Lukashenka’s Worthless Paper

China quickly put the dictator in his place.

Having come to power in 1994 and having thoroughly rewritten the Constitution in 1996, Aliaksandr Lukashenka gave himself the right to issue decrees that had the force of law. And for many decades he ruled by means of his “decree right” without regard for the “parliament”. But in 2004, an innovation appeared in Belarusian lawmaking — Lukashenka issued Directive #1 “On measures to strengthen public security and discipline”.

He baffled lawyers with this legal act. After all, there was not a word about the ruler’s directives in the Constitution or in the legislation. The dictator’s press service even had to issue a separate statement explaining the essence of this document.

During his entire reign, Aliaksandr Lukashenka signed 12 directives. Moreover, two of them — “On improving the functioning of the system of government and management bodies, strengthening executive discipline” and “On the implementation of the foundations of the ideology of the Belarusian state” — were published in March 2025.

The topics of these documents are very diverse, from de-bureaucratization of the state apparatus and increasing the efficiency of the agro-industrial complex, to priority areas for the development of the construction industry and the inadmissibility of price increases.

Perhaps the most unexpected directive — “On the development of bilateral relations between the Republic of Belarus and the People's Republic of China” — was signed in 2021. It provided for the implementation of more than 50 different Belarusian-Chinese projects by the end of 2025.

Among other things, the directive, for example, obliged officials “to ensure that each region and the city of Minsk attract at least 150 million US dollars of direct Chinese investment by 2026 within the framework of interregional cooperation.” Of course, this was not done. The exception is, perhaps, the Minsk region, where the Belarusian-Chinese technology park “Great Stone” is located.

The directive provided for “the joint production with Chinese partners of feature films and (or) TV series dedicated to the fight against fascism and Japanese militarism.” And also the creation of a “regional center for the promotion of traditional and innovative Chinese medicine” in the industrial park “Great Stone”.

And the cherry on the cake is “the creation of an international logistics hub on the land route China-Europe through the operation of an international logistics consortium and the development by 2025 of the issue of connecting the industrial park “Great Stone” to the European railway track of 1435 mm from the Belarusian-Polish border with the involvement of the corporation “China Railways” and other interested parties.”

And if the regional authorities or sluggish officials can be blamed for the lack of progress in the above-mentioned areas, then in this case, Aliaksandr Lukashenka bears direct responsibility. The migration crisis provoked by the Belarusian authorities and the actively used anti-Polish rhetoric led to the fact that relations between Warsaw and Minsk finally deteriorated.

It got to the point that in July 2024, the Polish authorities threatened to completely block the transit of Chinese railway cargo through Belarus. Which, of course, was not part of Beijing's plans to implement the global trade initiative “One Belt — One Road”.

As a result, the blockade of Chinese cargo on the Belarusian-Polish border did not take place, but the aftertaste, as they say, remained...

But what the Belarusian authorities managed to do was, as envisaged by the directive, raise the status of Belarusian-Chinese relations to the level of “iron brotherhood, exemplary comprehensive strategic cooperation and all-weather partnership.”

But the Chinese are not “Russian brothers,” and they seem unlikely to exchange their investments for “kisses from Lukashenka.”

Aliaksandr Kutsitski, UDF

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