{"id":11595,"date":"2023-07-25T16:05:15","date_gmt":"2023-07-25T13:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/api.pozirk.online\/longreads\/lukasenka-helping-putin-demonize-poland\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","slug":"lukasenka-helping-putin-demonize-poland","status":"publish","type":"longreads","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/longreads\/11595\/","title":{"rendered":"\u0141uka\u0161enka helping Putin demonize Poland"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n By Alaksandar K\u0142asko\u016dski, BPN<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka put on a show during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on July 23, threatening to unleash the Wagner Group on Poland. <\/span><\/b>\n<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t He claimed that Wagner militants based in Belarus were eager to carry out an incursion into Warsaw and Rzesz\u00f3w, a city in southeastern Poland.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Two days earlier, Putin accused Polish leaders of seeking \u201cto return what they consider their historic territories, today\u2019s Western Ukraine. It is well known that they are dreaming of Belarusian lands as well.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Minsk and Moscow have been promoting the baseless claim that Warsaw seeks to reclaim the territories that Joseph Stalin stripped from Poland and granted to the Byelorussian and Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republics at the end of the Second World War.\n<\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n
\n\t Putin pledged to use \u201call means available\u201d to defend Belarus should it come under attack from Poland.\n<\/div>\n

\n\t The accusations are a clear indicator of Moscow\u2019s frustration with Poland\u2019s support for Ukraine following the February 2022 Russian invasion.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u0141uka\u0161enka had made unsubstantiated claims that Poland was looking to retake western Belarus long before Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine. A conflict of values is the main source of tension between Minsk and Warsaw, not territorial disagreements that were effectively resolved in the 1990s.\n<\/p>\n

Political mistrust<\/h2>\n

\n\t The Polish government has consistently supported Belarus\u2019 pro-democracy activists pushing for international sanctions against the \u0141uka\u0161enka regime.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t The Belarusian ruler seems to suspect Warsaw of helping his opponents to prepare for an uprising to remove him from office. Neither Poland nor the Belarusian opposition recognized him as legitimate president after the disputed 2020 presidential election.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Warsaw has strongly condemned the Belarusian government’s crackdown on dissent and Polish minority leaders.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Poland gives refuge to Belarusian opposition supporters who face politically motivated persecution in their country. Minsk has repeatedly accused Poland of training Belarusian militants for an alleged insurgency and vocally expressed concern about Warsaw\u2019s efforts to secure Poland\u2019s eastern flank.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u0141uka\u0161enka was genuinely grateful to Putin for his statement of security guarantees. \u201cAs a matter of fact, you are the first man in Russia to say it openly, clearly and comprehensibly,\u201d he stressed.\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\t Poland\u2019s effort to beef up security\n<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n

\n\t Poland has moved two mechanized brigades closer to its eastern border in response to the relocation of thousands of Wagner Group militants to Belarus following a failed mutiny in Russia last month.\n<\/div>\n

\n\t \u0141uka\u0161enka\u2019s aggressive rhetoric proves that Warsaw\u2019s concerns are justified.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t He said that Wagner Group fighters based in Belarus were eager to \u201cgo on a trip\u201d to Warsaw and Rzesz\u00f3w, the main entrepot for Western weapons destined for Ukraine.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Warsaw has repeatedly voiced concern about Russia’s Wagner Group presence in Belarus. The presidents of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland sent a letter to NATO earlier this month, urging it to respond.<\/p>\n

\t Poland’s defense minister recently announced the deployment of more than 1,000 soldiers and 200 vehicles to the country’s east.\n<\/p>\n

Rzesz\u00f3w trip unlikely be easy<\/h2>\n

\n\t Ukrainian border guards on July 22 said that up to 5,000 Wagner militants could had arrived in Belarus. A Wagner commander said that up to 10,000 fighters might be relocated.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Although the contingent is too small for a major offensive on Ukraine or Poland, it can be involved in hybrid operations to destabilize the European Union\u2019s border.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t While Ukraine is said to be prepared to rebuff a potential attack from Belarus, Poland has been reinforcing its army with help from NATO and the United States in the first place.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t “Poland is a NATO member, of course, and we will defend, if necessary, every inch of NATO territory,” Matthew Miller, spokesman for the US Department of State, told journalists on July 24.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u0141uka\u0161enka on July 23 made a couple of remarks indicative of his concern about the mercenaries\u2019 presence.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u201cWe really control what is going on,\u201d he said in an apparent reference to sentiment in the Wagner camp. Belarusian security agents must be watching the mercenaries closely.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u201cOf course, I keep them in central Belarus, as agreed,\u201d he said in an apparent reference to his behind-the-scenes deal between with Putin.\n<\/p>\n

\nWagner\u2019s danger <\/h2>\n

\n\t Putin no longer seems to control Wagner and its chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was said to be rude with the Russian leader during a conclave on June 29.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Speaking earlier this month at the Wagner camp in Asipovi\u010dy, Prigozhin said that the Wagner contingent would stay in Belarus for a while, training Belarusian troops, and would later travel to Africa.\n<\/div>\n

\n\t He also said that his force could step into the fray if Belarus were attacked.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t \u0141uka\u0161enka also had said that Wagner militants might be hired as military instructors, stressing that the mercenaries would stay in Belarus only for some time.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Although he has threatened to unleash Wagner on Poland, the Belarusian strongman is hardly genuinely interested in an armed conflict with the NATO ally.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t He probably hopes that Belarusian troops will benefit from Wagner instructors\u2019 combat experience, but expects most of the militants to leave for Africa soon.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t The future of Prigozhin\u2019s African projects is uncertain now that Putin may seek to avenge the Wagner chief for the failed revolt.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t The five or ten thousand militants concentrated near Asipovi\u010dy may eventually become a problem or a threat for \u0141uka\u0161enka.\n<\/p>\n

\nNon-existent territorial claims <\/h2>\n

\n\t Poland offered Belarus to drop all territorial claims and recognize the existing borders even before the collapse of the Soviet Union. However, the October 1990 visit by Foreign Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski to Minsk was a fiasco.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Belarusian communist authorities told Skubiszewski that since Belarus had not been a party to postwar agreements, it was not empowered to sign treaties that would confirm the frontiers of 1945. The Polish overtures were frustrated because Minsk hesitated to pursue foreign policy initiatives without the Kremlin’s blessing.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Most notably, in late 1990 Minsk refused to sign a declaration of friendship and cooperation, although Russia and Ukraine had already signed similar agreements. Minsk specifically objected to a wording about its borders with Poland and to the treatment of the approximately 300,000 ethnic Belarusians in Poland.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t After the August 1991 coup in Russia, relations evolved rapidly once Belarus had declared its independence. In a declaration of friendship and cooperation, signed in October 1991, the parties renounced territorial claims against the other and promised to respect minority rights. In December 1991, Poland extended diplomatic recognition to Belarus.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t In 1992, Warsaw offered Belarus a treaty confirming existing borders and establishing clear principles of minority rights.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t When the treaty was initialed in April 1992, Polish Prime Minister Jan Olszewski said that \u201crelations between our countries can serve as a model for relations among other countries in our region.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n\t By codifying 93 percent of its eastern border by mid-1992 (206 kilometers with Russia in May, 428 kilometers with Ukraine in May, and 605 kilometers with Belarus in June, with only the 91 kilometers with Lithuania remaining), Warsaw sent a clear signal that it had no interest in eastward expansion.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t When Stanisla\u016d \u0160u\u0161kievich, speaker of the Belarusian parliament, signed the Belarusian-Polish treaty in Warsaw in June 1992, he connected relations with Poland to Belarus\u2019 European destiny.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t Belarus then opened its first embassy in Warsaw, not in Moscow. For the next eighteen months Poland offered \u0160u\u0161kievich and like-minded Belarusians a window on the West, helping Belarus to join regional institutions and initiating military cooperation.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t The direct election of \u0141uka\u0161enka as president of Belarus in 1994 ended fruitful cooperation with Poland and began a dictatorship of Soviet nostalgia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alaksandar K\u0142asko\u016dski, BPN Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka put on a show during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on July 23, threatening to unleash the Wagner Group on Poland. He claimed that Wagner militants based in Belarus were eager to carry out an incursion into Warsaw and Rzesz\u00f3w, a city in southeastern Poland. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":75,"featured_media":0,"template":"","rubric":[22],"class_list":["post-11595","longreads","type-longreads","status-publish","hentry","rubric-theviewer"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\u0141uka\u0161enka helping Putin demonize Poland | Pozirk<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"By Alaksandar K\u0142asko\u016dski, BPN Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka put on a show during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on July\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/longreads\/11595\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u0141uka\u0161enka helping Putin demonize Poland | Pozirk\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Alaksandar K\u0142asko\u016dski, BPN 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