Today’s New York Times published a rather grim outlook on the presence of Soviet era’s secret services in the countries of the old Warsaw Pact.

The case of Alexander V. Litvinenko, the former K.G.B. agent who was poisoned in London in November, would not seem out of place here, where a death threat in Romania, a suicide in Bulgaria and unbroken silence on several unsolved murders provide clues to the continued presence of the secret services today.

Some members of the secret police remain in place. Others took advantage of the state-asset fire sale that came with the dismantling of centrally planned economies and are now quietly powerful players.

Modern-day Belarus, similarly to Russia, resembles a cobweb of various security structures described in detail in a book of Oleg Alkaev “Death Squad.” These interdependent, or competing, groups have bloomed during the long 12 years of Lukashenko rule. The first, and so far the only, Belarusian President has created a network of “siloviki” (a common term to describe law-enforcement structures) to suppress any blossoms of dissent, and so far his servants have succeeded in this rather straightforward mission.

What worries me is the great number of them, those K.G.B. agents, well-paid and dishonest judges, special task force officers, secret service operatives, etc. Belarus by far is the most militarized country in Europe if to count all those various cops and agents who found an easy way to earn money in spheres where not too much thinking is required.

Where will those people be when their services are not needed any longer? But that is just a tip of the iceberg. Consider this. Lukashenko is famous for ruining small and mid-sized businesses and private initiatives. But take a bus, go around the country, talk to the locals, and you will be surprised to find out that in many, many provincial towns, the mayors’ sons and relatives have been opening stores, restaurants, and hotels. In Minsk it happens on a far larger scale; those local barons and “siloviki,” just like in Russia, are buying up Belarus, and their cobweb is growing wider and denser.

What Lukashenko has managed to achieve is that many “unreliable” entrepreneurs are out of business, and diverse markets are now controlled by his people and the people designated by his people. The cobweb. Call it however you want, maybe you can call me paranoid for such fears, but I do sense a network of mob-alike structures forming in my homeland, and this is scary. Unless you are in accord with the regime, you cannot make a lot of money in Belarus – this is almost an axiom. And sadly, the network of those who serve the regime, especially “siloviki,” are now establishing themselves as businesspeople. They look further into the future and build up their careers now, planning their lives in post-Lukashenko era.

In the period after the fall of the various European Communist states in 1989–1991, some countries employed the policy of lustration. In other words, limiting participation of former communists, and especially informants of the communist secret police, in the successor governments or even in civil service positions. But in our case with every other year of Lukashenko’s rule, the prospect of lustration seems to be more and more unrealistic. What we can aspire for is, at least, to sack the judges who sentenced political activists and to fire the most notorious “siloviki,” well, maybe imprison a couple if we can prove their guilt for some of the atrocious acts committed these years. But we cannot purge the entire country of all these diverse and terribly corrupt nomenclature, bureaucrats, and loyal servants of the current regime. Simply there are too many of them.

And what is really bad is that this cobweb will hold us on a leash for long, long years aggravating our European prospects. A very serious danger Belarus will face after the demise of the regime is resurgence of criminal structures and, I even can guess, appearance of very vast and powerful organized criminal groups firmly intertwined within the Belarusian economy. Oh, well, maybe I just need a cup of coffee.

The Varsity Online reported:

I guess this is the most amazing piece of freeware I have come across this year. It is very interesting whether Psiphon might help us and our friends in other censored countries to break through the filters. In our case, this program seems like a musthave during an electoral season. Please, check out the official web site of the project for details and free download.

Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka arrived in Tehran late on November 5 for two days of talks with Iranian officials. Belarus’s foreign minister, Serhiy Martynov, says the visit is aimed at bolstering official relations and advancing large-scale economic projects. Read more at RFE\RL.

The pictures of this dismal encounter are so hilarious that Wolny, one of the administrators of the politically incorrect satirical web site, Belzhaba, has promised to create a separate category about the meeting, inviting Photoshop artists to play with the images to make them look even more ridiculous.

I personally laughed my ass off when I saw this.

See more here.

Three months ago, Zmicier Dashkevich and I were luckily strolling along the streets of Washington, DC, and New York City. I remember how we went to a Protestant church in the U.S. national capital, what a nice person he was to talk to, how religious and righteous, kind and intelligent he was. His faith in our victory was unwavering. And now after the Court announced the dismal sentence, one and half years of prison, his last words were, “We will win.”

Zmicier Dashkevich during the trial.

Ala Bulash, the judge who carried out the sentence.

Photos are by Julia Darashkevich, courtesy of Nasha Niva.

There have been many articles in the oppositional press and on blogs attempting to figure out the reasons for Lukashenko’s outward attack on Russia. Some of those posts are expressions of sheer glee, others tend to be more cautious. I find myself in the camp of the latter, as nothing seems to indicate any positive turn for our economy and political climate even if Lukashenko and Putin get more vocal of their long-lasting feud rumored about since the first days Putin was elected. Sometimes, the relations between the two presidents overtly deteriorate, but they continue to play the brotherhood game, because they both need each other.

I agree that one of the most probable causes for Lukashenko’s blast of pugnacity was that he had found new important allies among the non-aligned nations. And he must be feeling more secure confronting the Kremlin’s push to accelerate the integration, alternatively threatening to impose higher gas prices.

Meanwhile, repressions against Malady Front (Young Front), a youth opposition group, continues with a new twist of absurdity. Paval Krasouski, one of the organization’s regional leaders, was arrested as a suspect in organizing a series of blasts in Vitsebsk in fall last year. As reported by TOL blogs, Krasouski was abroad on the day of blasts, and border stamps in his passport confirms it. The guy, who happens to be my old acquaintance, faces capital punishment. Now the regime has done many weird and absolutely lawless things. But I can’t believe they will frame an absolutely innocent person just like that. The world must not just watch from the distance.

The news for today is that Milinkevich announced he would take bull by its horns and initiate a new political movement, For Freedom, which was supposed to be created much earlier with backing of the Council of United Democratic Forces. Well, some might argue here that it had already been launched, but the political parties, as Milinkevich deems, had dawdled wasting time on internal campaigning and petty inner-circle power struggle.

At least publicly none of the party leaders voiced any criticism of the former oppositional candidate’s plan, and to the contrary they saluted his effort to unite nonpartisan activists. But it’s quite easy to guess what they really thought of this.

Will it work? We’ll see, but what saddens me is that again some political struggle triggers creation of a new structure. Our politics so often reminds some wicked clownery or childishness, i.e. struggle of personalities and not of ideologies. How many rightwing and leftwing groups do we have? Two or three for each and every one of us?

Only in this case, I really think Milinkevich could be right in his actions, as it might give some boost to the dormant political climate. For Freedom can become an alternative to the feeble (almost pathetic) parties lacking new members and ideas.

President Lukashenko has returned to TV screens. Just as I described in my previous post, his press conference was televised on all Belarusian channels, and the transcript was reprinted by all major state publications.

There were no new messages in his speech, but the media picked up on his threat to break off relations with Russia if it persists with the plan to raise the price of gas for Belarus in 2007. Lukashenko demanded that Russia should grant Belarus Russian internal cost of gas, but he refused to sell Gazprom 50% of Beltrasgaz stocks for 300 million dollars for that matter. According to Lukashenko, doubling of the cost of gas will cost 1 billion dollars to the Belarusian economy, and that is 1% of GDP; and this money can only be reimbursed through transit costs, military bases, deemed the president.

Lukashenko presaged that the integration processes would cease for a few years because of the forthcoming Russian presidential and parliamentary elections.

And yet showing his erratic nature, Lukashenko used his usual set of superlatives to describe his overwhelming allegiance to Russia when it comes to feuding with the West. So speaking to the Russia’s regional media, he reiterated his hackneyed thesis that Russia did not have other troops on the Western frontier except for the Belarusian military.

He said, “Just as it has always been in our history, if tanks move in from out there towards Russia, we will be dying here to protect Russia. And our nation must be ready for that. And now try to name any other country which would openly state that it’d be ready to die for Russia.”

If you hadn’t heard the abovesaid comments, maybe you’ll be interested, but to me, all this gibberish sounds insipid and trite. In a few days, he’ll tone down his bravado and go kiss some ass when Putin snaps his finger. I’ll be glad if somebody proves me wrong.

I pity those people in Belarus who have televisions with rabbit-ear antennas and neither satellite dishes nor basic Cable. I remember how all broadcast stations were canceling whatever they’d had on their schedules when Lukashenko addressed the nation or his government in a public meeting. He openly humiliated officials, members of local governments many of whom were much older than him. And they never fired back, sat like juvenile criminals – eyes down, scarcely breathing, afraid to budge. All this nonsense looked like a televised freak show, staged with one purpose – to show that the president cared for his people and allowed no spin among his subordinates.

Watching him speak, what I rarely did, I must confess I questioned his sanity. Can an intelligent human being behave in such a disreputable way? Can I recall any living president of any country to engage oneself in a three ring circus like this? Probably not.

Well, it’s not just me guessing at Lukashenko’s condition, but Anatoly Lebedko, the United Civil Party Chairman, has come forth questioning the incumbent’s ability to run the country and filed a query to the Council of Ministers. In his statement, Lebedko mentioned some of recent Lukashenko’s whimsies. For example, in a few interviews, Lukashenko said that around 95% of the electorate voted for him in the last election, which contradicted even the official results. He also blabbed that 99% of young people supported him. He also said that he was on a special mission in Havana and spoke on behalf not only of his country but of entire Europe. These and other facts led Lebedko to doubt Lukashenko’s ability to adequately comprehend what goes on around him and his ability to run the country. There are some other funny examples Lebedko offered. Read the entire article (in Russian).

Well, yeah, there you go. Funny to read, but oh, so true. Lukashenko’s health is a major concern. But on the other hand, I am also worried how things are going in the democratic sector. Seems like the divide between some political forces has touched the ground and is more visible than ever. The question is almost rhetorical - why did four political parties – the United Civic Party, Social Democrats ‘Hramada,’ Communists, and Labor Party – chose to distant themselves from the Belarusian Popular Front and, I assume, Milinkevich? It seems to me that his influence on the democratic camp is being tarnished, and I strongly doubt how the coalition can be preserved in its current state. Mini-coalitions which are being formed for the forth-coming local elections lack some feasible system of coordinates. The card house is as weak as it gets without a proper strategy, or maybe it’s about time when the spirit of the masses is “F**k the strategy! The ship is sinking anyway. We’ll go the other way.” But what is that other way?

I believe that the cleverest thing the democratic forces can do when and if they come to power is to invite the topnotch economists – like Solidarity did when they got Lipton and Sachs on the board, and like Saakashvili is doing now, having gotten Mart Laar to be his economic advisor. That is surely a very clever move.

One of the reasons why the Belarusian opposition fails is because they listen but fail to hear what intellectuals say. Had they taken the analysts’ advice more seriously, maybe we would’ve had somebody else running the country these days.

A Russian born Ukrainian novelist, Andrey Kurkov, has written an article about Alexander Lukashenko for the British journal, New Statesman. From this rather concise look at the Belarusian ruler, readers can carry out a few interesting and even controversial points.

The author writes:

Perhaps the most surprising thing about Belarus is that it doesn’t wish to be a state at all. The dream of most Belarussians is to be united with Russia. No other ex-Soviet republic so bemoans the break-up of the USSR. This can be explained by the essentially patriarchal attitude of the country’s citizens and the very high percentage of pensioners - higher than in any other former Soviet country. Add to this the fact that around 20 per cent of the adult population has only primary education, and it is possible to understand why Belarussians are so fond of their “Man of the People” president, Alexander Lukashenko.

Well, to start with, I hate to repeat it again and again, but it is dated to call the inhabitants of Belarus Belarussians. The New Statesman copy editors could’ve googled for different spellings of the word. Maybe they would be surprised to learn that most English-language sources have long switched to the term “Belarusian,” which is grammatically correct as it derives from the name of our country. That is Belarus and not Belarussia.

Contentwise I would argue with the notion that the dream of most Belarusians is to be united with our Eastern neighbor. Check IISEPS data. Well, to make it easier, here’s a table I’ve copy&pasted from their web site. The question was – If a referendum on Russia-Belarus integration is held, how would you vote?

If you say, there are a lot of folks who are pro-integration, I’ll agree with that. But hell no, this is not a majority. And what is even more important, the number of those who consider incorporation of Belarus into Russia as positive is smaller than of its opponents. Check the data here.

Well, heck… I guess I need to express my doubt that “around 20 per cent of the adult population has only primary education.” I tend to think this figure is lower, as the literacy rates according to the stats I have seen are pretty darn high.

I cannot deny the fact that our compatriots were dumb enough to elect such a leader. To make it even worse, now as he ripped us off our constitutional right to elect a government in a fair election, we can hardly do anything about it no matter how high or low the level of education was in Belarus. Well, sure, we can do something. And the amount of the bad publicity our regime receives is a good thing. It helps. The New Statesman ranked Lukashenko among the world’ top 10 worst dictators. I concur. Luka has well deserved that stigma. 12 years of authoritarian rule and counting.

And it’s a shame Belarus figures in the international media almost exclusively courtesy of the regime’s misdoings. As Kurkov points out, “If it were not for the character of its president, few people beyond the borders of the old USSR would be aware of the existence of Belarus.” And that is sad.