In the months after dictator Alexander Lukashenko refused to concede an election widely seen as fraudulent, his regime has faced significant sanctions from the European Union (EU), France, the United Kingdom (UK), Canada and Switzerland, but not the US.

Since Belarus’ August election, the EU, the three European countries noted above and Canada have together leveled over forty new sanctions against those suppressing democracy in Belarus. Meanwhile, the US has added 8 new sanctions. America’s lack of action and leadership here is especially shocking when reading Canada’s statement, which notes that the actions were taken in “coordination with the European Union” and omits the United States entirely.

Sanctions Related to Belarus - As of 16 November 2020

1. EU - 59

2. France - 59

3. UK - 59

4. Canada - 55

5. Switzerland 44

6. US - 33 (25 individuals, 9 entities)

Total: 309 entries. 300 individuals, 9 entities. 276 sanctions by the EU and Canada, 33 by the US.

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A count of sanctions by country or organization makes the numbers seem close, but is misleading. 25 out of America’s 33 sanctions actions were taken prior to this year. The most significant American action in terms of Belarus sanctions - targeting dictator Aleksandr Lukashenko himself - was taken by George Bush in 2006. As we noted in earlier analysis, the Biden administration is likely to take quick action to catch up to Canada and European partners. To review the source data yourself, you can visit 6 different government websites, or use Castellum.AI to see 600+ global watchlists in one place. To request an account, email contact@castellum.ai.

Methodology

Multiple countries and international organizations have sanctioned the leadership of Belarus for democratic interference, and have sanctions lists titled “Belarus.” Our first step was identifying all the list sources which had Belarus lists. These were:

1. Canada | SEMA

2. EU | Sanctions

3. France | Tresor

4. Switzerland | SECO

5. UK | OFSI

6. US | OFAC

We then ran a query showing us all entries within those lists. We were careful not to query based on address or citizenship, because many of the lists are missing this information and where address is available, it can be misleading. For example, Canada's lists don't have location data for anyone (check their site out here.) For the other sources, some of them actually have non Belarus locations for the Belarus designees. 

For example, Vadim Dmitrievich Ipatov, Deputy Chairman of Belarus’ Central Elec­toral Commission (CEC), was sanctioned by all five countries mentioned above and the EU. Canada lists no address or place of birth, the EU, France, Switzerland and the UK list a Ukrainian place of birth while the US lists the Ukrainian place of birth, and “Minsk, Belarus” as the address.

Likewise, searching by citizenship leads to misleading information as well. Canada’s SEMA, the EU, France’s Tresor and the US’s OFAC have all neglected to add citizenship information for Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko.

Regarding the statistic comparing the total number of actions taken by the EU and Canada (276) vs the US (33). As many of the names on these lists are the same person listed multiple times (like Ipatov), the split is more like 59 to 33, not 276 vs 30. However, the United States imposes the second most sanctions globally (after Russia), and generally imposes magnitudes more than its allies (for example, as we noted in an earlier post regarding China). For this reason, looking at US total actions vs the actions of its allies is a good indicator of how important a certain issue is to the US government.