Belarus
After independence the first move of Belarus' authoritarian President Lukashenko was to try to use the Belarusian Orthodox Church to shore up his rule inside the country. His government has signed 5 concordat-like “agreements” with this part of the Russian Orthodox Church. Whilst almost half the population call themselves Belarusian Orthodox, the figure for Roman Catholics is only 15%. Thus domestic politics appear to have little to do with the impending concordat with the Vatican. However, the Belarusian President appears to believe that this link to the Vatican will help him find acceptance in the Western World and afford him some independence from Russia.
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“Europe's last dictator” seeks Vatican acceptance |
President Lushenko of Belarus is a promising concordat partner. With his record of gaoling politicians who oppose him he should have no trouble getting the impending concordat ratified. And, because he's shunned internationally, he's eager to do whatever takes to get Vatican recognition. | |
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Belarus leader wants Orthodoxy as state ideology |
After Belarus was thrust into independence in 1991 its authoritarian president at first tried to use the Belarusian Orthodox Church to shore up his rule, as outlined in this 1996 article. However, the Belarusian national church is just a branch ("exarch") of the Orthodox Church of Russia, and therefore offers him little independence from the huge neighbour. Now he is looking to the Vatican to give help him find acceptance in the EU. | |
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2003 “concordat” with Belarus gives Orthodox Church more power, but full extent unknown |
The Belarusian Orthodox leader, Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk, hailed the 2003 concordat as "a blank cheque to develop co-operation programmes with all branches of power". (There are 14 so far.) The secret draft proposal of this contained anti-constitutional provisions such as immunity from prosecution for Orthodox clergy and media censorship powers for the Church. While these are not in the final version, there is concern that they may reappear in secret agreements. | |
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Agreement on cooperation between the Republic of Belarus and the Belarusian Orthodox Church (2003) : Text |
Since 1999 Belarus has been signing “co-operation agreements” with its Orthodox Church. A major “general accord” came in 2003. While lacking the international clout of concordats, these church-state pacts still confer many concordat privileges. | |
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List of Belarusian Orthodox concordats and highlights from the Border Guard pact (2003) |
In the old Soviet Union the Border Guard, which kept citizens from fleeing the country, was an arm of the KGB, the Communist secret police. In post-Communist Russia and Belarus the Border Guard has adopted the new state ideology — the Orthodox Church — but remains politicised, as before. Here are excerpts from the Agreement between the Belarussian Orthodox Church and the Belarusian Border Guard. |
