/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/larazon/QSNF7AN42ZBVXITFZRTIUWNMQQ.JPG "The United States, United Kingdom and Canada impose new sanctions on Belarus")
The United States Government, in collusion with the United Kingdom and Canada, have announced a new battery of sanctions against the Belarusian regime in retaliation for what they consider a “brutal campaign of repression” against the opposition, started precisely a year ago, with controversial elections that Washington has directly described as “electoral fraud.”
“A year ago, the people of Belarus wanted their voices to be heard and define their future through the most basic expression of democracy”, US President Joe Biden recalled, alluding to the vote that granted his counterpart Alexander Lukashenko his sixth consecutive term.
Biden believes that, “instead of respecting the clear will of the Belarusian people,” Minsk opted for a crackdown that resulted in “thousands” of protesters arrested and with a series of actions that would demonstrate the will of Lukashenko to “stay in power at any cost.”
Biden, what justifies the “responsibility” of United States to defend Human Rights, has promulgated a decree that expands the capacity of its Administration to encircle the Belarusian regime and its surroundings, with punishments aimed at both individuals and entities in sectors considered strategic. Thus, they join the blacklist companies such as the state-owned Belaruskali OAO, key in the production of potash, and other firms linked to tobacco, construction, energy or transportation. The measures also affect the banking sector, for example with the incorporation of the private entity Absolutbank.
Washington also targets the Belarusian National Olympic Committee, accused of facilitating money laundering and evasion of sanctions and of failing to protect athletes such as Kristsina Tsimanuskaya, a refugee in Poland from “discrimination and political repression”.
The United Kingdom and Canada also join the sanctions
The British Government announced on Monday a package of economic sanctions against Belarus, in response to human rights violations in that country and the democratic weakness of the Alexandr Lukashenko regime.
Foreign Minister Dominic Raaba noted that “Lukashenko’s regime continues to hit democracy and violate human rights in Belarus. These sanctions show that the UK will not accept Lukashenko’s actions ”. “Products from Lukashenko’s state industries will not be sold in the UK,” he added. The sanctions include preventing Belarusian airlines from landing or flying over British territory and also a ban on providing technical assistance to President Lukashenko’s fleet of luxury jets. Among other things, the United Kingdom will ban Belarus from the London financial service and will also not be supplied with products used for the manufacture of tobacco.
The United Kingdom had already imposed sanctions on several Belarusian officials last June after the arrest of journalist Roman Protasevich after the plane in which he was traveling was diverted to Belarus.
For his part, the head of Canadian diplomacy, Marc Garneau, has insisted on the need to “put pressure” on those responsible for various abuses, given that “a year has passed since the Belarusian regime demonstrated a total lack of respect for Human Rights during the fraudulent presidential elections ”.
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