The war in Ukraine, the threat posed by Russia and a wide range of broader security issues were among the key topics discussed at this year’s Warsaw Security Forum. One of the participants was Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, Chairperson of the United Transitional Cabinet of Belarus. The Belarusian opposition leader commented on both Donald Trump’s decision to lift sanctions on Russian diesel and the proposed Belarusian potash deal. “There should be no business with dictators,” she told TVP World. Tsikhanouskaya said pressure on Alexander Lukashenko’s regime should not be eased as long as political repression continued in Belarus and the regime remained complicit in Russia’s war against Ukraine. Tsikhanouskaya also argued that sanctions remained one of the most effective tools for influencing Minsk. In her view, any discussion about lifting them should be conditioned on the release of all political prisoners, an end to repression and an end to Belarus’s support for Russian aggression. The leader of the Belarusian democratic forces further stressed that any future peace settlement concerning Ukraine must also address Belarus and the presence of Russian troops on its territory.
