Publications

This study is dedicated to analysing the adaptation of Ukrainians who came to Lithuania after February 24, 2022. It is meant to highlight the main issues and challenges that Ukrainian refugees face in Lithuania.

In this episode, Brian Whitmore of the Atlantic Council shares his take on deconstructing the power vertical in Belarus. What is the Lukashenka dilemma? Will the Kremlin incorporate Belarus? What can the West do to release over 1,500 political prisoners in Belarus? And what makes Lukashenka’s power vertical so unique?

The prospects for progress in the process of accession to the European Union (EU) primarily revolve around two core areas: enhancing domestic readiness within the candidate countries in the Western Balkans as well as Ukraine and Moldova, and adapting the EU’s enlargement toolbox to ensure the accession process is effective and irreversible.

On September 28, the U.S. State Department’s Global Engagement Centre (GEC) released a special report on how China seeks to reshape the global information environment. In the report China was accused of employing “a variety of deceptive and coercive methods … to influence the international information environment.” As a response, the Chinese Foreign Ministry pushed back hard against the report, accusing the United States of being an “empire of lies” and adding that “it is the US that invented the weaponizing of the global information space.”

In the new episode of the Minsk Express podcast, Professor Elena Korosteleva of Warwick University presents a new book “Belarus in the Twenty-First Century. Between Dictatorship and Democracy” and shares insight on how Belarus looks in the context of emerging autocracies around the world. How exportable is Aliaksandr Lukashenka’s autocratic rule. Is there any prospect for Belarusian Studies and for Belarus itself? 

Europe has long relied on Russian energy resources. This was often based on the convenience that the interdependence that was to emerge from intensive trade would allow Russia to become a player abiding by international rules. This belief collapsed when the West began to impose sanctions following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In the first episode of the third season of Minsk Express, we discuss the geopolitical setting of Belarus today and its place on the political agenda in the West. What is the impact of Belarusian democratic forces on changing the situation on the ground? How has the dramatic increase of the Belarusian diaspora around the world affected the country? What are the prospects of change in Belarus? And finally, how does Russia’s war in Ukraine change Lukashenka’s calculus?

This analytical review focuses on several dimensions: the current state of the Chinese economy and its important indicators, property and banking sectors, and youth unemployment as a significant societal challenge.

Some would say that China’s moral compass already broke in February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine and China did not condemn the war while maintaining its pro-Kremlin neutrality. But is neutrality the best Beijing can do now in the face of unequivocal evidence of inhumane barbarity by Palestinian terrorists against Israelis in violation of all humanitarian and international law?

Real-life Godzilla, two-headed fish and other abnormal creatures – that is what you would find in the Pacific Ocean right now if you were to succumb to China’s disinformation campaign against Japan’s decision to discharge treated wastewater from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant.

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) announced that it will suspend the publication of youth unemployment data while the government seeks to “improve” and “optimize” statistical work. This announcement elicited decision on Chinese social media, with some users on Weibo accusing the government of “burying its head in the sand”. Indeed, the announcement comes at a critical juncture when the unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds in urban areas hit a record high of 21.3%. However, instead of addressing the drastically worsening youth unemployment, the government has chosen to stonewall the issue.

The Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation, in cooperation with the EESC and the SCEEUS, has compiled a study on European - Ukrainian defence cooperation. The paper is accompanied by commentaries from various European experts.