EU lifts travel ban on Belarus president

From Justin Z: In a surprising move, the European Union temporarily lifted a travel ban placed on President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus and 34 other country officials on Monday, CNN.com reports. According to the article, the move is the EU's way of telling Belarus that their international relations will improve if Belarus takes the proper steps to remove their dictatorship, the continent's last of its kind. Belarus was receptive of the dropped ban but the article doesn't mention anything about their feelings regarding a change in government. Anatoly Lebedko, leader of the opposition United Civil Party, said that the move is just an attempt on behalf of the EU to draw Belarus away from Russia and won't improve democracy in the country. Even those in the EU say that while the move is good to hear, the relations between Belarus and the West/EU are far from perfect.

Sergei Kostyan, a member of Belarus' parliamentary foreign affairs commission called the move, "a good step for Europe and for us. It's hard to hold discussions or solve anything through an iron curtain." To this point, it does indeed seem like a step in the right direction. When two stubborn entities continue to stay in their ways, it takes one side to acquiesce-- in this case, it was the EU. Still though, there is much work to do, especially when the last high-level contact with Belarus was back in 2004.