In a bid to increase Belarusian exposure to US culture and values the US Embassy in Minsk along with the organization Students for Global Democracy held a video conference yesterday connecting university students in Belarus with students from Washington, DC area universities and the University of Indiana. The event took place against the background of Belarus’ increasingly tumultuous political situation, and while discussants mostly confined conversation to mundane aspects of university life, anxiety on the part of Belarusian students occasionally bubbled to the surface.
The conference, which lasted just over an hour, allowed Belarusian students gathered at the US Embassy to engage their American counterparts on a range of issues related to university life. Both sides agreed that finding gainful employment following graduation is a challenge. The Belarusian students, all of whom had studied in the United States, complained about a law requiring students receiving government funding for higher education to complete two years of government service upon graduation. According to one student, the government gives graduates the worst positions and often sends them away from big cities to poor towns and villages. An American student from George Washington University sympathized. In order to pay off the $100,000 plus he had accumulated in student loans he had decided to join the US Marine Corps.
An air of cautious reserve overhung the discussion as students, particularly on the Belarusian side refrained from discussing controversial issues. According to Charlie Szrom, President of Students for Global Democracy, organizers sought to avoid interpretation of the event by Belarusian media as an American propaganda ploy. The idea behind the video conference said Szrom, was to “educate Belarusians about American life,” counteracting the Belarusian media’s often negative portrayal of the United States and Americans.
Still, with dimming prospects for political change following Belarus’ 19 March presidential elections, many students expressed dissatisfaction with the dilapidated political and social environment. One young woman noted that students are much more interested in international news because “here the news is not interesting because nothing is changing.”
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has called Belarus the last dictatorship in Europe. Under the leadership of President Aleksandr Lukashenko the country has become impoverished and isolated from successful post-Soviet countries like Poland and the Baltics. The Belarusian population has little access to information aside from that produced by the heavily censured state media outlets. According to one student at the video conference, “most people who don’t live in the capitol just see what the government wants them to see.”
According to an official at the US Embassy in Minsk, video conferences between Belarusians and Americans serve “to keep the lines of communication open.” The embassy has already held a few of them, including one a month ago linking high school students in both countries. At the close of yesterday’s event Szrom expressed his intentions to hold a follow-up conference in a few months’ time.