January 14, 2007	Sunday	Zilhaj 23, 1427

MOSCOW: A deal between Russia and Belarus ending their oil transit crisis spells a return to normal for now, but fundamental tensions undermine relations between the two countries, analysts said on Saturday.

The two ex-Soviet states have long portrayed themselves as natural bedfellows -- board a Moscow-bound train from Minsk and loudspeakers on the platform still crackle into life and emit a burst of Soviet patriotic song.

Such is the sense of shared destiny, in official propaganda, that 15 years after the Soviet Union’s collapse the two continue to talk of reuniting -- Russian nationalists particularly cherish the thought of boosting their country’s sagging population with 10 million extra Slavs.

But the mood was subdued on Friday as the two sides signed a deal ending a bitter transit row that caused the shut-down of the main oil pipeline from Russia to Europe earlier in the week and further dented Moscow’s reputation.

The problems between the countries, encapsulated in the personal enmity said to exist between their presidents, Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko, “can be papered over, but underlying tensions will remain,” observed Moscow-based security analyst Pavel Felgenhauer.

He said that for Russia’s current leaders, keeping the loyalty of western neighbour Belarus remains vital, hence Moscow’s willingness under Friday’s deal to reduce an earlier demand that Minsk pay a $180-per-tonne tax on oil imported from Russia. The tax will instead be $53.

Belarus represents a buffer against the expansion of the Nato military alliance for a Russian military “that is still building its strategy around the idea that conflict with Nato is the biggest threat,” said Felgenhauer.

Belarus is also a vital route for transit of goods between Russia and the European Union, particularly as Moscow's relations with neighbouring Ukraine have worsened and Russia has boycotted a major oil pipeline to the Latvian Baltic port of Ventspils since 2003.

Belarussian opposition leader Vintsuk Vyachorka, who heads the Popular Front, bemoaned Moscow’s support for the authoritarian Belarussian leader by providing energy supplies at below-market rates.

Friday’s agreement should make Minsk pay something closer to market rates for oil -- much of which Belarus has refined and sold in Europe -- but the rate Belarus pays for natural gas from Russia remains below that paid by other ex-Soviet states.

“The current agreement represents a failure of Lukashenko’s policy, based on selling off elements of Belarus’ independence in exchange for cheap energy,” Vyachorka told AFP.

But like Felgenhauer, others also see a gradual move by Belarus away from Russia, which the Belarussian official media heavily criticised in the recent dispute, likening Moscow’s behaviour to a “bull in a china shop”.—AFP