Belarus Country Page

 

   

Belarus Data Belarus Summary Reports: NCSJ report (below) CIA World Factbook U.S. State Dept. - background U.S. State Dept. - Human Rights U.S. State Dept. - Religious Freedom U.S. Embassy Minsk Belarusian Embassy About NCSJ Country Reports Return to Directory

Population: 9,648,533 (July 2009 est.) Ethnic Composition:  81.2% Belarusian, 11.4% Russian, 3.9% Polish, 2.4% Ukrainian, 1.1% other  Religion: 80% Eastern Orthodox, 20% other (Roman Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim) Jewish population: 50-70,000 2009 Aliyah (emigration to Israel): 407 1989-2006 Aliyah: 73,691 Size: 207,600 sq km    Capital: Minsk  Major cities: Gomel, Minsk, Mogilev, Vitebsk Freedom House Rating: Not Free

Currency: 2,880 Belarusian rubles = $1 GDP: $49.04 billion (2009 est.) GDP per capita: $11,600 (2009 est.) GDP Growth: -3.3% (2009 est.) Head of State: President Aleksandr Lukashenko Head of Government:  Prime Minister Sergei Sidorsky Foreign Minister:  Sergei N. Martynov Ambassador to United States: vacant (Charge d’Affaires: Oleg Kravchenko) U.S. Ambassador to Belarus: vacant (Charge d’Affaires: Michael Scanlan) Chronology of all U.S. envoys to Belarus

SUMMARY

Belarus’ failure to hold free and fair elections has kept Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in power since he was first elected to a five-year term of office in 1994. Lukashenko has hinted he may remain in power even after his current Presidential term ends in 2011 and has recently promoted one of his sons to Belarus’ Security Council.

Belarus’ history of domination by foreign powers has muted its national identity and drive for independence. Many Belarusian institutions remain mired in Soviet-era protocol and attitudes. Belarus’ struggling economy retained its pre-independence structure; the current regime has stopped, and in some cases even reversed, market-oriented reform. With the alienation of Western governments and the accompanying shortfall in foreign assistance and investment, Belarus increasingly depends upon its neighbor Russia with the two countries intermittently cultivating a bi-national union. However, recent Russian energy price hikes and moves to gain control over Belarusian gas and oil distribution networks suggest that Belarus now finds itself between an unsympathetic West and a newly tough-minded Russia pursuing “market relations” and no longer willing to subsidize its domestic policies. Without cheap Russian oil and gas, Belarus may face a new and less stable era.

Although its constitution provides for fundamental freedoms, the government routinely commits and abets civil and human rights abuses. Opposition exists, but is routinely thwarted.

The Belarusian Jewish community – once at the heart of the Pale of Settlement, then nearly wiped out by the Holocaust and by Soviet policies – is now represented through many local organizations and is actively supported by Israeli and American organizations. However, anti-Semitism is prevalent and has been throughout Belarus’ history. Relations with the government are complicated by the authorities’ tepid response to popular and political anti-Semitism and by the lack of resolution of communal property restitution and preservation issues.


return to top

REPUBLIC OF BELARUS

INTRODUCTION
POLITICAL SITUATION
    Religious Freedom
    Foreign Policy
ECONOMIC SITUATION
JEWISH COMMUNAL LIFE & ANTI-SEMITISM
    Organizations and Programs
    Restitution
    Anti-Semitism
    Official Response
U.S. POLICY

Belarus (“White Russia”) occupies about one percent of the total territory of the former Soviet Union. Mostly landlocked, flat and slightly smaller than Kansas, Belarus is bordered by Russia, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland.

Belarus has a long history of domination by foreign powers. Part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from the 13th to the 18th centuries, then incorporated into the Russian Empire during the partitions of Poland (1772-95), Belarus endured repeated periods of Russification during its long occupation by the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. As a result, Belarus did not assert a national identity distinct from Russia until the end of the 19th century. In March 1918, after the collapse of Tsarist Russia, local nationalists established a short-lived Belarusian Democratic Republic, crushed by the Red Army less than a year later. In 1922, Belarus (known then as the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic) formally became one of the four constituent Soviet republics. Belarus lost almost 2.2 million citizens (one-quarter of its population) in World War II.

The Communist Party of Belarus, and the entire Belarusian population, was one of the most conservative in the Soviet Union. In March 1990, elections brought reformist Stanislau Shushkevich to power in Belarus. Shushkevich advocated free market reforms and distancing Belarus from Russia. Although in a March 1991 referendum, 83 percent of the Belarus electorate voted to preserve the Soviet Union, Belarus declared its independence that August.

Shushkevich signed the Belovezhskaya Pushcha accords dissolving the Soviet Union and forming the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) with Russia and Ukraine in December 1991. His opposition to closer relations with Moscow motivated his ouster by conservative lawmakers in January 1994.


return to headings


POLITICAL SITUATION

Belarus is a presidential republic. The popularly elected President is head of state and nominates the Council of Ministers and its chairman, the prime minister. The legislative and judicial branches are separate but subordinate to the executive.

Belarus’ first post-Soviet constitution took effect in March 1994, establishing a strong Presidency, a Parliament (Natsionalnoye Sobranie), and a Constitutional Court. Presidential elections in July 1994 resulted in the upset victory for populist candidate Aleksandr Lukashenko, a former collective farm manager, who campaigned on a platform of anti-corruption and greater economic integration with Russia.

In November 1996, despite widespread protest, voters adopted a new constitution in a heavily manipulated referendum, greatly expanding the powers of President Lukashenko and extending his term until 2001. Opposition parties and the international communities condemned the referendum as neither free nor fair, deeply flawed, and illegitimate. Several Belarusian state officials, including the Prime Minister and the head of the electoral commission, resigned in protest. Many within the opposition were fined and arrested. 

Following the 1996 referendum, a new and smaller parliament, the National Assembly, was created with deputies loyal to Lukashenko. This bicameral parliament consists of a 110-member House of Representatives (Palata Predstaviteley), and a 64-member Council of the Republic (Soviet Respubliki), with all members elected to four-year terms. The President appoints all judges to the Supreme Court and half of the members of the Constitutional Court leading to a non-independent judiciary.

The most recent Parliamentary elections took place in 2008. According to the OSCE, the elections were undemocratic and the work of international observers was seriously hindered as the observers were refused access to the facilities where the votes were counted. But according to a CIS elections mission, the elections in Belarus conformed to international standards. According to the official results the oppositional parties failed to gain any of the 110 available seats, all of which were given to parties and non-partisan candidates loyal to President Alexander Lukashenko.

The Belarusian government has come under severe criticism from international human rights organizations. Freedom of speech, movement, and assembly are limited, and the government maintains a virtual monopoly over the press. Some Soviet-era restrictions remain in effect, and overt expressions of protest can draw harsh reaction from the authorities. A number of opposition figures have gone missing after criticizing President Lukashenko, while others have been tried and jailed.

Lukashenko has provided Belarus with a degree of political stability and a basic standard of living, thanks to generous Russian energy subsidies, that give him a genuinely popular base of support. Combined with state-sponsored repression of oppositionists, a state-dominated media, and a loyal state bureaucracy, Lukashenko easily won another term in office on March 19, 2006, with official results giving him nearly 83 percent of the vote. The main opposition candidate, Alexander Milinkevich, a 58-year-old professor of physics, officially received 6 percent. Subsequent polls suggested that as many as 20 percent of the voters may have voted for Milinkevich. The European Union (EU) and United States called the campaign and election undemocratic and fraudulent and have imposed travel bans and financial restrictions on Lukashenko and his associates in retaliation. Russian and CIS observers, however, called the election “open and transparent”.

Hoping to spark a “color revolution” similar to those that have taken place in Ukraine and Georgia, Milinkevich held protest rallies in Minsk after the election that drew thousands of demonstrators. However, those numbers dwindled rapidly due to harsh weather conditions and arrests.

Local elections held in Belarus in January 2007 were likewise condemned by foreign observers as neither free nor fair, with no international monitors allowed and with the opposition facing serious impairments.


return to headings

Religious Freedom

The U.S. State Department reports that while the Belarusian constitution grants religious freedom, the government does not always respect this right in practice, especially with respect to “nontraditional” faiths such as Protestantism or Eastern religions. Lukashenko has promoted the Belarusian Orthodox Church, granting it privileged status as the only officially recognized Orthodox denomination in Belarus via a 2003 concordat.

In October 2002, the government enacted the Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations. The Law narrowed the number of groups able to register as legal religions, limited the activities of all nontraditional religions, and emphasized the Russian Orthodox Church’s position as the country’s preeminent religion. For a group or local chapter to be registered, it must have been active in Belarus for at least 20 years and must consist of 20 Belarusian citizens. Unregistered groups are banned from any religious activity. Religious literature (particularly of foreign origin) requires the approval of a new state agency, effectively subjecting it to government censorship. With or without official registration, some faiths have encountered police harassment, difficulty renting or purchasing property to establish places of worship and difficulty training clergy.

Citizens theoretically are not prohibited from proselytizing and may speak freely about their religious beliefs; however, authorities often interfere with or punish individuals who proselytize on behalf of some registered and unregistered religions.



return to headings

Foreign Policy

Belarus retains close ties with Russia. A 1995 referendum strengthened economic relations, and the 1997 and 1999 Belarus-Russia Union Treaties provide for close coordination of foreign, military and economic policies, although few provisions have been implemented. Russia has also extended financial support, but since mid-2000 has distanced itself from Belarus. In early 2003, a bilateral working group was developing a draft union constitution to be ratified by a referendum to be held in both countries. Belarus and Russia had also reaffirmed their intention to achieve currency unification by 2005. However, persistent differences over energy and transportation costs, tax policy, customs, foreign trade, and constitutional issues, as well as worsening relations between President Lukashenko and the Russian leadership, make union increasingly unlikely.

Russia - Presidential Press Service August 2003: Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Lukashenko at the Kremlin before a meeting of the Russian-Belarusian Union State’s State Council

President Lukashenko’s foreign policy grew more erratic in 2006 and early 2007, especially following a sharp dispute with Russia over its energy price hikes in January 2007. Lukashenko has sought to secure new markets and win new allies and energy suppliers, pursuing closer relationships and trade deals with Venezuela, Cuba, and Iran, and meeting with Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He also unexpectedly proposed a union state with Ukraine; reached out to the European Union, saying that Belarus was ready to be an “eager pupil” of the West, but rejected EU calls for dialogue with the Belarusian opposition; and reiterated his longstanding claim that Belarus is Russia’s western “outpost.” Lukashenko claimed that, ultimately, neither Europe nor Russia is essential to Belarus’ survival, and that Belarusian independence remained his key priority, trumping even his longstanding policy of integration with Russia. Lukashenko also stressed the need to develop closer ties with Iran, Venezuela, and China in particular, especially to diversify energy supplies.

Analysts suggest that the shock of the 2007 Russian energy price hikes and his resentment of Russia’s actions have forced President Lukashenko to re-examine his current isolation, dependence on Russia, and difficult relations with America and Europe. Noting that the March 25, 2007 opposition demonstrations commemorating the short-lived 1918 Belarusian National Republic occurred for the first time in years without major arrests or assaults by the police, some have suggested that long-standing Western demands that the Lukashenko government must improve its human rights record before relations can be improved may finally be having an effect. However, in April 2007 Lukashenko rejected EU preconditions for closer relations and said Belarus will not tolerate foreign pressure. Belarusian relations with other nations in the region, especially those with more democratic systems, are tepid.

Belarus has been part of such collective organizations as the European Community, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since the 1990s. However, relations with, and support from, these groups have deteriorated as economic and democratic reforms in Belarus have stalled or reversed.

Belarus has done little to appease the international community in diplomatic, political, or economic terms, and Lukashenko has openly disparaged international criticism of his policies. Since 1998, the United States and EU governments have periodically imposed travel bans and asset freezes on high-ranking Belarusian officials in response to diplomatic interference and anti-democratic actions, most recently after the March 2006 presidential election. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice specifically cited Belarus as an “outpost of tyranny” during her 2005 Senate confirmation hearing.

In 2000, Belarus’ Foreign Minister Ural Latypov visited Jerusalem to sign bilateral agreements on trade, investment, science, culture and education with his Israeli counterpart, and the countries agreed to deepen bilateral ties. Latypov also met with other Israeli officials, laid a wreath at Yad Vashem, and extended an invitation for Israel’s foreign minister to visit Minsk. In December 2004, Israel reopened its Minsk embassy, which closed in 2003 due to budget shortfalls.

Top election officials believed the September 28, 2008 parliamentary election could dissolve western stereotypes that depict the country as undemocratic because of the presence of opposition candidates. While the elections fell short of OSCE commitments for democratic elections, the EU has cited improvements such as the welcomed presence of OSCE monitors and the release of political prisoners, and in October 2008, travel bans were suspended for Lukashenko and 40 other top officials, allowing them to enter the EU for the first time since 2006. They also ended a separate four-year-old ban on high level contacts with Belarussian officials. But ministers maintained asset freezes on top Belarusians and upheld the ban on Belarus’ top election official to show disappointment over shortcomings in the September election in which the opposition again failed to win a seat in parliament. However, the EU is ready to engage Belarus and relations between the two have warmed since September.


return to headings


ECONOMIC SITUATION


Belarus had a relatively well-developed industrial base and a well-educated technical workforce under Soviet rule and retained much of it following the breakup of the USSR. A strong agricultural sector and good public education afforded Belarus one of the highest standards of living among the Soviet republics. However, Belarus has had to manage the massive social and economic repercussions of the April 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in neighboring Ukraine, which spread radioactive fallout across large sections of southern and eastern Belarus. Chernobyl generated a public health crisis, forced substantial population resettlement, and left large sections of the countryside unsafe for habitation or cultivation.

The Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991 cut off Belarus from its traditional supply sources and markets, leaving it in the precarious position of having to import two-thirds of its raw materials. Facing the difficult transition from a state-run economy to a free-market system, Belarus pursued initial economic reforms in the early 1990s but has backed away from reform and liberalization in almost every sector since Lukashenko’s 1994 election. Lukashenko has stressed the need for a “socially-oriented market economy” largely in state hands, with banks and many privatized companies renationalized by his administration.

Negligible progress in privatizing state-owned industries and Belarus’ growing isolation from the West due to its deteriorating human rights record under Lukashenko have deterred foreign investors and kept out foreign funds critical to rebuilding the Belarusian economy and infrastructure. International financial institutions largely ceased their funding from 1996 to 2000, and several major foreign investors pulled out by 2002 due to a hostile business climate.

The economy remains heavily dependent on subsidized Russian oil and gas imports, much of which are re-exported at world market prices, earning Belarus significant profits and allowing President Lukashenko to continue generous social welfare policies that many describe as crucial to his popular support. Living conditions are above average for many Belarusians when compared to some other former Soviet republics, thanks to state pensions and subsidies of basic goods. Official unemployment is low, but under-employment remains a problem, and the poverty rate is estimated at more than 25 percent.

Russia accounts for 60 percent of Belarus’ export market, with heavy emphasis on energy supplies and raw materials. The 1998 Russian financial crisis hurt Belarus badly, and Russia supplied Belarus with a $96 million stabilization loan over 2001-02. Plans for a Belarus-Russia currency union have been repeatedly postponed since 2004 and now appear unlikely, given growing economic and political frictions between Minsk and Moscow.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) continues to support projects in Belarus arranged before 2000, but otherwise has refocused its aid on small non-governmental enterprises. After two years of absence, the World Bank resumed funding in 2002 with a pledge of $22.6 million in loans for infrastructure repairs to schools and hospitals. The Bank has loaned Belarus $193 million since July 1992, a fraction of its outlays to Ukraine and Russia. While the IMF continues to offer technical assistance to Belarus, lending organizations stated in April 2003 that high-level assistance will be put on hold until Belarus enacts substantial structural reforms. In early 2004, Belarus halted negotiations on a follow-on stand-by arrangement due to disagreements with the IMF on macroeconomic policy and claiming that it did not require IMF funding.

Despite steady GDP growth, the economy is hampered by high inflation, persistent trade deficits, and ongoing problems with Russia, its primary economic partner and energy supplier. Agreements made by Lukashenko and former Russian President Boris Yeltsin have foundered under President Putin’s tenure, undermining prospects for real economic union. According to President Putin, the relationship between the two countries “cannot be an equal one.” Likewise, President Lukashenko has insisted that relations with Russia must serve Belarusian interests first. Lukashenko rejected a 2004 offer by Putin for Belarus to join the Russian Federation, and pledged in April 2007 that Belarus will not become a province of Russia or any other country, saying that “sovereignty and independence are more valuable” than favorable natural gas prices.

In January 2007, Russia dramatically increased prices it charges Belarus for oil and gas which has had a serious effect on the Belarusian economy. In response, Belarus imposed a transit levy on Russian oil transiting its territory to Europe. Russia then briefly suspended oil shipments and accused Belarus of tapping its oil in a repeat of its January 2006 dispute with Ukraine. President Lukashenko bitterly criticized Russia’s price hike, calling Russia a “monster” in March 2007, and alleging in April 2007 that Russia is “bleeding Belarus dry” under the pretext of establishing market relations. He has also repeatedly said that he wants good relations with Russia, including an eventual union state of co-equals, and that Belarus will fulfill its defense obligations to Russia despite recent tensions.

Belarus’ economic growth has slowed in 2009 as it faces decreasing demand for its exports. The nation is also finding it difficult to increase external borrowing as the credit markets continue to tighten.
 

return to headings


JEWISH COMMUNAL LIFE & ANTI-SEMITISM

Located within the “Pale of Settlement,” to which Jews were confined by the Russian Tsars, Belarus was a center of Jewish life prior to the Holocaust. Jewish communities first appeared in Belarus in the 14th century, when the country was part of Poland-Lithuania. By the end of the 19th century, Jews comprised 13 percent of the total population of Belarus and half the population in Minsk, Vitebsk, Mogilev, and Gomel.

As Jews began to settle in Belarus, many in the Christian community consistently opposed their permanent settlement within cities and towns. Jewish communities faced the constant danger of pogroms. During the Soviet period, the authorities persecuted Jews, while the purges of the 1930s claimed many Jewish Belarusians.

During World War II, German forces and local collaborators murdered between 600,000-800,000 Belarusian Jews. In total, one-quarter of Belarus’ entire population was killed in the war, and 90 percent of the country’s Jewish population was wiped out. 571 Belarusians have been honored by Israel to date as “Righteous among the Nations” for helping to save Jews during the Holocaust, including seven inducted in April 2007.

photo: Terry Fisher

World War II  Memorial at Khatyn

return to headings

Organizations and Programs

There are 43 official Jewish community organizations in Belarus and 37 religious congregations. The primary coordinating body is the Belarus Union of Jewish Organizations and Communities (ABJOC). Religious services are provided throughout Belarus by several organizations, including Chabad Lubavitch, Aish HaTorah, the World Union for Progressive Judaism, and the Union of Religious Jewish Congregations (URJC). At least half of the country’s Jewish population is thought to live in or near Minsk.

Educational programs operate in cities throughout the country, with one Jewish day school each in Minsk, Gomel, Mogilev, and Pinsk. The Israeli Education Ministry currently funds all of the Jewish day schools. Over 20 Sunday schools hold classes. Although in 2002 authorities denied a request for the creation of a Jewish secondary school, permission was later granted to open the Bialik School in Minsk, the only state-funded Jewish school in Belarus. Operating inside a secular state school, the Bialik School hosts close to 300 students and offers seven hours of additional weekly instruction in various Jewish subjects, including Hebrew and Jewish history and literature.

The Marc Chagall Institute of Jewish Studies opened at the Belarus State University in 1999. Total enrollment in the school numbered over 500 students in 2004. ORT established a technology resource center at the Institute in May 2002 for teacher and professional training. More recent plans envision upgrading the ORT center to add IT and computer training opportunities as well as adding a science and technology center. The school is cooperating with the Marc Chagall Institute to expand science and technology education to Jewish students in Minsk.

In 1998, the International Humanities Institute (MHI) opened at Belarus State University (BSU) as a center for Jewish studies, the first Jewish academic center in Belarus since World War II, with significant international funding, including from the JDC. The institute enrolled about 500 students and offered courses in Judaica and other humanities, as well as a modern computer lab and lectures by foreign professors. In February 2004, during the school’s winter break, the Belarus Education Ministry suddenly ordered MHI closed, ostensibly due to a reorganization of BSU. Foreign observers and Belarusian Jewish community leaders, however, believed the closure was related to what the Lukashenko government saw as MHI’s “pro-Western bias” and to growing state anti-Semitism in Belarus. The Belarusian government first indicated its displeasure with MHI in 2003, when the school unveiled plans to build a new campus with Western and Israeli funding. The former MHI Judaica program continued as an independent entity within the BSU until the International Relations department absorbed it in 2005.

In September 2004, the Belarus Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied registration to the Belarus Bureau of the Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union (UCSJ) and froze its funds, arguing that the group was late in submitting its request for accreditation. The head of the UCSJ Belarus Bureau, which was first registered in Belarus in 2001, said the move was aimed at silencing his organization, which had spoken out against rising anti-Semitism and other extremist activity in Belarus.

The Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI/ “Sochnut”) runs a network of Hebrew-instruction ulpans, youth clubs and other programs to encourage aliyah. A chapter of Hillel, based in Minsk, has over 150 students, who contribute to many community events, particularly as part of the FSU Hillel Pesach Project, which organizes seders for thousands in Belarus.

The American-based Yeshiva and University Students for the Spiritual Revival of Soviet Jewry (YUSSR) has operated youth camps and seminars in Belarus since 1992, and sponsors adult education, Yiddish and Jewish cultural programming, primarily in Minsk and Mogilev.

An ABJOC-initiated Holocaust education program operates in several non-Jewish schools in Minsk and other cities. The program expanded in April 2003, when it held a two-day seminar for mostly non-Jewish teachers in Minsk, sponsored with help from the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress (EAJC) and the Belarusian Ministry of Education.

The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC/“Joint”) is active in Minsk and 14 other Belarusian cities. It runs the Creative Intellectuals Club for Jewish Studies, provides food and medicine to impoverished Jews through its network of Hesed (charity) centers, and operates a “Warm Homes” aid program for Righteous Gentiles who saved Jews during the Holocaust. In 2002, JDC, with financial assistance from World Jewish Relief and the Atlanta, Georgia Jewish community opened the Minsk Jewish Campus, which also houses a new Belarusian Jewish history museum established by ABJOC. Other programs include women’s clubs, children’s activities, and computer classes. In April 2007, the Minsk Jewish Campus, which now hosts 18 separate Belarusian Jewish organizations – among them the “Hesed-Rahamim” charitable and welfare organization, the “Rainbow” program for the rehabilitation of disabled and handicapped Jews, and the “Emunah” Jewish Cultural Society – celebrated its 5th anniversary.

Jewish Family Outreach Services support needy Jewish families during the winter, as part of the Minsk Jewish Campus. JFOS compliments the Hesed welfare system for elderly Jews by offering food packages, counseling and job training. JFOS maintains a database of over 3,500 families including 1,200 families in Minsk.

Several war veteran and ghetto survivor societies operate throughout Belarus, advocating for state benefits and for German and Swiss compensation; war veterans receive a state pension of about $100 per month.

Yama (“the pit”) was the first official Holocaust memorial established on the territory of the Soviet Union. Erected in 1946, it was dedicated in Yiddish and Russian to the 5,000 Jews from the Minsk ghetto who were murdered at the site on March 2, 1942.

In recognizing the Jewish heritage of its victims in a Yiddish-language dedication, this monument was unique in the Soviet Union. Unlike at other Holocaust sites in the Soviet Union, Jews were legally permitted to gather at Yama throughout the Soviet period. Another mass grave was discovered in October 2002 at Slutsk. Residents report that the estimated 12,000 victims, mostly Jews, were taken from Slutsk and a nearby concentration camp and executed by Nazi forces in 1942-44; excavation of the site continues.


return to headings

Restitution

Belarus has no law on the restitution of communal property, and attempts to salvage Jewish cemeteries and properties have met with mixed success. Jewish cemeteries in Slonim, Volozhin and Radim have been fenced off to prevent construction, thanks to efforts by the Jewish community. A small number of Communist-seized buildings, including nine synagogues, have been returned to the Jewish community, but little progress has been achieved overall. Some 96 synagogues remain in state hands despite community efforts and letter campaigns to government authorities.

The Volozhin Yeshiva, built in 1803 as the founding institution of the modern Yeshiva movement, was returned to the care of the URJC in the early 1990s, as was the Slonim Synagogue. Both have been registered as state historical sites and need restoration. In April 2007, Volozhin city officials warned that the yeshiva building could be forcibly returned to city ownership if the Jewish community is unable to raise $20,000 for initial repairs to the abandoned building, currently in disrepair and located in Volozhin’s historic center.

In April 2006, a new Jewish synagogue, kosher soup kitchen, and office were opened in Brest, on the Polish border. The new facilities were opened in an office building whose ground floor has been leased by the local Jewish community, and were described as protected by a fence and a security system.

In May 2007, an ad hoc committee of U.S.-based Jewish organizations was formed and began discussions on how to raise the necessary funds. Belarusian Jewish community leaders believe that Volozhin city officials now will stop legal attempts to confiscate the building, but note that full renovation of the yeshiva is expected to cost more than $100,000.

In some cases, historical and cultural landmarks have been destroyed despite Jewish community opposition. A former synagogue, built at the end of the 19th century and located in a historic district of Minsk, was demolished in September 2001 to make way for luxury apartments. Before the building’s demolition, the Ministry of Culture revoked the building’s status as a historical monument. Jewish community protests addressed to the Minsk city government and to the Ministry of Culture received no response. In November 2002, 75 Belarusian lawmakers took up this cause, appealing to President Lukashenko to stop the destruction of Jewish cultural landmarks, especially the apartment construction and the construction of a parking lot on the foundations of a ruined 16th century synagogue.

The 2002 Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations has triggered anxieties in religious groups throughout Belarus. While Judaism is recognized along with Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, Islam and Russian Orthodox Christianity as a traditional religion with a long Belarusian history, many Jews see the law as a serious threat to religious freedom and to efforts to restitute communal property. Belarusian authorities have since used the law to deny the use of public venues or state-owned facilities to religious groups, including Jews, seeking to meet outside designated places of worship.


return to headings

Anti-Semitism

The primary sources of anti-Semitism are local Orthodox churches, individual politicians and intellectuals, and marginal youth groups that include neo-Nazis and skinheads. Anti-Semitic publications have also appeared in local newspapers and in books published by “Orthodox Initiative,” a Minsk publishing house whose majority owner is the Minsk Orthodox Diocese. It and other local publishing houses have published stridently anti-Semitic books in the recent past that depict Belarusian Jews and “world Jewry” as enemies of Belarus.

Anti-Semitic acts involving Jewish cemetery desecrations, graffiti and attacks on community property (especially on synagogues and Holocaust memorials) have taken place in Brest, Gorodeya, Pinsk, Rechica, and other cities across Belarus in recent years. In August 2005, the Yama memorial was found covered with wreath fragments and human waste. The Pinsk Holocaust memorial was damaged in April 2005. In Brest, a monument commemorating local Jewish Holocaust victims was defiled in November 2004. In Gorodeya, a Holocaust memorial was damaged in July 2004.

The Jewish Sunday school, the Jewish Charity Center and the office of the Jewish Youth Organization in Borisov have also been targets of attacks. No suspects have been identified in any of these cases.

In the fall of 2004, authorities changed a plaque on a new Holocaust memorial to omit the mention, in Belarusian, of Jewish deaths, although they left the language unchanged on Hebrew and English plaques. The memorial in Gorodeya, a town near Minsk, commemorates over 1,000 Jewish deaths there in 1942 at the hands of the Nazis.

Acts of cemetery desecration occurred in May 2005, in Miasshevich. Although the cemetery was near a police station, the police denied seeing the vandals and made no arrests.

Two prominent cases of cemetery desecration occurred in June 2003, in Grodno and Mogilev. In Grodno, a soccer stadium was being expanded over a 300-year-old Jewish cemetery; construction unearthed and destroyed numerous human remains. The Jewish community appealed to the Belarusian government and Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe (CPJCE), as well as the world and European governing bodies for soccer (FIFA and UEFA) in an attempt to stop the construction. Following international pressure, regional authorities agreed in 2003 to cease excavation and to rebury the uncovered remains elsewhere. In 2006, they granted permission for a plaque noting the site of the former cemetery. Local Jewish leaders argued the incident reflected official insensitivity more than actual anti-Semitism, citing the partial destruction of other, non-Jewish cemeteries during other construction projects.

Also in 2003, local authorities opened the Jewish cemetery in Mogilev to non-Jewish burials, resulting in the destruction of Jewish graves, and crosses reportedly were erected at the entrance to the cemetery.

Anti-Semitic graffiti in public places continued to appear throughout 2005. In addition to swastikas – seen on walls, fences, doorways and underground passages throughout Belarus, often accompanied by the abbreviation for the neo-Nazi Russian National Unity party (RNE) – newer symbols and combinations have been introduced.

The Belarus branch of the RNE movement, led by former Lukashenko aide Andrei Valliulin, has branches in 11 cities, and holds nationalistic and anti-Semitic demonstrations unhindered by the authorities. In January 2006, about 30 neo-Nazis marched in the city of Grodno. According to the U.S. State Department, since 2003, Grodno city authorities have repeatedly denied the registration of a foreign rabbi because he does not speak Belarusian or Russian.

In January 2006, production of kosher bread in a local bakery in Mogilev resulted in anti-Semitic local newspaper articles, including an editorial claiming that the blood of sacrificed animals is used in kosher rituals and warning local Orthodox Christians to stay away from kosher products as “anti-Christian.”

In March 2007, a Holocaust memorial in Minsk was vandalized on the 65th anniversary of a mass killing of German and Belarusian Jews by the Nazis in the wartime Minsk ghetto. A Holocaust memorial plaque was stolen from the same site but was recovered in April 2007 after the German Embassy in Minsk offered a reward for its return.

In February 2008, vandals set fire to wreaths and flowers laid at the memorial to Holocaust victims in Brest. The memorial has been vandalized many times since it was erected in 1992. On May 9, 2007, vandals set fire to flowers laid at the monument. Police opened a criminal case but did not identify any suspects. In February 2007 vandals desecrated the monument, but no suspects were identified. In November 2006 an explosion occurred at the same monument, which police attributed to petty hooliganism.

In April 2008, a Holocaust memorial in Slutsk, Minsk region, was damaged in a vandal attack. Unknown persons splattered brown paint over the fence around the memorial, daubed 15 swastikas on the memorial using a stencil, and painted the (incorrect) birth date of Adolf Hitler. Vandals reportedly targeted the office of the Jewish community the previous year, daubing swastikas and anti-Semitic graffiti on the building.

return to headings

Official Response

Relations between the Belarus Jewish community and the government have deteriorated since 2000, amid the appearance of increased official involvement in popular anti-Semitism and support for policies insensitive toward Jews and other minorities.

Belarusian authorities have often shown themselves unresponsive to official complaints against anti-Semitic hate literature. For example, an Israeli embassy letter protesting an anti-Semitic article published in the journal “Republic” in April 2005 was ignored by the government, leading the embassy to publish its letter in an independent newspaper in May 2005. At other times, officials have dismissed complaints against anti-Semitic publications by stating that their authors were merely expressing their personal opinion, as was the case with a May 2005 protest against another anti-Semitic article; it received an official reply in July 2005 that concluded that there was no basis for accusing the author of promoting anti-Semitism because he was only expressing his personal point of view.

Members of Lukashenko’s inner circle have engaged in public anti-Semitic appeals, or have declined to speak out against the publication and broadcast of anti-Semitic diatribes. For instance, Eduard Skobelev, a member of the presidential entourage and editor of the official Presidential Bulletin, is a prolific anti-Semitic writer, and authorities ignore community complaints against his writings. No substantial legislation or law enforcement changes have occurred to address the rise of skinhead and neo-Nazi activity. Finally, as international pressure has increased on President Lukashenko and his regime, some of his supporters have began to include Jews in their public condemnations of Lukashenko’s many alleged enemies abroad, even resorting to old stereotypes of Jewish conspiracies against Slavic victims.

In July 2002, in a series of letters to the Office of the Public Prosecutor, the Council of Ministers, and the Chairman of the State Committee on Religions and Nationalities, ABJOC addressed anti-Semitic incidents and the past inaction of authorities and urged appropriate measures to curb anti-Semitism and preserve interethnic relations. 

The state Public Prosecutor responded in August 2002 that several criminal cases had been opened, in Borisov, Vitebsk, and in Minsk, in each of the cited defacement incidents. The letter also explained that two men convicted for cemetery desecrations in Borisov in 2000 had received amnesty, and that other suspects in the case were released because they were minors. Lukashenko responded by stating that there is no anti-Semitism in Belarus, and deemed the desecrations “mere hooliganism.”

In October 2003, an attempt was made to close down the Marc Chagall Institute of Jewish Studies in Belarus State University; in response to national and international concern, the government promised to allow the Institute to continue operation as part of the University.

In January 2004, Jacob Gutman, an activist and President of the World Federation of Belarussian Jews, was arrested and briefly detained for an unlicensed demonstration outside the President's office in Minsk. Gutman had intended to call on President Lukashenko to stop the destruction of Jewish sites, Jewish cemeteries and monuments in memory of the Holocaust victims.

Despite a May 2003 order by the Prosecutor General and the Ministry of Information to remove Russki Vestnik, an anti-Semitic and xenophobic newspaper, distribution resumed in February 2004 through the state-distribution agency Belzoyuzpechat. Anti-Semitic literature continues to be sold at the National Academy of Sciences.

In July 2004, reports surfaced that a publishing company connected with the Russian Orthodox Church in Belarus published two anti-Semitic works sold through the “Orthodox Book” shop in central Minsk. One book, There Are No Inferior Peoples, claims that the Soviet system was built on the model of the Jewish community. The other book, How Anti-Semites are Made, compares Zionism to fascism. The author, priest Andrey Kuraev, remains an influential figure in the Church in Belarus.

Belarus sent a delegation to the 2005 OSCE conference on anti-Semitism in Cordoba, Spain. The Belarusian Chairman of the Committee on Religion and Nationalities, Stanislav Buko, submitted a statement saying that “Belarus, its civil society, categorically condemns all forms of anti-Semitism, as well as xenophobia and intolerance and racism as a whole.” In December 2005, Eduard Skobelev, editor of the Presidential Administration’s bulletin, released a book containing anti-Semitic statements and accusations, while claiming he had the support of the Presidential Administration.

In March 2006, citing the restrictive 2002 Law on Religious Associations, the Minsk city administration refused permission for a local Hassidic group to hold its Purim and Passover celebrations at state-owned venues on the grounds that religious events could not be permitted at venues frequented by children. The celebrations eventually were held in a local synagogue, which could accommodate only a small number of the invited guests.

In April 2006, a Jewish music teacher was threatened with criminal prosecution for celebrating Purim with Jewish children during an optional class on Jewish culture at a state-run kindergarten in the eastern city of Mogilev.

In July 2006, former Belarusian parliamentarians and opposition members requested the Prosecutor General to file incitement charges against a publisher of anti-Semitic literature connected to the Orthodox Church. Noting that the literature is being printed at a state-run facility, the oppositionists warned that this implicated the government in the publication of hate literature.

In September 2006, Rabbi Boruch Lamdan, a Hassidic Israeli rabbi working in Bobruisk (Mogilev region), failed to have his state permission to conduct religious activity renewed. According to Lamdan, this was the result of his late filing of Belarusian taxes on charitable contributions he had received. However, R. Lamdan has remained in Bobruisk, where he ministers to the local Jewish community, and is attempting to renew his state permission.

In November 2006, the Belarusian KGB declined to investigate the latest desecration of the Yama Holocaust memorial in Minsk, which had been defaced with swastikas and anti-Semitic leaflets by a group calling itself the “White Rus-Aryan Resistance Front.” Dismissing the incident as “teenage hooliganism,” the KGB said it saw no need to investigate the incident and that it had no information on this group. In October 2006, in response to complaints by a local opposition activist who had been threatened by local members of the openly neo-Nazi Russian National Unity (RNU) movement, the Belarusian KGB replied that no such organization was registered with local authorities and therefore did not operate in the activist’s home region. Belarusian opposition activists reported several other cases of RNU harassment, intimidation, and death threats in 2006, and have accused the Belarusian government of turning a blind eye.

In March 2007, following a visit by the Israeli ambassador to Belarus, the city authorities of Mogilev gave permission for the reconstruction of an old ruined synagogue in the city and for the erection of a Holocaust memorial on the site of the former Mogilev ghetto, to be funded in part by the local Jewish community.

Belarus criminal code has multiple articles that deal with crimes motivated by religious or other bias that call for a wide range of fines and prison terms. In 2007, Jewish organizations reported more than 30 cases of vandalism, but not a single one was prosecuted under these laws. According to the government of Belarus, the investigation of these attacks revealed no anti-Semitic related motives but rather, they were the result of “the upbringing of those who committed the crimes.” The prosecution of anti-Semitic crimes is rare and receives little media coverage.

In October 2007, President Lukashenka made anti-Semitic remarks to Russian provincial reporters, insisting that Jewish residents had turned Bobruysk, a city of 226,000 residents in the Mahilyow region, into a "pigsty." "If you were in Bobruysk, you saw in what condition the city was," he said. "Entering it was a fearful experience! It was a sty! This was mainly a Jewish city. Well, you know how Jews treat the place where they're living. Look at Israel, I've been there," he said. He also called for Jews "with money" to return to live in the city.

In April 2008, human remains from an old Jewish cemetery discovered during excavation work near a stadium in Gomel were reburied at another local Jewish cemetery. A rabbi traveled from Israel to conduct the ceremony. Local government officials attended and facilitated the reburial.

Later in the month, an international conference on Belarusian-Jewish dialogue took place in Minsk. Experts from Belarus, Israel, Russia, and Ukraine participated in the conference, which was organized by the Belarusian State University with the assistance of the Israeli Embassy and several Jewish organizations.


return to headings


U.S. POLICY 

U.S. Embassy

February 2002: Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Steven Pifer meeting with journalists in Minsk

After Belarus released several political prisoners in August 2008, the United States lifted some sanctions against Belarus. The United States continues to be one of the country’s strongest critics, but was wiling to reevaluate ties with Belarus after the September 2008 elections.

Statements by the White House and State Department strongly condemned both the anti-democratic reelection of Lukashenko in March 2006, and the subsequent harassment and detention of pro-democracy protestors by police.

In April 2007, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs David Kramer visited Minsk to meet with opposition politicians, relatives of political prisoners, and students, and with the Belarusian Foreign Minister and the Deputy Head of Lukashenko’s Presidential Administration. During his visit, Kramer described the minimum steps that the United States demands of Belarus before bilateral relations could be upgraded, including releasing all political prisoners, dropping charges against opposition activists, and allowing freedom of assembly and speech.

Kramer added that already cool relations could deteriorate further, absent these steps, noting that the U.S. government could take additional steps to increase pressure on Belarus, under the terms of the Belarus Democracy Reauthorization Act, passed in December 2006 and signed by President Bush in January 2007. He said that, so far, Washington has not seen much evidence that the Belarusian government is genuinely interested in improving relations with the West.

U.S.-Belarus relations immediately following Belarusian independence were good. The United States opened its embassy in Minsk in early 1992 and, by early 1993, the countries had signed a bilateral trade treaty guaranteeing reciprocal most-favored-nation status; several other economic and assistance agreements followed. By 1995, the United States had provided several hundred million dollars in humanitarian assistance and technical aid to Belarus.

Relations worsened following the 1996 presidential referendum in Belarus, and Washington condemned a rise in human rights abuses, a lack of market reforms, and a weakening of democratic institutions.

A 1998 embassy controversy caused the pullout of the U.S. ambassador, and motivated the United States to cut most assistance to state institutions and join an EU travel ban. Since then, the travel ban has been lifted and then re-imposed periodically by the United States and EU governments. A ban was imposed in response to the flawed Presidential election in March 2006, which both the U.S. and the EU strongly condemned and described as “fraudulent.”

In July 2000, citing the failure of Belarus to respect internationally accepted worker rights, the Clinton administration withdrew benefits from Belarus in the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP), through which countries may export certain items duty-free to the United States.

The United States has also expressed concern over the suspected sale by Belarus of weapons, weapons-building materiel and training to rogue states, including illegal sales to Iraq prior to the 2003 U.S. military invasion. Belarus was adamantly opposed to U.S. military action in Iraq, and has pursued closer relations with U.S. foes such as Iran and Venezuela.

In May 2003, the U.S. Embassy in Minsk criticized the Belarus government’s failure to protect Jewish memorial sites from repeated acts of vandalism.

According to the State Department’s 2005 report on human trafficking, corruption and poor treatment of victims continues to be a major problem, but prevention and prosecution efforts have improved. In early March 2005, President Lukashenko signed a presidential decree to combat trafficking in persons.

The United States still supports educational and professional exchanges with Belarusian state institutions. Direct humanitarian assistance and support for exchange programs constitute only a small portion of this sum, most of which supports the activities of independent civil, media and business groups within the country. In October 2004, the U.S. Congress passed, and the President signed, the Belarus Democracy Act, designed to promote democratization. In FY 2005, Congress appropriated an estimated $11.8 million for Belarus. Since 1992, the United States has provided over $600 million in assistance to Belarus.

In July 2006, the U.S. Treasury froze the financial assets of a number of senior Belarusian government officials, including President Lukashenko, and prohibited U.S. citizens from doing business with them, as a result of their involvement in human rights abuses and political repression.

On March 7, 2008 the government of Belarus ejected the US Ambassador Karen B. Stewart from the country following an argument over travel restrictions placed on President Lukashenko and sanctions against state-owned chemical company Belneftekhim. The Belarusian Foreign Ministry announced at the same time that it was recalling its own ambassador to the United States. This was followed by the expulsion of ten other U.S. embassy staff from Minsk in late April.

	U.S. Embassy
August 2001: Rep. Peter Deutsch (right) visiting  Holocaust memorial in Minsk	February 2002: U.S. Ambassador Michael Kozak introducing Congressional delegation at Minsk press conference

return to headings

return to top