Poland Gets Tough With Europe's Last Dictator

A bitter row between Poland and Belarus over human rights, alleged espionage and democracy escalated yesterday when Belarussian police special forces stormed and seized a Polish community building near the country's border with Poland. The Polish government responded by withdrawing its ambassador from Minsk.

The dispute between the two countries pits the authoritarian regime of Belarus's president, Alexander Lukashenko - dubbed Europe's last dictator - against Nato and EU member Poland, which is crusading for greater democracy in the countries of the former Soviet Union.

Mr Lukashenko - fearful of the pro-democracy tumult that unseated regimes in Ukraine and Georgia - claims Warsaw is spearheading a western plot to destabilise Belarus and foment a revolution to forestall his re-election next year.

The Polish president, Alexander Kwasniewski, dismisses the claims as absurd, and is calling for EU support to isolate Mr Lukashenko and aid the struggling opposition.

In recent weeks, both sides have engaged in tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats.

Describing the situation as "a severe crisis", the Polish foreign minister, Adam Rotfeld, yesterday attacked the Lukashenko regime and criticised EU policy towards it.

"Human rights abuses and repressions in Belarus ... are a problem that should find wider international interest," he told a press conference in Warsaw.

The row is focused on the fate of Belarus's large Polish minority of around half a million and the organisation representing it, the Union of Poles in Belarus.

Special forces took over the union's offices early yesterday in the western town of Grodno after arresting, interrogating and convicting several of its leaders.

"At first, the building was encircled by police cars," one witness told Reuters. "Then police demanded everybody leave the building. When nobody agreed, special forces stormed the building."

The community leader, Andzelika Borys, has been questioned twice and yesterday said the Belarussian authorities had accused her of spying and embezzlement.

State television and newspapers in Belarus have been running a smear campaign against the local Poles, fanning ethnic tension.

While the row is ostensibly about Poles in Belarus, the broader battle concerns Mr Lukashenko's survival and the attempts of neighbouring countries to undermine him. He depends on Moscow to survive, but is now surrounded by leaders in Poland, the Baltic and Ukraine who want rid of him and whose countries have close ethnic and historical ties with Belarus.

Poland and Lithuania, both of whom helped to mediate the victory of last year's orange revolution in Ukraine, are seeking western support to establish a Radio Free Belarus.

Democracy activists in Belarus regularly travel to Warsaw, Kiev and Vilnius for meetings, and keep their bank accounts in Warsaw.

"It's a great feeling here," said a Belarussian student, Anastasia, sitting in a Warsaw cafe. "We can say what we want. We see in Poland what we want our country to be like in the future."

In Minsk, Ales Mikhalevich, an opposition activist jailed for 10 days by the Lukashenko regime, said he often went to Warsaw for meetings with Polish and western democracy activists.

Opposition leaders in Minsk, frightened to be identified, said they thought of Warsaw as the capital of the "new Europe" and the main source of moral and financial support.

Mr Lukashenko claimed this week that Washington had put up $30m (£17m) to try to obtain "regime change" in Belarus.