belarusian potash fertilisers through Lithuanian ports.
“In Poland, attempts are being made to test the waters in this direction, but the different railway gauge makes such transit more expensive than through Lithuania,” one well-informed source told us.
The key to understanding the situation is the Nezhin Mining and Processing Plant (in the Minsk region near the town of Liubań), which Lukashenka offered to the Americans for $3 billion. This enterprise could cover up to 20 percent of the United States’ annual demand for potash fertilisers (the U.S. is currently heavily dependent on supplies from Canada). This is an attractive offer for the United States, but only if fertiliser transport routes independent from Russia are launched. Hence the attempts to persuade Lithuania, because before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine Belarus exported the lion’s share of its fertilisers through the port of Klaipėda (part of the port was in Belarusian hands).
This is precisely why Lukashenka, at the request of the United States, released hundreds of Lithuanian trucks that he had held for many months as a kind of hostage. Allowing Belarusian potash fertilisers to pass through EU territory would also require easing European Union sanctions previously imposed on Belarus. But this could mean the return of Belarusian state enterprises to the European market and Lukashenka’s symbolic victory after nearly six years of confrontation with Brussels.
If someone in Poland, for whatever reason, wanted to support the Americans in “pulling Belarus away from Russia,” this would effectively put an end to the previous policy of many years of support (including financial support) for the Belarusian democratic opposition. Today, all the key Belarusian opposition organisations are already located in Warsaw, including the office of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya. A thaw in relations with Lukashenka would completely marginalise regime opponents in exile, who are already struggling to survive under difficult conditions.
On Tuesday, the week-long online vote for the Coordination Council (the Belarusian parliament in exile) ended, with just over 2,000 Belarusians taking part. Two years ago, more than 6,000 people participated in similar opposition elections. Suffice it to say that almost 150,000 Belarusian citizens with valid residence permits currently live in Poland (according to data from the Office for Foreigners from last year). Some Belarusians who remained in the country fear falling victim to repression and stay away from such initiatives, while others, struggling through legalisation procedures, job searches, and adaptation to a new reality, often cut themselves off from their previous lives.
The condition of the democratic opposition, the geopolitical situation, and Donald Trump’s favourability may at first glance seem to benefit Lukashenka today. However, the strategic interests of Europe, and above all Poland, lie not in situational trade with the regime in Minsk, but in the deep transformation of Belarus into a democratic and predictable state. And this, undoubtedly, will require waiting and avoiding hasty steps. It is Lukashenka who should be interested in resetting relations with Europe, not the other way around. Therefore, now is the time to end repression, begin pro-democratic reforms in Minsk, and ensure the possibility of return for political refugees and independent media. With such a Belarus, Poland could and indeed would want to engage in dialogue.