By Independent News Roundup
Belarus’ “Emil Czeczko International Charitable Foundation” bestowed one of its yearly “Peace & Human Rights Awards” to firebrand Polish MEP Grzegorz Braun, who placed fourth during the first round of this year’s presidential elections in May with 6.34% of the vote. It’s named after a young Polish soldier who deserted to Belarus in 2021, subsequently accused Poland of “genociding” illegal immigrants along the border, then supposedly hung himself, but President Alexander Lukashenko later said he was killed.
Czeczko is celebrated in Belarus as a courageous young man whose life was tragically cut short but is widely regarded in Poland as a misguided activist at best or a foreign intelligence asset at worst. Many in Poland simply consider him a traitor regardless of their opinion about his motives. It’s worth mentioning that Braun supports the Polish Armed Forces’ use of force against illegal immigrant invaders and thus most likely had a negative view of Czeczko before being bestowed an award by his namesake foundation.
This domestic political context enables one to better understand why Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski mocked Braun by saying that he “earned” his award while Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz described it as a “very dangerous situation” and a “blatant betrayal of the principles of patriotism”. These reactions were entirely predictable even if one wasn’t aware of how Czeczko is viewed in Poland since it’s well-known that Poland and Belarus are in what each describe as a “hybrid war” with the other.
The question therefore arises of why the Foundation would award Braun. The first answer is the most innocent and it’s that the board members genuinely wanted to show appreciation for his Orban-like pro-peace approach towards the Ukrainian Conflict. That’s possible, but considering that the Foundation is named after someone who Belarus considers to be a Polish dissident, there are reasons to assume that the board members aren’t ignorant of Poland’s domestic political situation like this answer implies.
This segues into the second answer, which speculates that the Foundation intended to hand Braun a poisoned chalice for his support of the same Polish Armed Forces who Belarus believes pose such a threat that Lukashenko felt the need to request tactical nukes and Oreshniks from Russia to deter them. Giving him an award from a foundation named after Czeczko, who embodied what Braun opposes, could thus be meant to discredit him for that reason and create the pretext for more state pressure upon him.
A variant of this answer goes even deeper by speculating that the aforesaid outcomes might be part of the “understanding” that Belarus’ KGB chief said that his country reached with Poland “in some cases” as part of the “big deal” that Lukashenko declared that he wants to reach with the US. While admittedly a conspiracy theory, it’s possible that the government encouraged the Foundation to hand Braun their poisoned chalice as a goodwill gesture to the Polish authorities or a quid pro quo for something else.
All that’s known for sure is that Belarus’ bestowing of an award to Braun was an unpleasant surprise for his supporters due to how it was predictably exploited to discredit him on the pretext that no true Polish patriot would ever be awarded by Belarus amidst their ongoing hybrid war. The fact that it came from a foundation named after Czeczko of all people, who embodied what Braun opposes, added insult to injury. Therefore, even if this award wasn’t intended as a poisoned chalice, it still served this purpose.
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