Cornflowers don’t fly to Crimea
“Cornflowers will remain in the sky, we will fly!” - this is how the head of the Belarusian state airline Belavia, Igor Cherginets, responded to European sanctions. He clearly took after his father, the writer, in eloquence. However, the cornflowers depicted on the liveries of Belarusian aircraft will not leave the sky. They will simply fly not to the West, but to the East. The airline was saved from collapse by Putin, who agreed to provide Belarusians with additional flights to Russian regions.
The first Belarusian plane flew to Ufa on May 31, and Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus Nikolai Snopkov said that such flight destinations as Sochi, Krasnodar, Mineralnye Vody, as well as Baikal and Altai are relevant for Belarus.
The wish list is, of course, impressive, but the most important link is missing in it - Belarusian aviation absolutely does not want to fly to Crimea, despite the fact that, commercially, flights there are much more profitable than to Ufa, and the request for fast flights to The Crimean resorts familiar to Belarusians since Soviet times are enormous. If you choose between two hours on a plane and two days on a train with a transfer, then the choice is obvious. But neither commercial benefit nor the convenience of Belarusians could outweigh the traditional Belarusian multi-vector approach.
It would seem that there's nothing left to lose; Lukashenko's Western foreign policy vector can be safely abandoned, and European skies won't open to Belarusian flights until the new president is seated in the Palace of Independence in Minsk. Relations with Ukraine are already at a point where recognition of Crimea can't further damage them, yet official Minsk stubbornly continues to adhere to the multi-vector policy that has driven it into the current impasse.
Now those close to the Belarusian government no longer deny that it is time for this government to recognize the Russian status of Crimea, but with a reservation. If we have to admit it, it’s not free. They want money for full recognition of the territorial integrity of their Union State partner. Much money.
On May 30, Alexei Dzermant, a frequent guest of talk shows on central Russian television channels, wrote the following: “Belarus and Ukraine have a decent trade turnover - up to $5 billion of a surplus per year for Belarus. After recognizing Crimea, the Ukrainian authorities will cut off everything, possibly diplomatic relations too. To compensate for these lost incomes, you will have to work hard. Most likely, we can only compensate in Russia.” Later, he came up with the idea of basing the Belarusian civilian navy in Crimea (hello Psaki!).
One of the leaders of the unregistered party of “father’s Russophiles” “Union”, Vladimir Gruzdev, was more straightforward, setting the condition for the recognition of Crimea to be the development of “an additional map with the Russian Federation, which will indicate how Belarusian income related to trade with Ukraine will be compensated.”
The loss of the Ukrainian market, which Belarusian jingoists are talking about, is rather a hypothetical thing. Belarusian supplies are very important both for the Ukrainian economy and for the Ukrainian oligarchs, who have developed good mutually beneficial relations with the Belarusian oligarchs. Most likely, the consequences of the recognition of Crimea will be multi-day galloping of “non-Muscovites” in embroidered shirts at the Belarusian embassy and the inclusion of Lukashenko in the “Peacemaker” database, and the real economic losses of Belarus from this will not be so great.
The accountants in the Belarusian pro-government expert pool would do well to remember that Lukashenko owes much of his presidency to Russia, which supported him last year, and that the price Russia will pay for saving Belavia will be losses for Russian airlines, which will now have to compete with Belarusians in the domestic market.
As for Belarusian losses in the Ukrainian direction, they can be more than compensated for by the full implementation of roadmaps for integration within the Union State.
Cornflowers Don't Fly to Crimea