This article appears in the November 24, 2023 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
High-Level Dialogue in Belarus
LaRouche’s Ideas Presented at Conference on Eurasian Security and Economic Integration
[Print version of this article]
Nov. 7—On Oct. 26–27, 2023 the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus organized a conference titled, “International High-Level Conference—Eurasian Security: Reality and Prospects in a Transforming World.”
Speakers from 30 countries, including many foreign ministers, deputy foreign ministers, think tank experts, and leaders of national scientific academies addressed the current existential crisis of world civilization and proposed steps to define a new security and development architecture. I was honored to represent the Schiller Institute to address the panel titled “Economic Integration and Conjugation in Favor of a Unified Eurasian Security Architecture.” (See below for that presentation.) Conference participation was in-person only, which allowed for intense discussion throughout the two days of presentations.
Speeches were given by leaders of many of the major governmental associations of Eurasia: the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Indicative of the inclusiveness, at a high level, of the dialogue, major policy speeches were delivered by Deputy Foreign Ministers from Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Iran, by the Union Minister of Myanmar, and by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, whose address was delivered by the Chargé d’Affaires of China in Belarus.
The conference was held in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, at the National Exhibition Centre BelExpo and at the President Hotel, where over 500 people gathered, including a large media contingent. Congratulations go to the Belarus Foreign Ministry for organizing an open intense dialogue at this moment of great danger, when the expansion of horrific wars—threatening to become a global nuclear war—are spreading in Europe and in Southwest Asia. As Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Péter Szijjártó, said in his speech, “If there is no communication, there is no hope for peace.”
A ‘Charter of Diversity for the 21st Century’
The conference was opened by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus, Sergei Aleinik, who first conveyed greetings from Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenka before presenting his own address. Minister Aleinik stated, “West-centricity is a thing of the past, its place is taken by multipolarity.” He called for developing a “Charter of Diversity for the 21st Century: Eurasian countries and even wider—the countries of the Global East and South, in fact, of the Global Majority—could openly and transparently develop such a document, which would set out the principles for building a just world order, reflecting the fact of diversity of civilizations. Western countries could also become participants in this process.” [Emphasis added —ed.].
Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Péter Szijjártó—the only senior figure from the governments of the West to address the conference—gave a passionate speech, warning that the security of the Eurasian space is in the worst shape since World War II, that the “old idea” of a development process “from Lisbon to Vladivostok” is now an illusion, and that, since the Western and Eastern economies are in reality “super-independent,” the only solution lies in the creation of “mutual respect, mutuality, and common sense rationality.”
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov delivered a major address, sharply denouncing the policies of the United States and Global NATO for carrying out practice drills for the use of nuclear weapons against targets in the Russian Federation, for organizing terrorist attacks like the Nord Stream pipeline explosions, and for declaring their goal to be inflicting the “strategic defeat” of Russia “on the battlefield, including with the hands and bodies of Ukrainian Nazis.”
Minister Lavrov thanked the President of Belarus for convening this conference “to connect Eurasia into a unified space so as to counteract common challenges in the name of peace and prosperity of all nations.” Notably, he concluded this major policy address by discussing a unique pathway for the inclusion of nations of the West into this new peace architecture:
As for our western Eurasian neighbors’ attitude to this, most of them are completely subordinate to Washington. Today we can see no prospects for a meaningful conversation with the vast majority of these countries. No such prospects exist. But in general—I want to emphasize this again—we are always ready to work together if our Western neighbors on the continent find the strength to become independent and gain the “strategic autonomy” that French President Emmanuel Macron and a number of other leaders constantly talk about; if they can abandon their neocolonial instincts and a thoroughly ideological confrontationist policy, and return to the path of pragmatic, mutually respectful interaction to find a fair balance of interests. We’ll see.
On LaRouche’s Discovery
This author presented a paper titled, “The Schiller Institute and the Eurasian Land-Bridge,” focused on three aspects of the contributions of Lyndon and Helga LaRouche to the international dialogue which has created the emerging New Paradigm: 1) the conception of the Eurasian Land-Bridge and the economic “development corridor,” 2) Lyndon LaRouche’s discoveries in the field of Leibnizian physical economy [See box], and 3) the discussion document authored by Schiller Institute founder, Helga Zepp-LaRouche in 2022, “Ten Principles for a New Security and Development Architecture.”
The presentation was very well received. I was interviewed by the major national TV, radio, and internet media, and by Russia’s TASS, which published a polemical article, titled, “Expert Calls for Reforming the UN to Prevent World War III.” The article stated: “The ‘new majority’ in the world body should include large unrepresented countries, says Richard Black, head of the Schiller Institute at the UN in New York.”
An expert from Switzerland responded to my presentation, saying, “I would like to found a new think tank in my country, modeled on the Schiller Institute. You always analyze the world situation ‘from above.’” Others commented that LaRouche’s approach to physical economy as a science represents a unique contribution to finding solutions. (See the full text of my presentation, below.)
The Non-Aligned Movement Successfully Challenges the ‘Political West’
A highly original discussion was presented by Dr. Richard Sakwa, Professor Emeritus of Kent University (United Kingdom) during the panel titled, “Perspective Outlines of Eurasian Security: Principles and Architecture.” Dr. Sakwa and I were the only speakers from the UK and from the U.S., respectively—a reflection of the clampdown and government threats against dissenting views in the “free West.”
Dr. Sakwa presented his thesis that while the “Political West,” typified by NATO policy making organs and the Anglo-American liberal imperialist establishment, have, since the end of World War II, violated the United Nations Charter with their sequence of illegal wars and their illegal sanctions weapon, it is, today, the self-assured Global South and East which comprise the conservative force, fighting to re-establish the principles and practice of the original UN Charter, as first conceived by U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
In a working, unpublished Memo, titled, “The Political West as the Subject of History,” Dr. Sakwa writes:
Crucially, the proclaimed normative foundation of the Political East is sovereign internationalism and other core ideas of the Charter system. Numerous resolutions and declarations assert UN norms, complemented by reference to the 10-point Bandung Declaration of 1955—which itself incorporated the principles of the UN Charter. The emergence of a Political East does not threaten the Charter international system but strengthens it. In response, the Political West has opposed the elevation of representatives of the Political East to leadership positions in UN and other agencies, accompanied by boycotts and walkouts. It is also accompanied by the misrepresentation of Russia and China as revisionist powers. In fact, in declaration at least, they [Russia and China] are committed to Charter principles at the level of the international system, making them conservative status quo powers. At the level of international politics, they refuse to accept the hegemony of the Political West, and to that degree they are revisionist, but in conceptual terms they are neo-revisionist: defending the Charter international system, but repudiating the practices of the Political West in international politics.
Dr. Sakwa writes, succinctly, “The Non-Aligned Movement of Cold War I has re-emerged in a more dynamic and self-assured Global South. The Political West as the subject of history is challenged as never before.”
Minsk Tractor Works: A Global Factor in Physical Economic Advance
My thanks go to the organizers of the conference for arranging for me a private tour of the world-renowned Minsk Tractor Works (MTZ). The plant was built in 1946, originally for the production of airplanes, but was soon transformed for the innovative design and mass production of tractors. The factory was government owned then, and remains so today.
In the 1990s, the City of London and Wall Street mega-speculators moved into the former Soviet sector with “shock therapy” policies, buying up, for pennies on the dollar, state-owned enterprises and quickly dividing them up, selling them off, and then shutting them down—a policy of economic genocide, which was tragically allowed to proceed in the Russian Federation for a period of time.
In sharp contrast, Belarus’ President Lukashenka successfully fought that policy, allowing precious machining enterprises such as MTZ to persevere and grow. Today, the Minsk Tractor Works has become one of the largest manufacturers of agricultural machinery in the world, with 16,000 people working at the main Minsk plant, and another 10,000 at subsidiary plants throughout the nation.
To date, MTW has produced more than 3 million tractors. More than 500,000 have been delivered to approximately 100 countries worldwide. Sixty-two models of different kinds of machines are produced, with more than 100 assembly variants for all climatic and operational conditions. Farmers will tell you that these machines are known for their amazingly long working life, ease of repair, and for their modest price to own.
There is a continuity in the national identity of the Republic of Belarus. This small nation of only 9.3 million citizens took the initiative to hold this Dialogue of Civilizations conference for mutual economic advance at a terrifying moment, as wars rage in Europe and in Southwest Asia. It is also a nation which for decades has been the machining workshop for what was once drearily called “the underdeveloped sector.” The “Belarus,” as the MTZ tractor is called worldwide, has transformed agricultural output in Pakistan, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Russia and Romania. In the 1980s, the “Belarus” so upshifted agricultural output in Vietnam, that that nation placed a picture of “The Belarus” tractor on its 200 dong currency note! Friends of The Schiller Institute will “hear” in the national mission of Belarus the idea: “The name of Peace is Economic Development.”
Lavrov: ‘If and When They Sober Up …’
On Oct. 31 and Nov. 1, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gave back-to-back speeches to young diplomats entering the Foreign Ministry and then to the Russian diaspora (“Strengthening Traditional Spiritual and Moral Values to Guarantee Unity among Compatriots”), which continued the themes presented in the Minsk Conference. He compared the West’s war against Russia today to Napoleon’s in 1812 and to Hitler’s invasion in 1941. He said,
Just like Napoleon in 1812 and Hitler in 1941, the United States has now brought together almost all Western countries to make yet another attempt to destroy Russia and inflict a strategic defeat on it so that it ceases to exist as an independent international actor. The level of Russophobia we are witnessing in Western countries is just mind-blowing.
Nonetheless, he told the young diplomats,
If and when they come to their senses and sober up from reveling in their grandeur, and if they turn to us and say that we should capitalize on the fact that we are, indeed, neighbors, we will then consider it. The Eurasian continent is experiencing significant growth and offers substantial competitive advantages, and it would be a waste not to capitalize on them. If they approach us with such proposals and show their willingness to abandon their previous policies, we will carefully gauge their level of seriousness.
As Foreign Minister Aleinik of Belarus said during his conference keynote address, “Western countries could also become participants in this process.” Will they? We hope that readers of this eyewitness report from Eurasia will mobilize with the Schiller Institute to force our governments to reverse course, and accept the loud offers from the Global East and South to choose peace, choose mutual security and choose a New Renaissance of development.
“The central feature of my original contribution to the Leibniz science of physical economy is the provision of a method for addressing the causal relationship between, on the one side, individuals’ contributions to axiomatically revolutionary advances in scientific and analogous forms of knowledge, and, on the other side, consequent increases in the potential population-density of corresponding societies. In its application to political economy, my method focuses analysis upon the central role of the following, three-step sequence: first, axiomatically revolutionary forms of scientific and analogous discovery; second, consequent advances in machine-tool and analogous principles; finally, consequent advances in the productive powers of labor.”
