Word: belarus
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What happens when the little guy plots revenge? Over New Year's Day, tiny Belarus caved in to Russia, its gigantic gas supplier and next-door neighbor, agreeing to a steep rise in prices. On Jan. 3, however, Belarus' neo-Stalinist President Alexander Lukashenko - and formerly a professed ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin - said on television that his government officials should "feel free getting oil supplies at your discretion, wherever you can" at non-extortionist prices. "Oil refineries must be supplied. Otherwise, our chemical/petroleum industries, that account for half of our economy, will stop, which means millions of people...
...unfavorable terms" to which Belarus finally agreed include prices only 5% less than Gazprom's initial demand, and more than double that which Belarus has paid since 2005. The country was also forced to sell 50% of its national gas pipeline operator Beltransgaz to the Russian gas company. The concessions will hurt. Lukashenko has propped up the Belarusan economy with Russian fuel and once was tipped to occupy the Kremlin himself. That seemed realistic as he cozied up to an ailing Boris Yeltsin. When Vladimir Putin took Russia's helm, Lukashenko's chances were dashed, and with them, one reason...
...delay has angered Putin, believes Lilia Shevtsova, an analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. Putin's second and final term as Russian President ends in 2008, and a successful reabsorption of Belarus would ensure his legacy as the first reunifier of the Slavic lands lost by his predecessors Mikhail Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Shevtsova also cites a more colorful theory: "Annexing Belarus could also create a legal way for Putin to stay on in the Kremlin." The constitution of the Russian Federation restricts any incumbent to two consecutive terms as President, but a new, expanded Federation could start with a clean...
...countries are far from united. In addition to the gas price hike, in late December Russia introduced a new export duty on its supplies of crude to Belarus. Belneftekhim, Belarus' state-run oil and chemical concern, immediately suspended all oil contracts with Russian companies. "We'll survive, but we're hard put now," Alexander Timoshenko, Belarus' government spokesman, told Time...
...state television returned to scenes of seasonal revelry, Sannikov's guests swapped predictions of how the situation would play out. Most anticipated that Lukashenko will cut subsidies that have kept Belarus' decaying industries and Soviet-style collective farms afloat. Vladimir Khalip, a Belarusan writer and documentary filmmaker, didn't think this would be enough to save the regime. "Now, its collapse is inevitable, come May or June," he said. Such forecasts have proved wrong in the past, but on one point there was consensus: there wasn't much that was happy about this New Year in Belarus...