Even the possible release of political prisoners cannot be viewed as some progress in relations between Belarus and the EU.

“The release of political prisoners merely eliminates the most odious reason why Belarus-EU dialog is impossible,” this opinion Ulad Vialichka, the chairman of the International Consortium "EuroBelarus" shared to the EuroBelarus Information Service.

According to him, recent activity of Belarusan Foreign Ministry in its efforts to demonstrate ability and readiness for more intense communication with the European structures can only be welcomed. However, the main question is whether all these efforts still lack political will to change the situation for the better: “If there is no political will for positive change in relations, all the steps will be of superficial and disguising character, aimed at smoothing over contradictions in relations rather than solving the problems and eliminating the causes of these problems. Unfortunately, for now Belarusan side worries neither about the causes nor about any other long-term interests”.

Mutual suspicion is a hindrance

— Do recent statements made by Vladimir Makei about the possibility to overcome problems in Belarus-EU relations change something?

— For now there were no particular cases of solving the problems. There exists only attempts to move the relations from the dead center, and some small steps are being done for that, such as lift of visa ban from Vladimir Makei, Belarusan Foreign Minister; criminal records from the participants of 2010 election campaign are being cleared, too. But these small steps only witness strong mutual suspicion and are done only to get actions in response, while all the problems remain.

Belarusan side is raising itself a price

— Which side is leading now in Belarus-EU relations then?

— I have a feeling that each side thinks that the other side is leading. But if we take a detached look on the situation, it becomes obvious that there is only one ultimate condition to unfreeze the relations, namely to release political prisoners. For some reason this condition is unfulfilled, though it is not a problem to do that.

— How good are chances that in the nearest future Belarusan authorities will finally do this step and release all the political prisoners?

— I believe that the situation is moving in this direction. However, their release will be to a certain extent connected with the forthcoming Eastern Partnership Summit. We would expect that the problem with the political prisoners resolves within the next six months, but it appears that the Belarusan side merely tries to sell this step as expensive as possible. And it’s hard to predict what “price” Belarusan side means.

We still have time till November

— What alerts me in this question is the statements made by European politicians about the assumed progress in the dialog. I hope that they are just being diplomatic in their attempt to show that the renovation of dialog after a long break is a great success per se. But this is exactly what Belarusan regime wants, when the demonstration of no progress is presented as some progress in relations. If the situation is continuing to develop in this way, Belarusan regime will only benefit from that.

It is clear that the EU expects more clear and accentuated steps from Belarus. How much time is left for that? I think that Belarus has time right up to the Summit of the EaP in November. If there is no reaction, then we can expect even stronger freezing of Belarus-EU relations.