Lukashenko: Ukrainian language will always be heard at Slavianski Bazaar
Festive and creative atmosphere of the 31st Slavianski Bazaar in Vitebsk International Festival of Arts does not encourage talking about politics, but its fate from the first day is connected with it. Aleksandr Lukashenko recalled this fact when speaking at the opening ceremony of the international arts festival.
“We did the right thing that we kept our festival then, in the difficult 1990s. Our motto ‘Through Art to Peace and Mutual Understanding’ is again relevant as never before,” the President said.
The Belarusian Head of State said that the creators of the forum at one time could not even think that the united Slavic world – powerful with its thousand-year history – would be placed in conditions of political and cultural survival, “That simple human values that are so important in relations between countries and peoples will be lost: friendship, trust, sincerity. We could not even imagine that our friendly Yugoslavia would disappear from the political map, that the post-Soviet space would plunge into a series of armed conflicts and that NATO would expand eastward, scattering the Slavs on different sides of the barricades.”
However, the most crushing blow was struck eight years ago right in the heart of the Slavic world — in the Belarusian-Russian-Ukrainian brotherhood, Aleksandr Lukashenko emphasised. “No matter how history is turned upside down today, we lost Ukraine long before the start of the special operation. Then, when its politicians themselves abandoned the Slavic identity, when we miraculously managed to bring Ukrainians to this stage, even those who have long lived in other countries. But no matter what it costs us, the Ukrainian language sounded at the opening of the Slavianski Bazaar. It will sound, including today! Moreover, it will always sound here!" asserted the Belarusian leader.
The Belarusian Head of State expressed confidence that Ukraine, the fraternal Ukrainian people, would return to its Slavic family, “We must do everything possible to keep the festival alive for people to come here from all over the world. Let no one doubt: our Slavic soul will withstand everything, once again suffer, and the ideas of goodness, peace and justice will triumph again.”
