Lukashenko: "Where Is My Union?"

This comes across as though it were published in the 1990s - Aleksandr Lukashenko, President of Belarus, is blaming Russia for the inability to create a unified Russian-Belarus state. Lukashenko spoke during his country's celebration of the May 9 victory over Nazi Germany in WW2:

"Today, we have friends everywhere: in Europe, Latin America, Asia and the Middle East. That's because Belarus conducts diverse foreign policy of peace." According to him, "we have a special relationship that has historically associated us with our brotherly Russia and Russian people."

According to the Belorussian President, the delays in implementing this federated state are not irreversible:

"We are working with the Russian side. There is an understanding - we will overcome the difficulties, now matter how hard they may be. We are being blamed now that we are drifting towards the West. None of what we do means we are leaning that way. We just want to have good partner relations with the West. I am confident that we will normalize these relations, despite those who do not want it."

However, Lukashenko criticized Russian counterparts for the fact that the 1996 Joint Agreement between his country and Russia is still not a reality:

"The fact that we have not progressed in constructing a federal partnership is not our fault. It is their (Russia) fault...Who does not fulfill the contract on the construction of the Unified State? We had to hold a joint referendum on that. Why didn't we? Because the Russians did not want to," - said Lukashenko, advising Moscow to "look at the internal causes of turmoil in our relationship."

Lukashenko made his latest appeal to Moscow because he thinks that Russians are put off by his initiative to organize in Belarus a meeting between the world leaders of the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. The original agreement calling for a unified state was signed during 1996-1997 between Presidents Boris Yeltsin and Aleksandr Lukashenko. It called for the eventual federated union that would encompass the territories of Belarus and the Russian Federation, with one government responsible for the foreign, economic and military policies. Lukashenko was a big proponent of such a Union, since he would naturally be first in line to become its leader if Yeltsin would cede power due to his health and age. Unfortunately, with Yeltsin's pick of young and energetic Vladimir Putin to the post of the Russian President in late 1999, Lukashenko's hopes of succession were dashed. Putin resisted the actual implementation of the Union for various reasons, not the least of which was the fact that Russia already controlled Belarus' subsidized command economy through lower energy costs on oil and natural gas. This unrealized Union is still popular amongst Russian nationalists and communists, who seek to re-establish the Soviet Union in one form or another.