JHS report Belarus post-Lukashenko

The role of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in European history has largely been forgotten, and today few Europeans are aware of the fact that the Belarusians were one of the peoples living in this multi-ethnic state formation, that as its zenith stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea. [...] The Belarusians did aspire to statehood during the chaotic aftermath of World War I and the Russian revolutions, but in the end, Belarus became a Soviet republic, where the Belarusian national identity was allowed to develop relatively freely during the first years of the fairly permissive policy towards the national republics. [...] They can and should take the lead in the EU opinion on the future shape of relations, backed by countries that have always been active advocates of the Eastern Partnership, like Sweden – and in close cooperation with the German Presidency of the European Council – and coordinate ideas for the shape of the European partnership with a free Belarus – and also with Ukraine. [...] Today the Kremlin policy toward the protesting Belarusians should be viewed in the context of the current Putin agenda: Putin wants to return to the Club of Great Powers using the Western disorientation and the U. [...] One of the country’s silver linings, the ICT sector, began to relocate its operations abroad in the wake of political repression and curtailment of access to the internet and communications to the outside world.