Belarus (magazine #9 2014) by BELARUS Magazine

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Belarus — Russia

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No.9 (972), 2014 Беларусь. Belarus

In the Stream of Knowledge

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Беларусь.Belarus Monthly magazine No. 9 (972), 2014 Published since 1930 State Registration Certificate of mass medium No.8 dated March 2nd, 2009, issued by the Ministry of Information of the Republic of Belarus

Crucial world summit

Founders: The Ministry of Information of the Republic of Belarus “SB” newspaper editorial office Belvnesheconombank Editor: Viktor Kharkov Executive Secretary: Valentina Zhdanovich

Design and Layout by

Weighty opinions

Career here and now

Statement of President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko President of

Teacher from Slobodka village

Belarus Alexander Lukashenko made an official statement after the meeting of the contact group in Minsk

High position in prestigious rating

European time About European Belar-

Head full of code This summer all inter-

Wi∙fi education First e-school opens in

The best welders worldwide

the Vitebsk Region

беларусь.belarus 2014

Беларусь.Belarus is published in Belarusian, English, Spanish and Polish. Distributed in 50 countries of the world. Final responsibility for factual accuracy or interpretation rests with the authors of the publications. Should any article of Беларусь.Belarus be used, the reference to the magazine is obligatory.

Not new, but eternal Pupils are taught

Ability to win

Minsk bid to become bike friendly Minsk can enter the top twenty of cities with the most cycle paths

Publisher: “SB” editorial office

Indefatigable work of the soul At a

This magazine has been printed at State Entertainment “Publishers “Belarus Printing House”.

ancient handicrafts in the Brest Region’s districts

recent exhibition at the National Art Museum — Ten Centuries of Art in Belarus — Zoya Litvinova was displayed among a number of artists. Certainly, it is a great honour, deserved by the bright, expressive creativity of the artist

The magazine does not bear responsibility for the contents of advertisements.

79 Nezavisimosti Ave., Minsk, Belarus, 220013 Order No. 2698 Total circulation — 1917 copies (including 729 in English).

Write us to the address: 11 Kiselyov Str., Minsk, Belarus, 220029. Tel.: +375 (17) 290-62-24, 290-66-45. Tel./Fax: +375 (17) 290-68-31.

us, about relations between Europe and Belarus, willingness to accept and understand

national contests on sport programming among ‘gamers’ over 18, passed under the sign of Belarus. Gennady Korotkevich from Gomel, well-known through his victories, won in the most significant world contests

Vadim Kondrashov Nadezhda Ponkratova

www.belarus-magazine.by E-mail: mail@belarus-magazine.by Subscription index in Belpochta catalogue — 74977

For future foreign subscribers for ‘Belarus’ magazine, apply to ‘MK-Periodica’ agency.

Notes of a young mother

E-mail: info@periodicals.ru Telephone in Minsk: +375 (17) 227-09-10.

PANORAMA  Exact copy of original Facsimile edition of Turov Gospel on show at National Library of Belarus in advance of Day of Belarusian Written Language

During the holiday, Vladimir Likhodeev, who republished the Bible, is showing how the ancient new printing machine works

The word won’t ever die The Day of Belarusian Written Language, hosted by the ancient town of Zaslavl gains in strength each year

he holiday opened in the evening with a theatrical performance at the town’s wall. As befits such an event, official speeches came first. The Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus, Anatoly Tozik, emphasised that this event, in the Year of Hospitality and the 70th anniversary of Belarus’ liberation, underlines the connection between history and modernity. He also paid attention that in the third millennium the book still worthily competes with other information carriers. Last year alone, over 11,000 books and brochures were released in Belarus, with a total circulation of 33 million copies. “He is really happy, who remembers their roots, while not forgetting about their native language,” he noted. Alexander Radkov, First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration, also addressed the guests and par-

ticipants of the holiday. He voiced the greeting of the President of Belarus. “Much is being done in the country to strengthen spiritual morality, as well as the creative and intellectual potential of Belarusian society, aimed at supporting the national book publishing industry. I will say without exaggeration that we observe not only State but also Presidential patronage of the book,” noted the Minister of Information of Belarus, Lilia Ananich, during an international round table discussion Consonance: Literature as a Mirror of the Epoch. She reminded that this year, the country has organised the Belarusian Written Language Day for the 21st time, while, in 2017, we will be celebrating the 500th anniversary of Belarusian book printing. Addressing foreign guests, the Minister added, “It’s very important that you come to us. It’s a wonderful opportunity to see with your own eyes into the pure mirror of Belarus with its beautiful city of Minsk and all corners of our country.”

erox have organised the reprinting for the National Library of Belarus, with support from the board of guardians of the library. In all, 500 copies have been bound, each keeping the features of the original and accompanied by historical and bibliographical commentary. Copies of the unique Slavic work have been published using the latest technologies, for distribution to Belarusian and foreign establishments of science, culture and education. Some partial copies will also be given to local schools. The Director of the National Library of Belarus, Roman Motulsky, notes that literary heritage is receiving great attention at present. He explains, “It's very difficult to return originals, almost impossible. However, we can recreate editions and are working to do so.” He notes that spiritual works have been to the fore so far, with a facsimile edition of the Slutsk Gospel being the first major attempt: it received the award ‘For Spiritual Revival’. The Polotsk Gospel was also recently published. The Turov Gospel is the most ancient Belarusian edition, and one of the most ancient in Eastern Europe, having been first released in the 11th century. Ten pages were found in 1865 in Turov, in a coal box, and are now kept at the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences’ library, in Vilnius. The Turov Gospel is considered of equal importance alongside the Slutsk Gospel and the Cross of Saint Yevfrosiniya Polotskaya. The copy uses chestnut ink to create large block lettering, which is easily legible. This geometrically verified handwriting was widely-distributed in the early Slavic Middle Ages, on sheets of thick parchment (small quarter size). In the remaining fragment, there are eleven decorated capital letters, painted in dark blue, green and red. 2014 беларусь.belarus

PANORAMA  Beautiful date Pesnyary legendary ensemble turns 45 years old

t’s said that a man is alive while the memory of him is alive. Eleven years ago, when Vladimir Mulyavin, the founder and leader of Pesnyary, passed away, it seemed that it would put paid also to the legendary ensemble. It happens often that a ship perishes without the captain. However, the case, begun by Mulyavin, is still in demand. The other day friends and disciples, relatives and stage colleagues gathered at the grave of Vladimir Mulyavin at the Moscow Cemetery to remember how the history of the group began. Composers Igor Luchenok and Oleg Molchan, Mikhail Drinevsky, the Chief Conductor of the Tsitovich Choir, Sergey Kovalchik and Alexander Gartsuev, art directors of the Russian Theatre and Belarusian Drama Theatre, and Valentina

Gayevaya, Head of the Khoroshki State Dance Ensemble, came to share their memories. Every one of them had their own history, connected with Mulyavin and his musical brainchild. They remembered, for example, how foreign tourists, coming to Minsk, bought Belarusian dictionaries to understand what Pesnyary were singing about. The song heritage of the group is a sort of gold reserve, not subject to depreciation, the Minister of Culture, Boris Svetlov believes. “Long ago, they already became the cultural history of our country. And, certainly, to a large extent it has become possible thanks to Vladimir Mulyavin. It’s difficult to imagine a more popular person that embodies Belarusian music.”

 In line with trans-boundary co-operation programme Restoration of waterway between Black and Baltic seas via Belarus to begin next year

беларусь.belarus 2014

 Electronic testing is way forward Law examinations via electronic testing

rom October, lawyers seeking qualification in Belarus will be taking electronic tests, with each examination being individual, to reflect various branches of law. The move should speed up the marking of examinations, which can be done in seconds by computer, compared to 30-40 minutes manually (with double checking). The Ministry of Justice is confident that, as well as being more efficient, the system will eliminate subjectivity in marking, and the incidence of appeals. Of course, the move also allows exams to be easily analysed in an electronic database and students can learn their results immediately.

elarus intends to work together with Ukraine and Poland to restore the water transport connection that will relink the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea. The meetings in Pinsk, Brest and Lublin were held to discuss this issue. A special commission has been set up and a specification of requirements has been worked out, which has already been confirmed as compliant with European standards. The feasibility study will be ready soon. “The document will then be submitted to international organisations and to governments of the countries concerned. We hope that we will make the transition from planning to construction,” noted Sergey Zubko, the Deputy Director General of Dneprobugvodput enterprise. An international tender has been already arranged, and a general contractor is being sought. Mr. Zubko underlined that the implementation of this project will allow Belarusian water transport companies to switch from local transportation to international transportation. It will be possible to use river transport to carry construction cargo and containers, while also expanding passenger transportation services. “This future is now not as distant as it seemed to us in the past,” added Mr. Zubko.

MEETING

Vladimir Putin, Alexander Lukashenko and Petro Poroshenko during the summit

Crucial world summit

ertainly, the crisis in Ukraine was the main theme at negotiations between the presidents of B e l ar u s , Ru s s i a , Kazak hstan, and Ukraine and top representatives of the European Union. The format was the first of its kind and was preceded by much media conjecture. Ukrainian colleagues were clearly excited by the meeting, to which they pinned hopes for the launch of a peaceful settlement of their conflict. Russian journalists had their

own views but one thing was clear: negotiations would not be easy. Intrigue remained after almost four hours of conversation, and work continued through an evening meal. The press could not help but speculate and it was nearly 9pm before any announcements were made. Mr. Lukashenko was the first to speak, declaring, “We’ve seriously discussed all complex questions connected with the crisis in Ukraine. Unfortunately, the situation is so serious that no decision can be made without top-level discussion. Separate steps and technical arrangements cannot settle the conflict. We’ve decided to develop a compre-

Crucial issues are being decided in Minsk hensive action plan to suit all interests; negotiations were not easy but dialogue was substantial and extremely frank. It is vital and so valuable that this dialogue has finally occurred. During almost four hours of discussions, all sides expressed their opinions. Positions differ — even cardinally — but, importantly, we’ve agreed on one thing: we must search for compromise. During discussion of the conflict in the east of Ukraine, all sides agreed on the necessity of de-escalation, liberation of hostages, and humanitarian assistance. It is essential that we prevent humanitarian catastrophe. Especially now, on the eve of winter.” 2014 беларусь.belarus

MEETING

First: the decision for Minsk to lead in hosting future meetings between the OSCE, Russia and Ukraine (and for the next to be held soon). The proposal of the President of Ukraine was supported by all participants of the meeting; Second: the working group s h o u l d e l a b o ra te w ays o f smoothing the waters between the Customs Union and Russia towards Ukraine, following its signing of the EU Association Agreement; Third: the discussion of problematic issues, connected with Ukraine, will follow the same format as that in Minsk (as suggested by the President of Kazakhstan and fully supported). The participants of the meeting have also focused on economic problems. These primarily centred on the energy sphere, with transit and gas deliveries causing much debate. It was the first such high level dialogue between the two most powerful integration associations on the continent. The importance of the Minsk summit, whose results have been long discussed by top politicians and experts, cannot be overstated. Events in Ukraine, at the centre of Europe, have roused close attention worldwide, as evinced by the attendance of two Deputy Chairs of the European Commission — Catherine Ashton and Günther Oettinger — and the European Commissioner for Trade, Karel De Gucht. President Lukashenko especially noted that no intermediaries had been sent to the meeting, showing that all sides were eager to see the situation in the centre of Europe resolved promptly. Public interest runs high and беларусь.belarus 2014

almost 200 journalists from 72 media outlets, across two dozen countries, covered the meeting. Meanwhile, the prehistory, recalled by Alexander Lukashenko, is interesting. During the inauguration of the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko asked that the Customs Union countries refrain from applying sanctions to Ukraine following its signing of the EU Association Agreement, requesting that Mr. Lukashenko carry his plea to the presidents of Russia and Kazakhstan. At that time, Mr. Poroshenko suggested holding a meeting to discuss problems and the President of Belarus fulfilled the request of his Ukrainian colleague: a series of meetings was organised between heads of states, in Minsk. Mr. Lukashenko underlined, “I’m convinced that nobody in this hall wishes to profit from the current situation; the idea is blasphemy. Our nations have entrusted us, presidents, with their destinies. What should we do in response to this trust? Are we to leave smoking ruins and razed homes in place of smoking factory chimneys? Are we to doom our

”

dividends, rather considering the destiny of ordinary people: the elderly and children — who cry, suffer and die.” The first step in this direction has now been made. After the five-sided meeting, Vladimir Putin and Petro Poroshenko met in private, as is natural. Besides the peaceful settlement of the conflict in the southeast of Ukraine, the two presidents had economic problems to discuss. The countries of the Customs Union are concerned by the Ukraine-European Union Association Agreement; according to Vladimir Putin, total damage to the Russian economy may surpass 100 billion Russian Roubles. A flood of European goods onto the Ukrainian market as a consequence of Ukraine dropping all import duties for EU goods could place many sectors of industry and agro-industry at risk. To protect its own market, Russia will be compelled to annul duty-free imports from Ukraine, introducing standard modes of trade. Mr. Poroshenko has agreed to create a monitoring group to estimate real losses for the Customs Union from Ukraine-EU Association. Another proposal is to start

Alexander Lukashenko: We’ve decided to develop a comprehensive action plan to suit all interests; negotiations were not easy but dialogue was substantial and extremely frank. It is vital and so valuable that this dialogue has finally occurred. people to suffering? It seems to me that we've had enough suffering in the past. If we want to be considered responsible politicians, we should fully recognise the load of responsibility before our nations, forfeit political ambitions and seek no

”

The President of Belarus described the main agreed points of action as:

discussing the shift towards a system of mutual recognition of certificates. Negotiations in Minsk ended with a tripartite meeting of the presidents of Belarus, Russia and Kazakhstan. By Lilia Khlystun

MEETING

STATEMENTS Vladimir Putin: Russia respects and will continue to respect the sovereign choice of any nation and any country in the organisation of its own political life and in the organisation of unions — military and economic. We hope that this won't be to the detriment of other participants of international dialogue or at our expense.

Undoubtedly, the meeting in Minsk of Presidents of Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and EU high representatives, became an important world political event. The fact of organising this kind of event is of great importance, since, for the first time the negotiating table has brought together representatives of the Customs Union, the European Union and Ukraine. The results of top level meetings and political statements of the countries’ leaders are also crucial; these testify to the launch of the dialogue. Belarusian and foreign experts comment their views on the meeting and its results.

Weighty opinions

Nursultan Nazarbayev: We must primarily provide humanitarian help to casualties in Ukraine. The Russian Federation has already begun to do so and international organisations, including the Customs Union and the CIS, should take part in this process. It is vital that we provide impartial international control over the delivery of humanitarian help. Therefore, I call upon those in conflict to declare armistice while assistance is rendered to those suffering. Petro Poroshenko: The destiny of the world and Europe is being solved here. The purpose of my arrival in Minsk has been to stop bloodshed and to begin the process of searching for political compromise.

lexander Ivanovsky, politologist and First Prorector of the Academy of Public Administration under the aegis of the President of Belarus:

Catherine Ashton: It’s vital that leaders of countries across the region are involved in dialogue, to find solutions. Our position is clear: we support the choice of Ukraine and the Ukrainian nation's path. It’s important for them to have good relations with the EU, and with other neighbours.

Minsk showed itself as a venue for serious negotiations from a good side. Among plenty of serious issues, which were tackled at the meeting of Presidents of the Customs Union states, Ukraine and EU high representatives in Minsk, an issue of assessment of Belarus as a country was also high on the agenda, which is able to organise and conduct such an event at a high level. “None of participants said any critical remarks regarding this issue. The or-

ganisation of the event, the atmosphere and the created conditions actually pleased everyone,” he said. Mr. Ivanovsky added, “The Head of our State stressed that we don’t seek some unilateral concessions or benefits. Moreover, Belarus acts as an organiser. I believe that the level of this organisation and the conducted meetings will facilitate a positive solution to a range of issues which can be reached during this stage of negotiations.”

lexander Shpakovsky, politologist and Director of Relevant Concept Information and Educational Institution:

2014 беларусь.belarus

opinions The meeting between the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Vice President of the European Commission, Catherine Ashton, and the President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko creates certain preconditions for the normalisation of relations between the EU and Belarus. The meeting in Minsk will not, of course, relieve Belarus from biased assessments from the European Union or from biased recommendations and criticism. However, the mere fact that the Head of the European external action service willingly engaged in dialogue with the Belarusian Head of State creates a positive background and conditions for the further normalisation of relations between the European Union and Belarus. The politologist believes that the meeting involving Catherine Ashton signals that EU national governments can and should negotiate with Belarus. “The very fact that the summit of this format and level is hosted by Minsk attests to the significance of Belarus’ geopolitical role by the international community,” said Alexander Shpakovsky. He added that the meeting is also recognition of the correctness of Belarus’ position on the Ukrainian crisis.

iktor Fesak, Deputy Chairman of the Permanent Commission for International Affairs at the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus: The meeting in the Customs Union-Ukraine-EU format in Minsk will increase the standing of Belarus on the international arena. “The Customs Union-EU-Ukraine meeting on our soil will give greater importance to Belarus in the international community and will greatly improve our relations with the European Union,” said the MP. The deputy noted that the meeting in Minsk is unlikely to result in the immediate resolution of the Ukrainian crisis. “Meanwhile, this meeting will mark the беларусь.belarus 2014

beginning of efforts to reach an agreement that will bring peace to Ukraine,” believes Mr. Fesak. The meeting is hosted by Minsk because Belarus is neutral on the conflict in Ukraine. “The Belarusian President has repeatedly stated that Ukraine is one of our main partners and a neighbour. Our countries have a common historical background and therefore relations between the two countries should be based on good neighbourliness and reciprocity,” added Mr. Fesak.

anina Sokolovskaya, Editor-in-Chief of the Izvestiya in Ukraine newspaper:

The very fact of holding a high level meeting in the Customs Union-UkraineEU format is important per se. According to the Editor-in-Chief, what matters most is the very fact of holding talks by the Presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and high representatives of the EU, rather than the outcome of the meeting. “We don’t expect any concrete outcomes in the form of important documents; however, we expect important political statements. For example, the Ukrainian President, Petro Poroshenko has already stated that he is ready to resolve issues only in a peaceful way,” notes Ms. Sokolovskaya. She believes that President Alexander Lukashenko can become an arbitrator who will help reconcile adversaries in eastern Ukraine.

arat Zhilinsky, Candidate of Historical Sciences and Deputy Chairman of the Permanent Commission for Education, Culture and Science at the House of Representatives: The Minsk meeting is a political victory for Belarusian diplomacy.

The Minsk meeting that involved the Presidents of the Customs Union, Ukraine and high representatives of the EU is a political victory for Belarusian diplomacy, Marat Zhilinsky, Candidate of Historical Sciences, and Deputy Chairman of the Permanent Commission for Education, Culture and Science at the House of Representatives told our correspondent. The MP believes that Europe saw that Belarus is a fully-fledged European State, and that many issues cannot be addressed without Minsk. After all, the summit was not held in Paris as it was believed, nor in Astana, Warsaw or Berlin; it took place in Minsk. According to him, the visit of highprofile European officials to Minsk demonstrated the readiness to use the Belarusian capital city for political purposes as a platform to resolve even the most complicated issues.

alery Chaly, Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration of Ukraine:

The Minsk meeting is an important step in settling the situation in Donbass. The meetings in Minsk had a positive result and gave us an opportunity to shift towards the process of agreeing the final ‘roadmap’ aimed at settling the conflict in the east of Ukraine. This was noted at the briefing in Kiev by the Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration of Ukraine, Valery Chaly. “As far as what happened in Minsk openly and behind the closed doors is concerned, I can say that this is a shift towards a ‘roadmap’ which is currently the subject of consultations in various formats,” noted Mr. Chaly. He emphasised that the meetings in Minsk gave a feeling ‘that the sides have come up to a definite point at which a decision should be looked for’. “No one needs escalation. I think that everyone understands that we need peace,” he summed up.

Belta

NEGOTIATIONS

The participants answered the journalists’ questions after signing of the protocol on a ceasefire in Donbass

To stop. To look around. To think

This event, which has been long anticipated, occurred in Minsk. At negotiations between representatives of Ukraine, the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) with participation of OSCE, ceasefire agreement for Donbass was signed.

quote the message of the news agencies which, like lightning, has flown all over the world: ‘The protocol on a ceasefire from 6pm Friday has been signed. The protocol consists of 12 points which include all aspects of control, exchange of captives and other issues’. Certainly, all these points demand additional explanation and for certain will be supplemented, explained and will become the beginning of long and hard work, but during the moment when these lines are being written, I want to share one main exciting feeling — the sensation that history is being made before our eyes, and that the main junction of the next historical turn occurred here — in Minsk! It is not a happy ending, but only the beginning and everything is not so simple that in the reasons and consequences of the Ukrainian crisis, it could be resolved by the forces of one side or another.

During the same minutes, when the participants of the meeting walked up the stairs of the President Hotel for the signing of the peace protocol, news agencies broadcast reports about some of the fiercest battles for Mariupol. According to one source, rebels have already surrounded and taken this city, according to another, the Ukrainian army continues their persistent defence. But what exactly happened in Minsk that was so important? It happened that the sides have realised in time that they went overboard and have expressed the political will to stop, look around and think it over. It was the desire of the participants themselves, with the possibility to be gathered in one negotiation platform given to them by Minsk. During the third round of negotiations, there was increased confidence of all participants in comparison with previous meetings on July 31st and on September

1st, as if they had tested the new mechanism and were convinced that it worked. While yesterday, when the next session of tripartite contact group was starting in the President Hotel on Ukraine issues, the effectiveness of this mechanism was not doubted any more by anybody. The optimistic tone was set by Leonid Kuchma who, before the beginning of the meeting, expressed its overall objective, “We have arrived for peace.” He, as well as the Russian representative, had declared in advance that the signing of documents following the results of this meeting would occur. Therefore, yesterday’s sensation was somewhat predicted. There was no sense to expect anything else after Vladimir Putin offered a peace plan consisting of seven points, while Petro Poroshenko recently announced the order to ceasefire. And a more representative delegation which arrived to Minsk from Donetsk, testified to the seriousness of intentions. The Prime Minister of DPR, Alexander Zakharchenko, the First Deputy Prime Minister of DPR, Andrey Purgin, Head of LPR, Igor Plotnitsky and the Chairman of the Supreme Council of LPR, Alexey Karyakin arrived to represent the interests of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics at the meeting of the contact group. As we see, the representation in comparison with last session was twice bigger. The fact that there was a major turn to peace was also confirmed by the whole world background. Even Wales waited for news from Minsk, where Poroshenko has promised to give the order to ceasefire, and also in Brussels, which did not publish the content of a new package of sanctions against Russia. The introduction of them can be postponed for some days or even cancelled. The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Philip Hammond spoke with Sky News TV Channel, noting that everything depends on the results of negotiations about peace which were carried out in Minsk. And they have already received these results. By Nina Romanova

2014 беларусь.belarus

officially

President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko made an official statement after the meeting of the contact group in Minsk

elarus welcomes the protocol on ceasefire between the contending forces in the east of Ukraine, signed by the Ukraine-RussiaOSCE contact group on September 5th, 2014. This long-awaited news gives us hope, albeit fragile, for the lasting peace in the region. The conflict in the brotherly Slavic state has been recently the most alarming and much discussed issue on the international agenda. Not only regional but also global security came under threat. It is no exaggeration to say that the war started to loom on the horizon in our common European home. We should give credit to the initiatives and proposals of, first of all, the presidents of Ukraine and Russia. Their fundamental top-level agreements reached on the Minsk land in late August laid a foundation for the peace process. Dialogue in the format Customs Union-Ukraine-European Union allowed engaging in the negotiations the parties who were genuinely interested in peace in Ukraine and in Europe. Concrete proposals of the President of Kazaбеларусь.belarus 2014

Belta

Statement of President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko

khstan to resolve the conflict were very important and timely. Certainly, without the persistent efforts of the leaders of the leading states of the European Union, the ceasefire in the eastern regions of Ukraine would have been impossible to achieve. No doubt, the Ukraine-RussiaOSCE contact group consisting of Leonid Kuchma, Mikhail Zurabov and representatives of the southeast of Ukraine and the OSCE played an extremely important role. The group did a truly herculean job and reached agreement on the issues which seemed absolutely impossible to solve some time ago. The work of the contact group deserves genuine gratitude and encouragement. This, by the way, is one of the few occasions when the OSCE has played exactly the role for which it was created, and has made a concrete contribution to the regional peace and security. We are proud that the peace process was launched in Minsk, on the Belarusian land. We’ll continue to make every effort for the sake of peace in our brotherly country. Our peoples have suffered enough in the wars of the last century,

and we do not want to see such suffering happening again, this century. The news of the ceasefire arrangements was welcomed with joy and hope everywhere. However, we should clearly understand that this is only the first step of a long and difficult journey. We’ll need to overcome a lot of unexpected things and obstacles to make sure the Minsk peace process should become irreversible and irrevocable. I’m convinced that the work of the contact group should continue. Perhaps it makes sense to give it more powers and raise its level for the successful implementation of all agreements reached. Now all the parties concerned need to stop and think. Think about the future of the country and the people. It is peaceful and constructive work, not the destructive war that will ensure the wellbeing of the state and ordinary people. The fratricidal conflict in our sister nation will leave severe scars in the heart of the Ukrainian nation. But it will be gradually forgotten. People will remember those who managed to turn the wheel of war towards peace! Alexander Lukashenko, September 6th, 2014

Nadezhda Ponkratova

DIPLOMACY

European time About European Belarus, about relations between Europe and Belarus, willingness to accept and understand

’ve recently been to an international conference, dedicated to the EU’s Eastern Partnership programme, where Professor of Moscow State Institute of International Relations, Andrey Zubov, read a solid lecture to his colleagues (most of whom were representatives of the countries that appeared after the collapse of the Soviet Union, so were primarily familiar with our common, i.e. Russian, history) on the topic whether Russia is a part of Europe. The question

Finally, all of us are responsible for a uniform Europe, for its safety and prosperity. We simply do not have other options than to cooperate with each other

itself seems absurd, yet this issue has been discussed many times. I’ll also remind that no one has an idea to discuss whether Belarus is a European country. I’ve spoken with two Belarusian ambassadors — Andrey Giro in Berlin and Andrey Yevdochenko in Brussels — about European Belarus, about relations between Europe and Belarus and about readiness to accept and understand. The thoughts expressed by them turned out to be so consonant and mutually complementing that I’ve risked uniting them into one article. 2014 беларусь.belarus

DIPLOMACY

Andrey Giro, the Ambassador of Belarus to Germany: The world is developing and nothing is standing still. Those items, steps and actions which seemed correct for German policy in 20102011 are now seen in another light, after the events in Ukraine. In 2011, Germany introduced sanctions, including economic sanctions against Belarus. Taking into account the role of Germany in the European Union and on the worldwide political stage, it’s clear that if Germany hadn’t promoted these ideas so actively, they probably would not have been implemented. Meanwhile, in the course of time, everyone began to understand that the situation in Belarus is far from the picture which sometimes appears in the media or in the stories of our fellow countrymen who consider themselves part of the opposition movement and who are pleased to visit European capitals and carry the only truth that, from their point of view, should be known by European public. We didn’t sit idle and also organised information events and trips, as well as trips for journalists and entrepreneurs, encouraging them to look at the situation and make their own conclusions. The absurdity of the situation became apparent just recently when Belarus received restrictions for its consistent domestic policy in the form of sanctions which cover almost 240 people. Under the conditions of current opposition regarding the Ukrainian issue, sanctions were introduced against several dozen Russian citizens. The absurdity of the situation is evident, but the bureaucratic system in the EU is such that much time and consensus is needed in order to make a decision, while no less time and consensus is necessary to abolish it. In order to launch this project, an initiative is needed that some country, or better still a group of countries, comes up with such an initiative. One of our major tasks nowadays is беларусь.belarus 2014

to assure the leadership and government of Germany, alongside representatives of various political powers, that a policy aimed at the isolation of Belarus is nonpromising, immoral and hasn’t brought the expected results, so there’s no sense to continue the pressure. All processes that are happening in our country occur in line with their internal logic, and if there are reasons for reforming some spheres of life, including the election legislation, which is often being criticised, then reforms are carried out. Many don’t want to see or understand that, after recent presidential elections, we’ve taken almost 90 percent of recommendations and remarks of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) into account. All these changes have been introduced into our legislation, have been implemented and will be applied at the next elections. Nevertheless, there are people who think that this is little and find any reason for criticism or knocks. Many politicians, with whom we managed to communicate openly, admit that double standards do exist and the attitude towards Belarus is somehow different than that towards other countries — members of the Eastern Partnership and other states that have more important meaning for the German economy than we have. Does it mean that we need to have more a important meaning for the German economy? This is evident. Restraint in accepting restrictive measures against Russia is explained that German business has too big interests in Russia, where around 6,000 representations of German companies are working, and Germany now satisfies around a third of its energy needs through Russian resources. Therefore, it’s clear that it’s impossible, or very difficult, to accept overnight such overwhelming sanctions against Russia as they are against Belarus. In any case, all sensible people admit that Belarus doesn’t pose a hazard for the European Union, and in many spheres, where co-operation isn’t politicised, this collaboration is almost exemplary. These

include, e.g., collaboration in the sphere of the struggle against organised crime and our contribution to the strengthening of European security in the destruction of personnel mines and simple weapons. Of course, I should also mention our 1994 refusal to utilise nuclear weapons. Moreover, no one abolished the Budapest Memorandum, which should guarantee sovereignty, independence and absence of sanctions and political pressure. Now, Ukraine is actively appealing to this document but without any apparent success so far. We have normal interaction in the sphere of law enforcement bodies and in the customs field, alongside environment protection, agriculture, agricultural monitoring, phytosanitary and sanitary control. There’s normal working interaction at the level of experts and understanding that Belarus, being a part of Europe and a direct neighbour of the EU, can’t be excluded from common European processes. Transport, logistics and transit are topics that can’t be successfully solved in Europe without us. Therefore, those politicians who understand this see the hopelessness of pressure and sanctions and try to now find ways to smooth them and return to normal life. We see these signals. Probably, they are currently not so clear and strong as we would like them to be but they do exist. For example, consultations between foreign ministries haven’t been organised for several years, but this year they were carried out. We are now more actively invited to take part in international forums, sessions, congresses and symposiums which deal with issues of pan-European importance.

Andrey Yevdochenko, Ambassador of Belarus to Belgium, Permanent Representative to the European Union and NATO: We l l , w e have uneasy relations with the European Union. Being here as constant rep-

DIPLOMACY resentative of Belarus under the EU, I had to endure a critical moment in our relations which continued for about a year and a half. I think that eventually, when emotions calmed down, normal, worthy and constructive behaviour of Belarus concerning the EU allowed us to reach a certain intermediate stage of normalisation of our relations. We have repeatedly spoken about that, in relations with the European Union we are ready to go further, as much as the EU is ready. How much are they ready? Unfortunately, the European Union cannot tell us today how much they are ready. That inadequacy, which exists in the policy of the European Union concerning Belarus, is obvious and notable to the whole world, except to the EU themselves. But unfortunately, big European wheels of bureaucracy are arranged in a way that when the flywheel gains speed, it is very difficult to stop it. Big efforts are needed. So, it is possible to say that Belarus is one of those extremely rare cases of unity of the European Union states in relation to one concrete country. We know the reason of that, which lies in the geopolitical interests of the EU. While Belarus does not have that pillow of safety as many other countries have. We do not have oil, gas, gold, diamonds, uranium, rare-earth metals and many other things which are the basis of EU foreign policy. But the crisis which is now developing in Ukraine, certainly, has led to a certain sobering. All understand that the development of democracy and progress is good, and nobody protests against this, including Belarus. The question is only what tools are used and how it is realised. After all, Europeans are not silly people, they see that all those revolutions which occurred in the territory of the CIS, have not led to an improvement of life of the people, to any economic breakthrough, and, to tell the truth, from a political point of view, the situation in these countries is estimated critically. Therefore, now the European Union does not have insight

”

All sensible people admit that Belarus doesn’t pose a hazard for the European Union, and in many spheres, where co-operation isn’t politicised, this collaboration is almost exemplary

on many directions. Brussels newspapers, printing and electronic media contain so much criticism, something that has not been seen for the last two decades. It is true that during the last years the policy was not absolutely wise, in both many member states, and at the level of administration of the EU. And, as a matter of fact, the financial crisis has not created these problems, it only has revealed them. After all, from an economic point of view, the European Union represents a rather mixed structure today. And the countries, on macro- and micro levels, have absolutely different sore spots. Why was it difficult to them to develop (actually, they have not fully developed yet) mechanisms and instruments for overcoming the crisis; because the illnesses are different and remedies should be also differ-

ent. Now there is a reconsideration of many issues of economic policy both at national level, and within the limits of the whole EU. Now, the leaders of many countries declare that the policy of economic toughening is not the remedy which will remove Europe from systemic crisis. However, it is necessary to allow for that these statements were made during the elections in May. The question is whether it will be embodied in the strategy and programme of the EU or not. Of course, there are a lot of questions on European foreign policy. We have the Ukrainian crisis and a set of other issues. In the EU, there are a lot of people who consider that pressure and sanctions can bring results in foreign policy. However experience shows that it is not so. Exactly! Finally, all of us are responsible for a uniform Europe, for its safety and prosperity. We simply do not have other options than to co-operate with each other. For example, I am deeply convinced that in ten, or maybe, twenty years’ time, we will have an integration of integrations and those who will do it will be bewildered, recollecting those sceptics who say today that it cannot be, because it can never be at all. As experience shows, nothing is impossible in politics and diplomacy. There is only the proper or improper time. Oliver Kaczmarek, Deputy of the Bundestag from the Social Democratic Party of Germany and Head of the German-Belarusian Parliamentary Friendship Group said, “We want open and fair dialogue on the political situation in Europe, in Belarus, on prospects of the development of Belarus/Europe and Belarus/Germany relations without any prejudices. We will give all-round support to representatives of civil society in Germany who co-operate with Belarus in various fields, first of all in the field of non-governmental organisations and Chernobyl aid. Thus we will promote the development of our relations.” Is the ice broken? By Inessa Pleskachevskaya

2014 беларусь.belarus

topic

Alexander Ruzhechka

IN THE STREAM OF KNOWLEDGE

High position in prestigious rating UNESCO placed our country fourth worldwide in the number of those receiving secondary special, higher and postgraduate education

his figure in Belarus is 641 people per 10,000 residents; only the Republic of Korea (699), the USA (683) and Chile (657) have more. Moreover, we’re considerably ahead of France (374 per 10,000), Sweden (496), Norway (495) and Austria (461). Undoubtedly, such a high position in this prestigious ranking serves as vivid recognition of the successes of our domestic system of education. However, isn’t there a shift in favour of higher education to the detriment of secondary education? Don’t we have too many students wishбеларусь.belarus 2014

ing to receive only a precious ‘wallpaper degree’, rather than those really wishing to master a popular speciality? The Deputy Chairman of the Standing Committee for Education, Culture and Science at the House of Representatives, Mikhail Volkov, confirmed that the question arises whether we need such a number of graduates with a higher education, “It’s necessary to raise the enrolment for working specialities into secondary special educational establishments. Not everyone should enter universities, only the best graduates — highly-motivated and with suitable knowledge. The work on their selection should start at school,

and truly capable pupils, who are resultoriented, should continue studying at senior classes. It means that these classes should be the obligatory profile where corresponding subjects are taught at the enhanced level. In my opinion, it would be reasonable to introduce obligatory examinations after the 9th grade in only in two subjects — the Russian and Belarusian languages. However, if a pupil wishes to go further to the 10th grade, then they should pass two more exams in line with the future profile, e.g., mathematics and physics, or a foreign language and history. In this way, less motivated schoolchildren would enter special educational establishments, while we would receive prepared alumni which will enhance in the future the quality of specialists with higher education. Meanwhile, the accent should be placed on professions which are truly in demand countrywide, e.g., engineers, programmers, doctors and specialists with a higher education in the agro-industrial complex, rather than lawyers and economists, whose numbers are too great nowadays.” By Anton Kostyukevich

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The right to education is guaranteed for every resident of our country. A multiple educational system, which has been formed and examined for years, allows the realisation of this

reschool education is, figuratively speaking, the first step on the stairs. A network of preschool institutions, which differ through types and profile of working with children, is included in its structure. Preschool education isn’t obligatory, but most children visit a day nursery, a nursery-kindergarten, a kindergarten and a kindergarten-school. On profile, kindergarten institutions are divisible into institutions of general purpose, with in-depth orientation, special preschool institutions for children with special needs and preschool centres for the development of a

Nadezhda Ponkratova

Landscape of education

child. By the way, the government is currently working on a question about providing private institutions of preschool education with state aid on child support. In this case, as the Deputy Prime Minister, Anatoly Tozik, said, when visiting Mogilev #1 Preschool Centre for the Development of Children, ‘participants will have even more incentive to work, to develop material and a technical base and to increase the skill level of its workers.” According to the opinion of the Deputy Prime Minister, with a more broadly supporting private initiative on creating preschool institutions in big cities, we can faster solve the problems with the shortage of places and can provide easy walking access to elementary education and breeding. General and secondary education, in other words — school education in Belarus — is received at the age of 6. The modern model of a general education school includes some stages. The first is elementary education, which continues from 1st to 4th forms. The next stage is basic education from 5th to 9th forms. After leaving basic school, young people have an opportunity to study at colleges, lyceums (upper-level secondary education) or vocational-technical schools, where they get, alongside secondary education, professional training. This education is qualified as vocational-technical education. Such pupils, who don’t hurry to 2014 беларусь.belarus

беларусь.belarus 2014

 In 2014, 55,000 people were matriculated in 54 state and 9 private higher education establishments. Slightly more than a half of them — about 28,000 people — on the paid departments, the other — 27,200 — will study at the expense of budget means. Programming and stomatology became the most prestigious specialties this year.

Artur Prupas

leave secondary school, get there secondary education in 10th and 11th forms. In the educational system of Belarus, two languages — Russian and Belarusian — are used. On the Belarusian educational territory there are also technical schools (specialised schools), colleges, schools-colleges of art, gymnasiums-colleges of art, vocationaltechnical colleges and linguistic gymnasiums-colleges, where vocational secondary education is available as basic, secondary and vocational-technical education. It can be full-time, part-time and evening education from 2 to 4 years in length. The national high school of Belarus is presented by 54 state-run higher education establishments, as well as 10 privately owned institutions. There are classical universities, profile universities and academies, institutes and high colleges. In our country, licensing of educational activity of all higher education establishments, independently of pattern of ownership, has been conducted. The Belarusian State University and the Belarusian National Technical University are leading higher education establishments in the national educational system, 9 institutions — leading industrial. Higher education is prestigious and available in our country. By the way, in Belarus the ratio of students to the total population is one of the highest in Europe. Entering a higher education establishment, an entrant chooses educational form, which can be full-time, part-time or evening-time. All graduates, graduating from institutions of various patterns of ownership, get a state-recognised degree. Training programmes in higher education establishments is designed for 5 years. In 2002, in accordance with the Decree of the President ‘On Accession of the Republic of Belarus to the Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications Concerning Higher Education in the European Region’, Belarus became a full member of the Lisbon Convention of 1997, prepared together with

UNESCO and Council of Europe. It allows the solving of the problem of recognition of diplomas from Belarusian higher education establishments, improves the development of international co-operation and the attraction of foreign students. 51 educational institutions conduct activities in the sphere of provision of paid educational services to foreign residents.

In the country almost 10,000 educational institutions are working; they represent all its levels, where about 445,000 workers are providing training and breeding of more than 2,000,000 children, pupils and students The training is carried out in the Russian or Belarusian language. Its cost, according to international practice, is defined by the institution itself on every specialty. Before the beginning of training, most foreign residents have to pass a one-year language course in Belarus, at the faculty of preuniversity training of the institution.

Training of scientific and scientificeducational personnel in Belarus is carried out in post-graduate course, the doctorate of the higher education establishments and scientific organisations of the Ministry of Education (edu.gov.by). In our country there is also a network of educational institutions of the system of further training and retraining of personnel. Republican bodies of state administration, as well as local regulatory authorities direct the educational system in Belarus. The Ministry of Education has responsibility for state and development of the educational system in our state. The adoption of the Code of the Republic of Belarus of Education on January 13th, 2011, became an important event for the educational system. Thereby, for the first time in our country, the task of codification of social relations in the sphere of education was solved and an independent branch of law — educational — was formed. The structure of the national educational system was specified. The name and matter of educational levels were renewed. But the Code isn’t a once and for all rigid dogma; life, as the saying goes, makes its allowances, so in one or two years, some changes and amendments will be made. And it says that innovations are possible also in the sphere of educational system.

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This summer all international contests on sport programming among ‘gamers’ over 18, passed under the sign of Belarus. Gennady Korotkevich from Gomel, wellknown through his victories, won in the most significant world contests.

Head full of code

omel’s gymnasia pupil, Gena Korotkevich, has recently kept the world school society on tenterhooks, securing for years the unconditional leadership in international Olympiads on informatics. Currently, the student, Gennady Korotkevich, is going the same way, but already in the ranks of professionals of programming, leading world ratings and taking his place in Wikipedia. Confirmations are lying on the surface — the series of Korotkevich’s victories in prestigious international contests on sport programming. The last sensational victory is in Google Code Jam2014. The contests, in which the Gomel guy participated for the first time, were held in the middle of August in Los Angeles, and they ended with a Belarusian final

again. In 2013, in this contest Ivan Metelsky, a student from Minsk, became the best. Currently, the 19-year-old Gennady Korotkevich, from Gomel has the title of the strongest programmer on our planet. In the world of programming Gena is a well-known guy. He began to show his unusual capabilities from the 2nd form of a usual school. Five years before the end of the gymnasium he created records, increasing the fame of the computer unique object with phenomenal abilities. When he was 11, he got a ‘silver’ at the international Olympiad on informatics among pupils, where the strongest young ‘coders’ of the whole world crossed his ‘brains’, and then — golden procession at contests and championships. There had been nothing like this in the world history of ‘competitive’ programming. “Nobody comes close to Gena today,” I’m fishing from the Internet for reviews of

pros after another victory by Korotkevich. “He is head and shoulders above the rest.” “Conversations at the Olympiad consisted of 40 percent of discussion about tasks, 10 percent of discussion about trainers and 50 percent about Gennady Korotkevich,” I discover in the same place a curious English article. “Ask any participant, who will win this year, and should it be a Kazakh or Japanese, a Swiss or an Egyptian, — all people will grumble without a doubt: ‘Belarus, Belarus’. ” However, it can be explained. Gennady’s parents Vladimir and Lyudmila Korotkevich are from the same environment: they are programmers and work at the Department of Mathematical Problems of Control of Gomel State Skorina University. A child can hardly resist if his father and mother with enthusiasm ‘hang up’ over a computer. Although it’s not typical for all children, here there is the same 2014 беларусь.belarus

case. Following his parents, the boy strived after a glowing monitor. And at six years he began to ask questions. His father worked out for the curious child an available game programme of using the computer; thanks to this, at the age of 8, the child was already an expert in programming. And then, a famous Gomel’s teacher, Mikhail Dolinsky, the founder of the Belarusian school of informatics and training techniques, began to work with the boy. Now, Gennady is a student of Saint Petersburg National Research University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics of Russia. The faculty can be not specified. I think it’s clear: the Faculty of Information Technologies and Programming. For this summer, the second year student has shaken the virtual space several times to its roots. For example, on August 1st, in Berlin, he won in the Yandex. Algorithm-2014 championship, and became the only Belarusian finalist. More than 3,800 advanced minds from 72 countries worldwide participated in the selections here. Taking the main prize in the Yandex, Gena returned to Gomel for two weeks — for holidays at home and, after the little break, he went to Los Angeles to the Google Code Jam International Contest on Sport Programming. 20,000 ‘coders’ took part, but only 26 qualified for the final. The result was again in favour of the programmer from Gomel — he got the main prize — $15,000. Miraculously, I managed to wrest Gennady from this cycle in virtual space and make an appointment. Korotkevich cheerfully steps out through a park in the centre of Gomel. I notice him easily from the last time we communicated, when Gena ended 11th form in gymnasium #56. I remember that he had been very late for our meeting — a football match on the school field had detained him. Today he has come on time. The man is ‘growing’ and certainly, I was surprised: All students have holidays as holidays — and you, young man, journeys without a break? беларусь.belarus 2014

I have holidays, too. With my parents I went to a recreation centre. We had a great time. Now I’m in my native city. Plus I have a few contests. Let me congratulate you on victories. Are you satisfied with your results? Thank you. I’m quite pleased. In the ‘Yandex. Algorithm-2014’ championship I accomplished four tasks from six. It’s better than my result last year. And in the ‘Google Code Jam’ contests I participated for the first time. Earlier my age prohibited me. Five tasks from six — it’s also not bad, but, certainly, not without a little bit of luck. …and long hours of training? Actually, now I don’t train before individual competitions, so as it has been, when I have learned in school; then I have really spent some hours a day on ‘keeping fit’. Today, it’s enough to join online-contests, which are held by some sites 1-2 times a week to stay in form. And what can you say about complexity? The aims of these specific tournaments are a bit different, and the contests differ through this fact, in spite of the same number of tasks. ‘Google Code Jam’ competitions are, however, more difficult. Here you have to really think a lot because the essence of this championship is to solve the task effectively. Perhaps, it can be made by a primitive way: you go through all possible solutions; and you can make it ‘useful’ and invent an effective algorithm. For example, there are a lot of programmes, which people use in their everyday life. These programmes can, perhaps, process every keystroke for 5 milliseconds, and can for 5 seconds. And if you always use such a programme, you won’t wish to wait every time an extra 5 seconds. Certainly, it’s interesting for me to understand: how it is there, inside a sport event, terribly remote from my reality. However, Gennady can hardly explain to me — a ‘weasel’ of algorithmic puzzles — the copy-book truths of programming: How can I explain it simpler? Ok, at the next meeting I will invent an example-task that even a housewife can understand. I

can say only one thing: sports programming is for me, above all, a hobby, which is interesting. Why? It brings pleasure. It allows me to see the world. It acquaints me with a lot of good and interesting people. Even rivals can’t be called rivals. They are more friends, and I enjoy their successes. Well, I know. It’s your statement: I compete with tasks, and not with rivals. I don’t deny my words. But, as you understand, very much depends also on my rivals. By the way, in the last years, it’s absolutely obvious that the main fight breaks out between guys from Belarus, Russia, China, Japan, and Poland. There is such a power landscape in sport programming now. Do you have any authorities? More often I’m impressed not by a man but by his separate quality. To take the best characteristics of other people and to build yourself. Perhaps, so. Let us suppose. And is there any famous statement, which coincides with your personal outlook? ‘TopCoder’ a well-known site, proposes to answer the same question, when registering. My quotation there is: ‘Nothing is impossible; impossible itself says I’m possible...’ — in Russian it means: “There is nothing impossible”, and in English there is in addition to it a funny word game. Judging from the fact that Gena Korotkevich is first again, everything has weighted in the favour of Belarus. And the effective algorithm, the own competition with tasks, ‘a touch of fortune’… When we have taken leave, I, certainly, have asked about the fact, which is on the tip of my tongue. Are the leading world companies fighting for Korotkevich? Actually, the companies propose all participants of such contests to pass an interview and a probation period. But I don’t hurry. I have finished only my second course. At first I must get an education, and then choose my work. But I’m thinking now. And, perhaps, I will weigh everything at the very last moment, as usual. By Violetta Dralyuk

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“It is very pleasant to me. And what was 35 years ago?” “I studied at school.” “You studied well!” “Yes, not bad. I always had 5 on the Belarusian language, because the teacher was very good.” I did not question what he meant — the female beauty of the teacher or quality of her teaching. Obviously, both these factors ensured that the pupil mastered the language well.

ў ў

Children learn the Belarusian language first of all in establishments of secondary education

ecently I got acquainted with an unusual person. Valery Novikov was born in Mogilev, but lives now in Germany. I started talking to him in the Belarusian language, knowing that he is Belarusian. And in reply, I heard our language too, although the person has lived for 10 years far from the fatherland. I could not help paying a compliment to him. “You speak almost ideally in the Belarusian language!” “I have not spoken it for nearly 35 years,” he answered. “Thanks for such this possibility”

 According to the population census of 2009, 5,058,334 citizens of Belarus specified Belarusian as their native language and 1,281,713 people had Belarusian as their second language. The number of citizens who speak Belarusian at home is 23.43 percent. In comparison with 1999, these figures reflect a decrease in the use of the Belarusian language. In 1999 36.7 percent of people recognised it as the language which they spoke at home.

Nadezhda Ponkratova

School teaches

Fir-tree grows in Mogilev Perhaps school is the basic place where, if desired, it is possible to master the Belarusian language. There are many good examples where teachers foster in their pupils a love of the Belarusian tongue. Today in Mogilev there is one class where Belarusian is taught. And one pupil, Yelochka Solovieva (in English, the name Yelochka means ‘fir-tree’) studies here. The Department of Education of the Leninsky District Executive Committee of Mogilev guarantees that the teaching of the girl will be organised properly. Belarusian classes in the Mogilev Region also exist in Gorki. For example, in Osipovichi, there is a whole Belarusian gymnasium of more than six hundred children. All others Belarusian language educational institutions are in the villages. What does it mean to study in the Belarusian language? — I ask the teacher who teaches children in a rural school. She explains, “Our textbooks are all in the Belarusian language, while we speak Trasianka (a mixed form of speech). There is an opinion that supposedly, children who finished schools with the Belarusian language teaching have difficulties studying at higher educational institutions, since Russian prevails there. Therefore, some villagers carry their children into Russian schools — into the cities. It happens also that new people move a village and are surprised. ‘You have a school with teaching in Belarusian?’ But, nevertheless, their 2014 беларусь.belarus

”

The Deputy Prime Minister Anatoly Tozik:

Proficiency in our native language is an indicator of our culture and self-identification as a nation. In my opinion, all teachers without exception should know the Belarusian language and, if at least one pupil in the class speaks in Belarusian, then the teacher should answer in our native language.

child studies the Belarusian language and their parents are satisfied that children can study one more language. Children and their parents are not against the Belarusian language at all.

We honour our language, and study Chinese On June 18th, 2002, gymnasium #23, with teaching in the Belarusian language was created at Minsk secondary school #23. It is located in the centre of the city. The building which it occupies was constructed before WWII. Therefore, the traditions of education are deep here. The gymnasium collective contains 386 pupils and all subjects are taught in the Belarusian language. For the sake of this, children from the whole city go to the central Independence Avenue, where the educational institution is located. Children arrive even from the suburbs. 45

teachers provide the educational process. Irina Pasyukevich became a director of the gymnasium from August 1st, 2014. Many may be envious of what the institution offers its pupils. The place is unique in Belarus, where pupils study Chinese and English in combination with subjects taught in the Belarusian language. The Chinese language is taught from the first form by native speakers, and by Belarusian-speaking teachers. Teachers go on training courses in Chinese universities. Graduates of gymnasium #23 are proud of their knowledge of the Belarusian language, but do not use it often in every-day life. One graduate explains. “It seems to me that teaching in the Belarusian language is a plus. We know our native language better, but it is not connected with a future career in any way. Entering the Belarusian State University, young people pass the entrance examination in Russian.”

V itali

yG il

Facts and prospects

беларусь.belarus 2014

In the 2013-2014 academic year, the number of pupils in Belarusian-speaking schools dropped. Thus, only 15 percent of pupils are receiving education in Belarusian. Ten years ago, it was almost 25 percent. While in Minsk this indicator is 1.6 percent of pupils. Such data was given by the Chairman of Education Committee of the Minsk City Executive Committee, Mikhail Mironchik. Today, five gymnasiums teaching in the Belarusian language are running in Minsk — #4, #9, #14, #23 and #28.

 From our own experience How to create a Belarusian-speaking group in a kindergarten

his year, Grodno kindergarten #45 opens the second Belarusian-speaking group for 12 children. Olga Valko, mother of three-year old Stasik, tells how it is possible to create a Belarusian-speaking group for a child if you want your child to live in a Belarusian-speaking environment “The main thing was to find parents who will agree to send their children into a Belarusian-speaking group. First of all, we started to discuss this with our acquaintances that have children of the same age. In the Vechernyi Grodno (Evening Grodno) newspaper there was an advert from the educational department about intake into the group. We also made our own flyers and pasted them up, placed them on the Internet and people started to respond quickly. People called me, and I directed them to where it was necessary to take their applications. It is necessary to say that not all children are from Belarusian-speaking families. There are parents who registered in our group as the kindergarten was located near their house. And secondly, the group is small, and it is very important for all mums. All parents want that it will be good for their children, therefore do our own repairs on walls and the ceiling. Probably, we also will buy furniture. We do it with our own money and for our own reasons. We have organised parents’ meeting, discussed everything and agreed how much money was needed, collected then the necessary sum, hired a brigade of workers and they do the repairs. Our kindergarten teacher is a student who studies at the Department of English Philology and in everyday life, she speaks Belarusian. She told us that she is happy to help. We went to the head of the kindergarten and our student was hired.”

By Viktar Korbut

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IN THE STREAM OF KNOWLEDGE

wi∙fi education First e-school opens in the Vitebsk Region

M tempts to convince teachers that they left

y generation — who finished school over two decades ago — well remember their at-

lar tricks. Moreover, no paper grade books are needed now: parents can learn of their children’s school successes from their electronic books. The latter are large sensor screens placed in halls of educational establishments. All information comes to the surface after a keyword and a username are inserted. Moreover, modern schoolchildren can use no paper exercise books: they simply need notebooks with

Сhemistry Teacher Vladimir Busel

Sergey Golesnik

grade books at home in case of receiving low marks. A single goal was pursued then: to avoid parents from learning of those grades. Pupils of the past did everything possible to have their marks put as late as possible. Meanwhile, modern technical progress leaves no chance for youngsters to enjoy simi-

2014 беларусь.belarus

Wi-Fi connection and high-speed Internet. In addition, special stickers (instead of chalks) are used to draw on interactive boards. All these and many other modern gadgets are successfully applied at Orsha gymnasium #1 — which has become the first educational establishment introducing the Virtual School Belarusian-Russian project.

Gadgets help pupils The Virtual School project — partnered by the Ministry of Education of Belarus and Sberbank of Russia — envisages establishment of a multi-service information-educational environment in an educational establishment. Last May, bankers allocated almost 1.5m Russian Roubles to equip Orsha gymnasium — including buying and installing of a powerful server, interactive software boards (for classrooms where physics, chemistry, mathematics and biology are lectured), a ‘mobile class’ with 25 notebooks, and a large sensor screen which could be used as an e-workbook. Last year’s alumni kindly envied younger pupils, noting, “These children are lucky! We had no such interesting equipment. Studies are more fun with the latter. Moreover, wider opportunities open in learning new knowledge.”

Play and study A teacher of chemistry, Vladimir Busel, demonstrates me the new possibilities. Among them is an interactive board which looks like an ordinary white canvas from the first sight. In reality, this is a large computer screen; a special sticker (resembling a ‘hybrid’ of an e-pencil and a computer) is sued to write upon it — either in black, or green, or red. The thickness and colour of lines vary depending on the set task. In distinction from a classical board, no chalk or wet cloth are needed. In addition, everything written could be saved in a computer беларусь.belarus 2014

memory. Erasing is possible with a single click (though a rubber could be chosen among instruments to erase a fragment). Mr. Busel adds that studies are now possible via playing. “The software includes a chemical laboratory,” he explains. “Choosing and mixing chemical ingredients resemble a computer game; while doing so, vir-

 At the moment, eleven educational establishments of Minsk are members of the E-School and Virtual School projects, with Orsha gymnasium #1 joining them on September 1st. Minsk secondary school #61 is supposed to be soon included as well. Specialists believe that all Minsk schools will be able to turn to this e-network by late 2015. As the Minister of Education, Sergey Maskevich, believes, the project shall then embrace Belarusian districts.

tual experiments are possible — i.e. demonstrating how lithium colours a gas-burner flame into violet. It’s a great fun which is, importantly, useful. Actually, this is truly convenient if a school lacks a well equipped laboratory or some rare chemical agents.” The new equipment makes it possible to conduct a test in a couple of minutes. To do this, pupils take a remote with six buttons. While answering a

question (which they see on a board), children need to press the correct button — which greatly resembles a TV quiz. A teacher, in turn, sees test results on their notebook screen.

Homework in blogs Twenty five notebooks create the local ‘mobile class’. They are kept in an original wheeled trolley, with WiFi connection. When not used, the notebooks are charged and, if necessary, could be moved from one classroom to another. They are distributed among pupils who are proposed to make exercises from their teacher’s Internet blog. As the Deputy Director, Marina Atsetskaya, admits, some teachers are widely using Internet for educational purposes. “Many educational portals exist where teachers can find materials for their classes: diagrams, posters, cartoons and videoclips. They could either compile their own teaching methods. Moreover, the new e-system could be used for the school paperwork and schedule arrangement.” The schedule appears on a large sensor screen, at the gymnasium hall. Parents — who have access to an individual login and keyword — can learn everything of their children’s progress. This is a kind of an e-diary. Director Natalia Kokhova notes that the screen could be also used for the gymnasium’s own TV news. “The English equipment was installed by Russians in late May of 2014. Our teachers were taught how to manage it. However, I think we’d need to send them for an internship to Minsk Lyceum of the Belarusian State University which is applying the Virtual School for a long time. The information-educational environment is truly in demand but it requires mastery of its use. Importantly, this should be done in a way when teachers learn pupils do with gadgets — rather than vice versa.”

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In recent times, information technologies have much advanced, easing teachers’ job. Moreover, they can demonstrate modern pupils and their parents that Internet opportunities stretch farther than e-games or social network connections; successful knowledge mastering is possible. Orsha gymnasium is getting convinced in the latter since September 1st. At the moment, 420 children attend its 5th-11th grades; these school-children already plan to further develop and improve the new Virtual School project. As Ms. Kokhova notes, an e-checkpoint is supposed to open soon at the gymnasium; to implement the idea, additional funds are needed. However, everything is now ready for pupils to take part in virtual Republican (or even international) Olympiads — worthily rivalling their peers from the capital.

Deputy Director Marina Atsetskaya is showing the capacities of the sensor blackboard

By Sergey Golesnik

 It is nice to read together We agree that there is nothing more pleasant for parents and teachers, than to see how, during the holidays, a child enthusiastically reads classical literature. But today, when a book has such powerful competition from the Internet and compute games, it is necessary to fight for young readers.

he project — Summer with a Good Book — is designed to interest children in reading. It started with the action which took place on the International Day of Chil-

dren’s Protection in the capital’s Gorky Park. Since then, in libraries and bookshops, children’s recreation camps and parks there were so much remarkable book holidays! Including one devoted to the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Belarus — a meeting with writers and veterans, the book exhibitions Unconquered Belarus and Messenger between Past and Future commemorating the 90th anniversary of Vasil Bykov. The whole writing, publishing group of visitors came to the Minsk city educational-recreation centre Leader, in order to talk about the best books about war. Veteran Vladimir Golovyuk, who was present at the meeting, admitted that he kindly envies today’s pupils, “They have so many possibilities for studies and the reception of an all-round education!” In each region, in each district, people thought up something unique. The capital li-

brary (named after F. Bogushevich) held a competition of children’s drawing called Rules of Safe and Cultural Behaviour of Children on the Road based on the book Alphabet of Young Passenger. Mogilev bookshops held a competition of children’s drawing At Leisure Time in Summer Day We Pick up a Book! Svetlogorsk residents discuss the books which impressed them at the Summer Club of Reading. During the action I Will Give a Book into Good Hands!, participants of student team movements exchanged their favourite volumes, and the project Family. Read Together with Parents! was entrusted to pioneers. After all, it is more enjoyable to follow the destiny of literary heroes together with the family! “Before us there is a task to ensure that kind and good books come to each school and in each recreation camp,” noted the Minister of Information, Lilia Ananich at one of presentations. 2014 беларусь.belarus

 Treated according to the merits

 In Russian school — Belarusian classes

For the first time, a teacher becomes an honorary citizen of Brest

he honorary rank was given to the honoured teacher of the republic, the headmistress of lyceum #1 named after A.S. Pushkin, Svetlana Semenova for her long-term, honest work in the educational system, her high professionalism, big personal contribution to education and upbringing of rising generation and her active participation in public life of the city. Directly on stage, to the applause of participants of conference, the Chairman of the City Council, Nikolay Krasovsky, pinned the blue ribbon, with an inscription ‘Honorary Citizen of Brest’, on the Director of the lyceum. In the history of the city, just 26 people have received such rank. “Among them there are war heroes, defenders of the Brest Fortress, Olympic champions and outstanding builders. But teachers have never been among them,” the Head of Administration of Brest’s Moskovsky District, Alexander Rogachuk said. “Semenova is a brand of pedagogics of our city.”

 You should only learn!

Since autumn, a Belarusian-speaking class began at the Russian school of Zürich

Having thanked for everyone for their high estimation of her work, Svetlana Semenova noted that the reception of high rank is a tribute to representatives of her trade. “I am glad not to that in the list of honorary citizens there is the surname of Semenova, but that opposite to this surname there is profession of a teacher. I am glad for all of us. This rank should be divided today between hundreds of simple teachers entering the classroom every day and bearing the responsibility for each child entrusted to us. It should be given to the big corps of my colleagues — directors who bear personal responsibility for the realisation of the state educational policy,” the honorary teacher said.

ot only children, but also adults living in Switzerland, can study here. Ales Sapega, the President of the Association of Belarusians in Switzerland, explained the details, “The offer of the creation of Belarusian classes was made by the Director of the Russian School — Children’s Town — which is in Zürich. This year, Belarusians helped with the organisation and the carrying out of the Day of Slavic Written Language. After that, the Director of the Russian School asked: ‘Why do not you run Belarusian-speaking classes?’ At that time it was very difficult; there were neither teachers, nor pupils. And the director offered to run this class within the Russian-speaking school.

analogue number). The colleges and 9 cadet colleges. According number of eleven-form to preliminary data, the number of instischool-children will tutions of general secondary education be 54,900 (2013-2014 with number of pupils to 25 people will first-form schoolMore than 930,000 be 90 (2013-2014 academic year — 166). children in Belarus — 55,100 people). pupils will sit down at In the Ministry of Optimisation, conducted up to the beginin 2014 school desks in Belarus in Education, they have added ning of the academic year, has resulted in the new academic year that on September, 1st, four the closure of 87 ungraded schools, whilst he common number of punew schools will be opened. On the 143 schools have been reorganised. pils will grow in comparison with whole 3,078 institutions of general secIt’s also expected that 10 new inthe 2013-2014 academic year, when ondary education will open their stitutions of preschool educathere were slightly over 915,000 pupils. doors (2013-2014 academic tion will begin work, and There are on the whole there are As to first-form school-children, this year — 3,175), including 147 more than 4,000 kinderyear there will be about 104,000 pupils primary schools, 399 basic gartens in Belarus, with (in the last academic year, there were schools, 2,275 secondary institutions of general 99,553), and there will be 89,000 nine- schools, 216 gymnasiums, secondary education more of them working during the summer. form school-children (2013-2014 — 27 lyceums, 5 gymnasiumin the country

104,000

3,078

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The best welders worldwide At Novopolotsk Neftezavodmontazh enterprise, highly qualified workers are trained in the company’s in-house facility

owadays, the attitude towards trades is rapidly changing. We shall take, for example, the electric welder. Ten years ago, his appearance was associated with a man in oiled overalls, who hides his face behind a metal mask. He had, as a rule, a lot of dirty work that was done by hand. However, a welder at Novopolotsk enterprise Neftezavodmash, Andrey Kozlovsky, doesn’t fit this description. He is young and handsome in his new, clean overalls. With his modern equipment contained in what looks like a manager’s case. Probably, a welder, who is the best welder worldwide, should look just so. Kozlovsky won the world contest of professional skills in the national team of Belarus in Beijing. Andrey confesses that his many skills, which he demonstrated in China, he received in the training department of his native enterprise, whose main activity is the assembly of technological equipment at Novopolotsk Naftan Oil Refinery.

Most importantly — practice Kozlovsky was not yet 20 when he came to Neftezavodmontazh. Over the last 11 years, he has learned a lot. He began, as all newcomers do, at the training station of the enterprise — with cabins, equipped outdoors. There, they could practice with various scrap pieces of iron. If you damaged something, it wasn’t important. Then after time, Andrey learned to weld so perfectly that he was involved in the assembly of one of the most unique instalments of Naftan — the AVT-6. At the bottom, it’s a metal vessel, 40 metres in height, where various chemical processes occur under pressure. Kozlovsky remembers that he had to work in the highest part of the instalment, “They were extreme conditions! You had to shimmy down through a halfmetre diameter hatch with all your equipment and you had to weld perfectly, without any defects.” It’s no surprise that, after such a practical preparation Andrey has taken the 4th and the 6th places in the individual event

in world contests of professional skills in Odessa and Beijing. “A contest begins with fifty theoretical questions. Then the practical part starts, during which you have to weld two metal pipes and two spools. The main thing is quality, although any contest seems to be an easy and pleasant walk to me, after every-day work under extreme conditions.” In these latter days, they reduce the use of hand work at Neftezavodmontazh. For example, welders assemble huge tanks with volumes of 50,000 cubic metres from metal sheets with the help of automatic American apparatus. The welders sit in two chairs that go along the welding seam inside and outside of the vast tanks. They weld one and the same seam from both sides at once. When the chairs move, they choreograph their actions by walkie-talkie, so as to not burn each other. In Belarus there are 2-3 such instruments and they are in high demand. Novopolotsk welders, together with the equipment, are invited to perform difficult jobs at the other Belarusian oil refinery in Mozyr. Recently, they have worked also at an oil refinery in the Leningrad Region of Russia.

Science on guard of quality A high-class specialist can define if a welded seam is well done, with their naked eye. But as welders of Neftezavodmontazh work at enterprises of the petrochemical complex, just visual proof of the quality of their work is not enough. Steelworks, pipelines and capacities of various diameters, which are assembled and installed by the welders, work under huge pressure and they often contain poisons or explosives. On the one hand, to guarantee the quality and take responsibility for the done work, a welder puts a personal stamp near his seam. So they can always say, who, where and what has founded. On the other hand, the laboratory of Neftezavodmontazh follows the quality of the work of the welders to avoid accidents. The production engineer, Lyubov Tankovid, who works there, explained that, as it happens, not any type of steel can be welded with another: “If a welder has taken the wrong steel or the wrong electrode, everything will fall apart! 2014 беларусь.belarus

To avoid it, a device for determining of the grade of steel is used, along with a ‘steeloscope’. It’s a small device, which looks like a gun. You press the trigger and see, how much molybdenum, nickel, iron, manganese, chromium, and titanium the specimen contains.” There is the whole science of physical metallurgy. To be familiar with the last scientific trends, Neftezavodmontazh co-operates with physicists and chemists of Polotsk State University, the Belarusian National Technological University. But the main thing is practice. They cut out a part of a weld to define the quality of it in practice. Then they bring the part to the laboratory, where they study it under a microscope, place it in ultrasonic waves and examine it with X-rays and gamma rays. If it has inside defects, cavities or splits, according to the words of the Head of the Welding Laboratory, Viktor Strinadko, they won’t escape the sharp eyes of his wards, “Currently, a plant on coke making is being constructed at Naftan. The project has been designed by Spanish engineers. They control the quality. Recently, together with the Spaniards, we have checked welds, conducted by our welders. We have performed their mechanical testing: with the help of special units we have broken, bent and cut the welding seams. We have even frozen them in a special freezer. The testing has been successful and no defects have been discovered.” The welding laboratory of Neftezavodmontazh has a special accreditation, which allows it to perform testing for foreign enterprises. Partners from Russia and Ukraine have used it more than once.

Professionalism — self-perfection Neftezavodmontazh appeared in 1959. It was created for the construction of Naftan, and the best specialists from the whole of the Soviet Union were invited. Its workers and engineers built plants and factories in the Perm, Norilsk, Grodno, Mordovia and Kemerovo Regions. They have worked in Cuba, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Algeria. And how does Neftezavodmontazh prepare personnel today? Can they really train up a high-class welder from the man in the street? I addressed these Welder of Novopolotsk Neftezavodmontazh enterprise Andrey Kozlovsky

беларусь.belarus 2014

questions to Alexander Yalovik, the Director General of Neftezavodmontazh OJSC. “Certainly, we hire young guys from Novopolotsk lyceum of builders. But, probably, it’s easier for us to prepare personnel in our own training point. Even if a man without any specialty comes to us, we employ him as a shift man. And we recommend that he prepare in his own time. In 2-3 months he sits a qualification exam. If he makes it successfully — he gets one of 35 trades. The most popular of them are a rigger, a welder, a cutter, a metalworker on assembling of steel constructions, and a metalworker on assembling of pipelines. And then everything depends on his wish to perfect himself. You can pass retraining and get a related profession all from his training station.” Getting in a team of professionals, just as half a century ago, requires young guys who aspire to advance their skills. Otherwise, tomorrow other people will come to take their place — those, who do their work better. A positive image, gained over the decades, is important and Neftezavodmontazh doesn’t want to lose it. Currently, the enterprise, with 1,300 people working at it, is modernising Naftan — one of the biggest oil refineries in Europe. It is using the newest building technologies and units and has sent its specialists to study in Germany. Today, the Novopolotsk’s welders and other specialists are working not only in Belarus. They are working in Russian cities like Tuapse, Nizhny Novgorod and Novokuibyshevsk. By intergovernmental agreements, they are constructing a mining and processing works in the Turkmen Garlyk settlement. Perhaps, they will also participate in the construction of a big ‘South Stream’ gas pipeline, which will connect Russia with Western Europe and go on into the territory of Bulgaria, Serbia, Hu n g a r y, Slovenia, and Italy. By Sergey Golesnik

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Career here and now

or two months already, they have been working at KvartsMelProm, not far from the village of Khotislav in the Malorita District. The guys have come here as a result of distribution, but actually, they personally chose the exact location. Gennady and Mikhail admit now that they’ve found here everything that a young engineer could dream of. “Our job is not at all tiresome; it’s really interesting. There’s an impression that we are a part of the Discovery TV channel,” the guys explain, while taking me to the plant’s workshops. Modern machinery produces blocks and bricks, and the company resembles a space station, with sparkling lamps and blinking screens. Arriving here, anyone would believe they are taking part in shooting of a scientific TV show. Around six months ago, the young men got acquainted with the plant — visiting it as interns. Gennady explains that their employment depended on pre-diploma practice. Accordingly, they

After-graduation distribution has definitely its pros and cons — as viewed by young specialists, Gennady Vashchuk and Mikhail Samoilyuk, who’ve moved from their native comfortable Brest to the hinterland.

needed to deliberately choose the place of their future workplace and internship. The young man spent much time searching for a proper company to be employed with — studying their pros and cons. One day, he got acquainted with the factory’s present director. As a result, he changed his mind about moving to his previously chosen company in Brest, preferring the Malorita District’s Khotislav. The two months of pre-diploma internship passed by quickly but the company Heads had no doubts in employing the guys: the results of their work confirmed that they were a worthy choice. As a result, on August 1st, KvartsMelProm ‘received’ the two young electronic engineers. The alumni of Brest Technical University admit that it might seem strange from the first sight when young men move to a village for at least two years; however, they immediately add that such thoughts are only natural for those who’ve never worked at a production facility. Not every company — in distinction from KvartsMelProm — enjoys modern equipment. Here, the most advanced German equipment (with Japanese electronics) is installed. Really, it seems unreasonable to substitute such an opportunity for a job in Brest, where 1990s production lines are still operational. 2014 беларусь.belarus

Belta

On coming into the workshop, Gennady switches on his laptop; he’s just finished a program for a controller. All bugs are fixed and the program is ready to be uploaded. The laptop is connected to the equipment and the data is renewed. From now on, no problems are possible. Meanwhile, Mikhail admits that some might view their work as mechanical and routine. However, programming industrial controllers is a truly artistic process. As the young man notes, people express themselves differently. Some turn to painting or music, while programmers feel satisfied seeing that everything operates smoothly. Importantly, the results of the guys’ efforts could be assessed immediately at the plant (after the program is uploaded). Gennady and Mikhail agree that this proximity to modern technology and the possibility to enjoy immediate results and develop further have become the major attractions for them. The young men live in a plant hostel. Each morning, a service bus takes them to the workplace and brings them back in the evening. The guys share a spacious onebed flat, with a kitchen and a bathroom. Mikhail and Gennady admit that they’ve left Brest to get used to an independent life, which they enjoy greatly. They don’t believe that urban life is more joyful: the local clubs gather no fewer youngsters than a Brest club. Moreover, the village has around a dozen shops, and a sports centre (with a gym and a swimming pool) is situated in Malorita, just 10km away. In a word, everything is close at hand. Meanwhile, the guys joke that, so far, the flat repair and decoration is their major “entertainment’; they wish to make it their true home. The money they received for coming to the village is really helpful. Gennady and Mikhail’s career is yet to develop but the guys are already happy. They have a very healthy ambition and believe that any plans are an optimistic look into the future.

It’s vital not to miss anything Belarusian education system to be seriously analysed

he Head of State gave an instruction to prepare a special session to discuss in detail the key issues of the education field, analyse its current state and to determine a development strategy for the nearest future. “We’ll scrutinise the education system very seriously. We’ve done it with the agricultural sector, construction, housing and public utilities industry. It’s necessary to look into the education system, taking into consideration our experience: what we achieved and what we failed, what has to be done and improved,” noted the President, while accepting with the report, the Minister of Education, Sergey Maskevich, and the First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration, Alexander Radkov. Meanwhile, Mr. Lukashenko emphasised that Belarus has a normal system of education. It only needs improvement, and not drastic reform. “We do not need more reforms. Nevertheless, life goes on, new processes and trends emerge, and the education system cannot stand still. In one way or

another, it has to be improved,” said the Head of State. Mr. Lukashenko wanted to know about the results of this year’s enrolment campaign in Belarus and the analysis of the application of centralised testing. The Head of State instructed the study of this issue once again, especially to analyse testing materials, their relevance and quality. Another issue on the agenda was the preparation of educational establishments for the new academic year. Mr. Maskevich told the President about the fulfilment of instructions concerning the development of the education sector. In particular, specialists prepared amendments to the Education Code after monitoring of the application of this legal framework. These changes will be submitted for public consideration within a year. According to the minister, it’s also essential to optimise secondary education facilities in connection with the development of the demographic situation. On the one hand, the number of school pupils is increasing. On the other hand, it’s partially caused by migration processes and a reduction in the number of pupils in rural schools. The ministry has stepped up efforts to resolve personnel issues in pre-school education facilities, something especially important for Minsk and regional centres.

By Artem Kiryanov

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Our acquaintance with Avgust Voitekhovich is one of our most valuable acquisitions during ‘Walking into a Faraway Kingdom’, a travel which we made in April-August of 1996. It was a 120-day pedestrian journey around Belarus along the State border, covering 2,810 kilometres. Our big trip began at the Druya settlement near Dvina, and passed through the village of Slobodka in the Braslav District. The very first overnight stay in the cold April night was in a boarding school, with the permission of Avgust Voitekhovich. He waited for us. Before the trip, we had published in the ‘Teacher’s Newspaper’ the text of our plans and then saw that material on the desktop of the teacher. Avgust Pavlovich worked as a teacher in the boarding school where we stayed.

n the morning, we learnt that he is the author of a unique code of teaching ethics. Our interlocutor, who is a modest person, told us about this by accident. The teacher showed us a local attraction — a bed with huge juniper bushes between the Potekh and Nedrovo lakes, acquainted with masters of straw-plaiting and he told about his and local life and work on the Code. We recollected these meetings on TV and at radio studios, in conversations with colleagues and acquaintances. And during our recent meeting with Avgust Pavlovich, he said, with a smile, that we promoted him so much that he became a popular person and had become acquainted with new and interesting people. His short stories were published in the Respublika newspaper and essayist Leonid Yekel wrote about him. And now has come the time for us to get to know him and his educational experience better. We talked in the same boarding school in Slobodka, where we had stayed 18 years earlier. In the former class where, in the early 50s, Avgust moved from

Ikazan school to Slobodka and went to study in the 7th form, it was a rural school. “Here stood my school desk, where I stared more at a local beautiful girl than at the blackboard: it is possible to say, that she was my first love...,” he recollects. It happened that he managed to privatise that sacred for him place, to make a repair, to adapt as his habitation. And now, his friends and acquaintances coming to rest by the lake and fish in Slobodka resort have a place where they can stay. While Avgust Pavlovich, inveterate fisherman, does not now work in the education system, he still remains a teacher for all. He treats people and naturists, such philosophers — with lucid mind, who always have the own view and opinion, with great respect. It is possible to say that such teachers are like common people: so willingly share with fellow villagers, their knowledge and supervisions. Avgust Pavlovich began the conversation by reading a small episode about his grandfather Ignat and his capacious, figurative, with national humour description-definitions of some life situations. However, to say the truth, not everyone liked those pearls of wisdom in rural ‘wrappers’. However, the author

Teacher from 28

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is sure: the main thing is that knowledge and wisdom were transferred from generation to generation. After all, as it is known, children and adults receive the major knowledge needed for life in society outside of school lessons. Inside the walls of the ‘class of the first love’ we made a small discovery: this year Avgust Pavlovich will have an anniversary. Seventy years ago, Belarus was liberated from fascist aggressors, and in the same year, 1944, on September 1st, Avgust, who was born in 1936, crossed the school threshold in the village Ikazan of the Braslav District for the first time. Our vis-à-vis with a school, let it be in different statuses, turns 70 years... Avgust Pavlovich, how do you think? Maybe, your childhood desires about harmonious relations with teachers became the outlines of the future Code of Pedagogical Ethics? Or did it start only when you became a teacher? Pupils everywhere have always had a critical attitude towards teachers. And I was among such pupils. We were able to estimate and compare each teacher, while a teacher during one day has before their eyes dozens or hundreds pupils. In past days, Slobodka secondary school,

though it was constructed in post-war years as a typical school for only 8 years of education, had over 500 pupils at that time. While in Ikazan there were 4-5 teachers, and we had the possibility of examining and estimating them better than they could estimate us. To understand what person is before you and how to communicate with this person. Certainly, each pupil has an opinion what a teacher should be. And probably those ‘expectations’ about the ideal teacher affected the Code of ethics. Well, it is impossible to do without ideals! Feelings and thoughts from the past enriched with one’s own teacher’s experience and the ideas of other teachers. I remember, when I was a pupil, I critically estimated the teaching methods of my teachers and tried to find, as it seemed to me, the best way to attract the sympathy and attention of pupils explaining how to deliver knowledge better. ‘I would do it differently here’ — I had even such thoughts. Were your teachers local? No, basically from Eastern Belarus. Probably they were sent to make us ‘Soviet children’. I was born near Poland, and the territory of the region was Polish till 1939. After the war, here were anti-Soviet

moods — after all, there was a war of various ideologies — as in Western Ukraine... After the war, in our Ikazan, some young guys decided to join the ‘forest brothers’. Though if you think about it, what did they hope for? Soviet power broke the spine of fascist Germany, but these guys were going to struggle against the Soviet power with rifles and running in the woods.... Were your parents literate? Yes. My father, Dvoretsky Pavel Vasilevich, was a lawyer. He had own firm in Ikazan: in Polish it was called ‘Privatna Bureau podan’. He helped villagers to file addresses, applications into various instances. Here, by the way, the willow armchair is one hundred years old — from his bureau (shows in the room). And that bureau, with accent on the first syllable is located in our house. As marriage of my father with my mum was not registered officially, I was, at first Dvoretsky, and then from 7th form, having received a birth certificate, I became Voitekhovich, after my mother. And as it happened, adult life also has two sides. At first I was an officer, and then, having transferred to the reserve, I received a second higher education and became a teacher.

Slobodka village беларусь.belarus 2014

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in it, the teacher — the main character. All the rest, without exception are maintenance staff, in the positive sense of the word. Let them create conditions for fruitful work, the normal activity of a teacher and a pupil. A teacher, I am sure, should not paint the floor in a classroom, preparing the school for the next academic year by hanging wall-paper. While in our country teachers do that. When free, a teacher should devote their time to self-education. Every day — selfimprovement. Only then they will be a

especially at the beginning. The headmaster and the director of studies, as well as some teachers had the first category. Next day I wrote an application: I ask you to allow me to go to the Institute of improvement of teachers in order to receive the highest category. They gave me permission. It was necessary to pass a proficiency examination, to introduce the author’s programme, to be tested for the novelty of pedagogical thinking, to conduct a lesson or educational activity in an unfamiliar class... a whole chain

Ivan Zhdanovich

Did you at once arrive to work in Slobodka? After the Institute, I taught in my native Ikazan school, then I moved here in 1970. Have you started a farm of your own? Of course not! I remember, how earlier journalists ecstatically wrote ‘a rural teacher has a cow and pigs...’ But it is already not a teacher but the worker of farmland. Those from the village know how much time and effort a farm needs. At that time when I was a teacher, I even did not have a cat. I constantly worked over myself. I read novelties, searched for something, I was ready to go somewhere and listen to lectures, or good transmission on radio or on the TV. I also wrote. I subscribed to magazines and newspapers. I knew that it was impossible to stop for one minute. In general, the educational system is a building which will never be completed. Public relations change, science and techniques develop, while human nature practically has not changed for centuries. Therefore, different contradictions arise. And the system is all the time in flux, and a teacher should always be well informed, and not just in education. In connection with changes in society, what’s your opinion? Do we need reforms in the education system? Without being afraid to seem conservative, I will tell that I am against reforms. But if it were my decision, I would change one thing: I would change the functions of elements of the whole system. As it is known, its elements are the following: the ministry, region, city and district administrations and departments of education. At the bottom is the school administration, the teacher and the pupil. In a broad sense pupils are students, post-graduate students, all whom we teach. As we see, it is a copy of the state system of administration, a line of command, while I suggest we reverse everything in the educational system. A pupil should become the central figure

Even in fishing Avgust Voitekhovich has many demands on time

real teacher. For our colleagues, the main thing should be ‘do not cease to study!’ — Leo Tolstoy’s words. From where comes your aspiration to study? From nature probably; an internal impulse. Well, the majority of people have it, if they are not burdened with other interests and cares. If we do not need to improve ourselves we would probably still be living in the Stone Age. I remember, when categories for teachers were introduced at schools in the early 90s, I received the 2nd category. By the way, the salary depended on it,

of tests, and I successfully passed all of them. I had already had publications in newspapers on pedagogical themes and the Code was published in 1989 or 1990, so I received the highest category. Unfortunately, some of my colleagues considered my act as immodest and it was very difficult to work in such a collective. When I turned 60, it was necessary to leave my favourite work. In August of 1999 I handed over my duties, having worked for 20 years as a teacher of the boarding school. Well, teachers are also people, with their own family ‘types’. 2014 беларусь.belarus

Yes, and my wife asked me ‘Well why do you need that highest category? In general, I am a philosopher in life and if to think it over — I do not drink, I do not smoke, I lead a healthy way of life — a good example for pupils, agree. Earlier I did not fall ill, so substitutes, as sometimes happens, were not needed. While at the boarding school I did everything by my hands. It is a pity that because of the ‘human factor’ I had not completely given myself to school, although I had enough forces.

created the Code, the colleague asked for forgiveness. I replied that it is good that it was beneficial to someone. Then Kabush came to Braslav, conducted a seminar in a gymnasium, offered for me to write an article for the magazine about the education of children in a boarding school, and it was published. I learnt that one authoritative scientist at the Institute of improvement of teachers told about the Code of Pedagogical Ethics: ‘it is like an icon for us’. It was pleasant to hear that. And I also read lectures in that institute.

Nature in Slobodka environment is also a good teacher

Tell me, where did you first publish the Code of Pedagogical Ethics? In the ‘Teacher’s Newspaper’. And I would say, that it did not gain special attention, but I did not put in efforts to popularise it. However, I took on-site and off-site courses on school psychologists in Minsk, where Vladimir Kabush, the well-known teacher in Belarus read us lectures. Then, in his book ‘School: Time of Changes’ we saw the Code. But the author, giving it as an example, praises a school of the Brest Region where he saw the Code on one of walls in a teacher’s room. When it was found out that I беларусь.belarus 2014

Have anybody from your pupils become a teacher? “Many; after all, hundreds of people are my school-leavers. Liza Shakel, Nina Levsha, Ira Daletskaya, Valya Bushmak, Iosif Pashenka graduated from the Linguistic University... There are also bookkeepers, economists, engineers, military men... Guys work here as tractor operators, drivers. When we meet they ask me how is fishing, how is my health? Although nobody writes me letters; with appearance of the Internet the epistolary genre has disappeared. I better knew those who lived in the boarding school. By

the way, although I was a teacher, I also did different work: as a bookkeeper, as a linen keeper, and I also ordered products... Children were from those villages, homesteads, where it was difficult to reach, or simply from close villages, from disadvantaged families. At our establishment, they were well-groomed, fed and they slept in clean beds. We had over 40 people at the boarding school, now, there are less than 10, while the school itself has over one hundred pupils. Perhaps in a village the situation is different, while in a city, as people say, there are pupils for whom teachers cry. Why it is so? The reasons are different. In the Code there is such a line: ‘never offend, do not humiliate a pupil, and then a pupil will never offend and humiliate you’. It is necessary to analyse thoughtfully such situations, to search for a way out. It is possible to address Konstantin Ushinsky’s opinion who, in the book ‘Pedagogical Anthropology’, wrote that pedagogics is a practical psychology. He explained ‘We do not say to teachers — do this or that way — but we say to them — study the laws of those mental phenomena with which you want to operate, and act in harmony with these laws and those circumstances in which you want to apply such laws’. Then the author pays attention that ‘not only circumstances are infinitely different, but also the natures of pupils are not similar’. So there cannot be any general educational recipes, because it is doubtful whether there exists one pedagogical measure in which it is impossible to find harmful and useful sides and which could give in one case a useful result, harmful in the second, whilst in the third — nothing at all. And still I will add that, in psychology there is a concept ‘reference’. It is about how one person is important for another person, in this case, the importance of a teacher for a child. If a pupil sees care from the side of a teacher, a kind and humane attitude, then the pupil will never make harm for you. Un-

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less, excuse me, a pupil is a degenerate. My recommendation to colleagues is to learn your pupils. In general, I consider that in pedagogical institutes of higher education, it is necessary to accept entrants only by the results of a vocational aptitude test and then there will not be conflicts between teachers and pupils. Today a teacher is one of the mass professions, but it is not so prestigious. But teachers are the ones who build the future of society, imparting knowledge to pupils. And all of us should care about school. And how is it possible for those, who do not like their work, to care? Such people suffer and crush the souls of children. Once I heard from a teacher in the morning: ‘I go to school and it is like being in prison’, while I went, as I mentioned before, as if going on holiday. So you can understand why some teachers and children cry at school — they do not want to go there. It means that you stand for kindness and humanism towards pupils. However, do you agree that sometimes both children and adults can perceive kindness as weakness or spinelessness? If someone’s kindness does not cause an equal, respectful attitude, then probably it is insincere and ostentatious. After all, children feel pretence and real attitudes towards them. They are very excellent judges of character! While adults coarsen in terms of feelings, and lose that important quality or skill — to intuitively feel truth and lies. In due course, we also lose the ability to figuratively imagine about what we read. I remember, in my childhood I read a fragment from a novel of Eduard Samuilenok ‘Future’ and I imagined, how the character Iliko stabbed carps. How he, with his friend, stood on a hummock with the fish in the river... I read and as I ‘saw’ all these things. Such perception is lost with age. While the children’s state of mind is not loaded, not damaged and is very receptive. Therefore, by the way, it is very easy to hurt them, even by sight, movement,

tone of voice or without speaking a word. Have you noticed the precise nicknames that children give to people! Once, a tall and thin teacher came to us — they called him ‘Rod’. A new pupil with white skin and white hair came to a class — ‘Sour Cream’. Such exact nicknames...” How do you think? Is it possible to foster kindness in children? You said about children who can bend their rage against the whole world, and it happens that, in a class, there are several such ‘children’, and they drive a teacher crazy. Here is how one Persian wise man and poet, Jami, reasons about similar extreme situations — ‘When you get into a snake hole then clemency and compassion are bad signs here. Do not wait for the hissing of snake and do not trust in its tears. Immediately kill the reptile, otherwise you will die.’. Fortunately, in my practice I did not have such serious conflicts with children. As for fostering kindness; I read an American psychologist Bandura that nobody fosters nobody, children take from adults everything that they need. And here is an example from our places. My sister lives in Miory and once she asked her neighbour whose children were good: how do you foster them? They replied ‘in no way.’ Children take the ‘example of behaviour’ from parents, brothers, sisters, from books, magazines and films. What you’ve co-opted, such a person you’ve become and it will be seen. We do not know, how our belief and needs are formed, while it is the basis of acts. Now scientists assert that environment influence is distributed in such a way. The first place — family: whatever it may be. Then — peer and, friends: they are important for children, children are imitators. In third place is mass-media, including the Internet. School is in fourth place, and one can speak about school fostering with great reserve. Such conclusions are not new for me. Once in the ‘Teacher’s Newspaper’ I read a report on a trip of

a delegation of the Ministry of Education of the USSR to Japan. They looked around, and then ask a question, ‘How do you organise school fostering?’ The Japanese did not understand the question. They replied that school should teach, instead of fostering, that is the responsibility of the family. The Japanese teach their children to play musical instruments and to draw. Versatile development, children learn how to create beauty, to live beautifully. The sensation of beauty and aspiration to it is a strong base of personality. In general, children know much, apart from what they receive at school. The philosopher and scientist Paracelsus told about ‘pre-experience’, the experience of ‘pre-birth’. Do you believe in it? People also say that an ‘old soul’ comes into the world, with already a big experience, and it happens that a young soul comes, which needs to learn something, to learn the hard way. While an inclination to music, even if there are no musicians in a family or to drawing may become that experience since childhood. I have an interesting book ‘Ensemble of Universal Worlds’, it is about the thin bodies of a person. It appears, that we have an intuitive body which ‘manages’ art and, if it is developed from birth, then we have chance that a child will be a musician, an artist, or poet. Did you have such cases when strong physicists or mathematicians were born in simple families? Certainly! And such cases often happen in Slobodka and its vicinities. Parents are poorly educated while their children get on in the world. So I believe that we come into this world already having previous experience, potentialities, with God’s gift. Avgust Pavlovich, are you already writing your ‘pedagogical poem’? I am writing, thinking over directions and sections of a future book about bases of psycho-pedagogics. Because of mod2014 беларусь.belarus

esty, I did not speak at conferences before, but now I want to share my experience with people, to give people something. Say, I stand for when starting from 5th form, when subject education begins and different teachers come to a class, that the class register should contain a small psychological portrait of each pupil consisting from 10-15 points. It is necessary to specify there the type of nervous system: weak or strong, whether it is inert or mobile. The left or right brain works more actively. Then any teacher can look at the information and to learn something about each child. It is very important. I remember, once when I was in a corridor I heard from a classroom, ‘Well, how long you will stand here like a blockhead?’ A pupil was near the blackboard, and had a lapse of memory and no words. While the most important thing, he knew the material, his mother before a lesson checked his knowledge, but the boy had a weak nervous system, and when a teacher raised their voice and humiliated him, the boy was confused. How many conflicts and even tragedies happen because of that? Moreover I stand for greater activity of the right brain. As we know, pupils experience overdevelopment of the left brain which is responsible for logical thinking. While figurative, if the emotional sphere is underdeveloped problems can arise with emotional deafness. It would be desirable to develop the ideas of different teachers, including the well-known Amonashvili, about the necessity of the most different relations at a lesson. And my Code basically oriented towards that. I was creating the Code over two years. And now I have an idea to develop a special course on it, in order to support the theses by the opinions of different people, and examples from my own practice. All principles in the Code are alive, not invented and it is necessary to bring it to schools.

My code For a long time I, like many of my other colleagues, lived in line with the rules for pupils. Occasionally, they renewed and changed. Meanwhile, I’ve never come across rules for teachers. So, I decided to invent for my own Code of educational ethics for myself — it took me almost two years. This code helped me many times to come out of difficult situations with dignity. I hope that it will help many other teachers, especially new ones to revise their attitude with pupils. This is my code of educational ethics: 1. To enter the classroom with a smile: this is an overture of a joyful lesson. 2. First teach — then ask. 3. Be fair in assessing the knowledge and behavior of pupils. 4. Keep your word strong before children. 5. Protect pupils from every kind of strong headedness. 6. Be sure to keep children’s secrets. 7. Be self-restrained and patient. Don’t ever descend to the insulting and humiliating of pupils and they won’t ever insult and humiliate you. 8. Be an example in everything: in work, clothes and behavior. 9. Don’t ever demand from your pupils what you won’t do yourself. 10. Be able to put yourself in the pupil’s place in any situation. 11. Remember: you’ll be able to understand pupils only when you love them. 12. Don’t stop studying — not even for a second. Be thoughtful and you’ll be able to learn much from your colleagues and your pupils. 13. Don’t ever complain about your pupils. Remember: a good teacher can be displeased only with themselves. 14. Don’t ever compare pupils: this develops envy and anger among some and courtliness and hypocrisy among others. 15. Trust your pupils. Refuse from trifling tutorship towards them. 16. Be benevolent towards those who accidentally stub. 17. If you’re not right — ask pupils to accept your apology. 18. Find something good in even the most neglectful pupil. Try to raise their esteem in their own eyes and they will meet your expectations. 19. Live in the interests of children and you’ll understand that the joy of close relations with children is one of the greatest joys on the Earth. 20. Go to school as if for a holiday. Otherwise, there’s nothing to do there for you. Avgust Voitekhovich, former teacher of Slobodka school in the Braslav District

Interviewed by Ivan and Valentina Zhdanovich Slobodka village, the Braslav District

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Old embroidered patterns are renewed in Glubokoe Art School

Not new, but eternal

Pupils are taught ancient handicrafts in the Brest Region’s districts

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schools and 489 preschool institutions of the Brest Region opened their doors in the new school year. Almost 156,000 pupils have come to study there. However, today’s pupils study not only physics and chemistry. After lessons, during the weekend boys and girls will go to musical schools, eco-educational institutions, sports circles and clubs. Much was done in the Brest Region in order to revive national handicrafts — pottery, woodcarving, cooperage, weaving and others. Therefore, centres of handicrafts are ready to receive children of different ages. Art workers are initiators of that. Reviving Belarusian traditions in handicrafts, the masters impart their skills to the children.

For example, Bereza Centre of Handicrafts revived a craft which was popular earlier — making chip bird-amulets. Young master, Alexander Lavrinovich, studied under well-known woodcarver, Nikolay Galaburda, from Sudilovichi village. Once, such a bird rescued young Nikolay in Germany. The Nazis drove away the guy as a captive for compulsory labour. In his spare time he made amulets and exchanged them for bread. Our ancestors ascribed a miracle force to the wooden bird, called it a custodian of children, a symbol of family happiness. However, the amulet should not be stored at home for long. The Director of Bereza Centre of Handicrafts, Natalia Kovalevich explained why. “Made of aspen or linden log, the amulet

was hung up over a table, a cot, and after Christmas it was burnt in the stove or in fire on Kupalie night. It was believed that the bird took away all evil, therefore it was necessary to burn away all the evil which the bird kept, and then to make a new amulet.” Another ancient custom of Belarusian villages was revived in Pruzhany — they learnt how to wind dolls. It is possible to admire Lyalki-motanki (wound dolls) in the Centre of Creativity of Children and Youth. ‘Lyalka-motanka’ is considered to be one of the most ancient symbols of Slavic culture. Our grandmothers and great-grandmothers were able to make it without needles, and at times even without scissors, while we have forgotten this 2014 беларусь.belarus

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aim preserving and popularising the best traditions of the potter’s craft, a pottery centre was opened in the Stolin District’s Gorodnaya village in 2003, thanks to the efforts of a local teacher and now its treasurer, Olimpiada Leonovets. At present, the centre is famous all over the Polesie area and it is unique in our country. Pottery is taught here to local schoolchildren by a hereditary potter and master of the Pottery Centre, Avraam Basovets, a laureate of the Special Award of the President of Belarus for achievements in the sphere of culture and arts in the ‘Folk Creativity’ nomination. Another craft, registered into the List of Intangible Heritage of Belarus, can be mastered in the Brest Region — that of rootstock weaving. I found craftswoman, Maria Kravchinskaya, working at the weaving loom in the rural club of the Kamenets District’s Podbela village. She showed me a ‘dyvan’. This is how a woven bedcover is called in the Kamenets District. It showed red roses against a blue background. When she turned it upside down, there were blue roses against a red background. The bedcover is reversible, without any wrong side. It’s as if it comprises separate woven cloths which are connected with each other along edges and in the places of patterns. Maria Ivanovna mastered this skill here, in Podbela, and then taught her daughter Natalia, her friends and granddaughter Karina. Now, several local schoolchildren attend classes at the club in the evenings. Not far from Podbela, the village of Kamenyuki is lo-

cated, which has a House of Crafts and Culture, where craftswoman, Nadezhda Gritsuk, teaches children rootstock weaving. Here, boys and girls study how to work with timber, since the Director of the House of Crafts and Culture, Irina Kushneruk, is a famous woodcarver — the only woman in our country who carves delicate figurines with the help of a chain saw. I asked Irina how contemporary school-children are keen to learn almost forgotten crafts and will her efforts, and those of her colleagues, help to preserve and return these forgotten skills. She replied immediately. “Children are delighted. The forgotten can be returned but we need to enhance the prestige of masters in society.” Then I ask the children whether the mastered are worthy of honour. “Of course,” they respond. Some twenty years ago, it was difficult to imagine that clay pots, baskets, rushniks and vyshyvanki (traditional clothing decorated with embroidery) would be in great demand at trade fairs. Now, such items are ‘trendy’, as they say, and ancient crafts will live due to our countries efforts without any doubts. By Valentina Kozlovich

Pottery also requires skills

Valentina Kozlovich

skill. Now it is time to return to this unsophisticated art. The Director of the Centre of Creativity of Children and Youth in Pruzhany, Alena Pukhnarevich, recollects that it all began with the creation of a new circle of the European toy. “We decided to return to the past. We talked to old women, drew sketches of dolls which once were wound by our ancestors in the Pruzhany District and some information was found on the Internet. Then we held a master class. Now, all our teachers practice making dolls and our children also learn the craft. Initially ‘motanki’ were used as amulets, but in the present day, these dolls are in demand as souvenirs. We started making such dolls and the first was a doll-herbalist. We fill the doll’s head and chest with thyme. In the summer we can also use other herbs, which we gather, like mint, or Belovezhsky balm. The doll-grainer is filled with grain. By old tradition it is necessary to wind, following movement of the Sun and to carry out an odd number of windings. The doll is made faceless as the owner should paint her face.” Pupils ‘have wound’ amulets for all their relatives and now intend to make them for sale. The Belarusian town of Ivanovo is well-known for its tuns and tubs. Since 2000, the unique Belarus cooperage school has been operating in the city, and recently was renamed Ivanovo Children’s School of National Arts and Crafts. Cooperage is men’s work. “Is it difficult?” I ask Dima Svirepa, who is the grandnephew of the famous cooper, Sergey Ivanovich Svirepa, from the suburban village of Rylovichi. The boy shrugged his shoulders, “I’m already quite skilful. However, at first, my hands ached.” The boy doesn’t have blisters on his hands but boasts enough excitement and enthusiasm. Meanwhile, both boys and girls are able to spin a pottery wheel. With the

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Ability to win It is no secret that Belarus gives a great attention to sport. Citizens are interested in it, and the State takes care of it, building palaces, arenas and stadia. Every possible sporting activity is carried out and various laws promoting the development of sports have been adopted. At the Olympic Games, Belarus constantly finishes in the top-twenty on the medal’s table amongst over 200 participating States! The lion's share of the responsibility for results falls on the shoulders of experts who are engaged in training of sportspeople and trainers. We ask: What is sports education in Belarus and where can it be received?

t is clear that it is impossible to become a professional sportsman in just a couple of years. Long years of effort and assiduous training is needed, therefore people in our country start doing sports from an early age. Sports clubs, schools and specialised schools of the Olympic reserve, children and youth sports schools are organised for children and young people all over the country. The basic preparation of sportsmen occurs there, and then, The headmaster of Yunost Igor Molchanov and the coach Maksim Pobortsev

someone from them combines sports activity with education in an institute of higher education or the Belarusian State University of Physical Culture. As for schools and colleges, some of them are notable for their higher level and enviable results of their pupils. As, for example, one of our outstanding sports schools is the Hockey Specialised Children and Youth Sports School of the Olympic Reserve Yunost, which celebrated its 39th birthday on September 1st. This school has trained such stars, as Ruslan Salei, Alexey Kalyuzhny, Mikhail Grabovski, Sergey Fedorov and many other eminent professionals. Its headmaster, Igor Molchanov, knows the school’s history well. The school op ene d i n 1975

and, at that time, almost all Belarusian hockey as it is called, was based around the pupils of Yunost and they showed quite good results at the Olympic Games and the World Championships. The school was twice recognised as the best in the USSR, due to the results of work in 1989 and 1990. It has won many tournaments, with victories in sports contests of the peoples of the USSR in 1982 and 1986 becoming the most significant. At that time, Yunost gave a handicap to such eminent schools, as Spartak and CSKA. Even now, it tries to compete with the top names at international tournaments, and the half of the current national team consists of pupils from Yunost. Yunost is part of the structure of the club with the same name and meets all the requirements of the development of children and youth in sports. It is a unique school in our country, with preparation at all ages. Children come here when they are 6 years old and finish training when they are 18. Today, Yunost has at its disposal three locations where training is carried out — the covered skating rink in Gorky Park, the Minsk Palace of Sports and the Chizhovka-Arena which has recently been put in operation. In total, the school has 8 teams which participate in the Championship of Belarus. The headmaster of the school, Igor Molchanov, says happily, “We are prize2014 беларусь.belarus

Alexander Ruzhechka

During the training at the Children and Youth Sports School of the Olympic Reserve Yunost

winners everywhere, therefore today we are considered the strongest school.” At the school, as well as at the institute of higher education, there is both free education and also paid training. Parents can buy hockey outfits at their own expense. As for kids from needy families, the school provides outfits for them. Currently, eight sports classes operate in Yunost. They are created in order that children can have time to both to study and to do sports. The management watches the results of their wards in the general educational sphere, visit schools and meet the teachers, and if someone has problems with marks and discipline, then appropriate measures are immediately taken. Pupils can even be threatened with suspension from playing hockey. Igor Molchanov talks on the perspective of children, “The future of a child will depend on the desire of parents to make an athlete and personality from a citizen of our country, and also on the desire of беларусь.belarus 2014

the child. If parents support this desire and help a child to stand on its own feet as a person, then a child will necessarily become successful.”

Higher sports education As for sports education at the level of higher education, it can be received at the Belarusian State University of Physical Culture. Grigory Kosyachenko, the Rector, heads the educational establishment. ‘Always in motion’ is the university’s motto. At present, about 6,000 people study at the university — listeners, students, advanced students, postgraduates. Over 900 specialists teach this ‘army of sportspeople’. The number of countries represented is rather impressive: Russia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Estonia, Syria, Libya, Iran, Iraq, China and Israel. Over the years, stars of Belarusian sports have studied here: Alexander Medved, Yelena Belova, Vitaly Shcherbo, Marina Lo-

bach, Yekaterina Karsten, Alexander and Andrey Bogdanovich, Alexey Grishin, Dmitry Dashchinsky, Victoria Azarenko, Alexandra Gerasimenya, Lyubov Cherkashina, Alexandra Narkevich and many other eminent sports stars. The university carries out research on the optimisation of preparation of sportspeople to the Olympic Games, World and European Championships. Experts search for the most effective means of physical, technical, tactical, psychological and theoretical preparation of these athletes. A lot of attention is given to the question of youth sports, the problems of restoration and the increase of sports working capacity. The main sports university in the country does not have problems with places for carrying out of training. At its disposal are a sports and training complex with courts for basketball and handball, volleyball and tennis, freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling, football, weightlifting, boxing, fencing, gym-

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nastics, precise-coordinating sports, combined gym for dances, skiing lodge, shooting gallery and medical centre. The Institute of Tourism is part of the university. While the sports part of the establishment consists of several faculties. The Faculty of Sport Games and Combative Sports was created in 1972. Graduates of the faculty can work as trainers on various kinds of sports at child and youth sports schools, sports clubs, schools of Olympic reserve, in national teams or schools of higher sportsmanship. They can also work in the system of secondary education as teachers of physical training at schools, gymnasium and lyceum. The faculty consists of eight departments: bicycle, skating and equestrian sport; sports games; wrestling; football and hockey; fencings, boxing and weightlifting; philosophy and history; biomechanics; theory and methodology of physical training and sports. The Faculty of Mass Sports was formed one year later on the site of the sports faculty that was founded in 1959. The structure of this faculty includes nine departments: 2 theoretical — education and sports medicine and 7 training: swimming, track and field athletics,

Sports education can be received at the Belarusian State University of Physical Culture. At present, about 6,000 people study at the university — listeners, students, advanced students, postgraduates. Over 900 specialists teach this 'army of sportspeople.'

gymnastics, ski and shooting sports, water-technical sports, sports-fighting martial arts and special training and psychology. Graduates of the faculty work as trainers in such kinds of sports, as gymnastics, aerobics, sports dances, track and field athletics, swimming, hand-to-hand fight, karate, taekwondo, cross-country ski race, jumping race, orienteering, ri-

fle and pistol shooting, biathlon, rowing and canoeing, yachting, mountaineering, auto racing, and also sports psychology and sports direction. At the Faculty of Health-Oriented Physical Training and Tourism created on at the pedagogical faculty, they prepare personnel for improvement of health of the population of Belarus. Today, the faculty has ten departments, six of them are training. The basic qualification required is to be a teacher of physical training, but in addition to this qualification, students also receive another one, specialising in this or that department: health-improving physical training, physiology and biochemistry, anatomy, foreign languages, physical rehabilitation, medical physical training, management of sports and tourism, physical training of preschool children, the Belarusian and Russian language, sports and recreational tourism. Graduates of the faculty work in the system of the Ministry of Sports and Tourism and subordinate organisations, in educational institutions, fitness centres, clinics, tourist companies and establishments of public health services and other organisations. By Yan Zhur

2014 беларусь.belarus

Soyuz

Belarus — Russia

810 days which changed the world The project of the Union State becomes the basis of a memorial in honour of the heroes of the First World War

he history of the Union State of Belarus and Russia officially totals less than twenty years. But actually, the union of these two fraternal peoples is based on a centuries-old history when, more than once, it was necessary to repel aggression from the outside. The events during days of the First World War developed in such a way, the 100th anniversary of which was widely commemorated on August 1st, 2014 in Belarus and Russia. The monument in memory of the heroes and victims of those old battles was solemnly opened on Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow. Memorial activities also were held in Minsk. But the central event took place in a small regional centre, Smorgon, which is located at a distance of over one hundred kilometres from the Belarusian capital. Heads of the Belarusian Government, ministries and department and the Standing Committee of the Union State, headed by the State Secretary, Grigory Rapota, representatives of youth and veteran public organisations, thousands of people were present at the event. Why here? The point is that in the territory of the Grodno Region (at that time it was the province) located in the northwest of Belarus, the Russian army managed to stop the equipping of German and Austrian troops with the newest weapons. At that time, the troops already occupied the most part of Poбеларусь.belarus 2014

Competent comments, Secretary of the Union State Grigory Rapota and Deputy Prime Minister Anatoly Tozik

land, the city of Vilnius, Grodno and Brest. The war became a terrible tragedy for inhabitants of the region and its population was reduced almost by a third. Till now it reminds of itself by dozens of Russian and German/Austrian military burial places, nameless and common graves where hundreds of thousands of the fallen are buried alongside concrete pillboxes and other defensive constructions. The economy fell into disrepair. In total, 800,000 Belarusians were called into the Russian Army. 130,000 of them died. 50,000 civilians were violently taken as prisoners to Germany. Many hundreds of thousands also went into exile and were evacuated into the remote regions of the Russian Empire. Many of them did not return home. The front line lay through the small provincial small town of Smorgon. Looking today at its cosy streets, the whitewashed walls of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches and the modern buildings sparkling with plate glass, it is difficult to believe that a hundred years ago, for 810 days and nights, a line of cruel opposition between the Russian and German/Austro-Hungarian armies passed through here. As a result, only ruins and a handful of people remained of the city’s population of 16,000 inhabitants. But the German plan to arrange here a ‘Russian Cannes’ — the grandiose defeat of the Russian empire — failed. On the contrary, Smorgon turned into the second Verdun for the Ger-

mans. Here, despite the huge number of victims, their offensive impulse completely ran out. An enormous number of victims, which became the main thing that led to the signing of the Russian-German armistice in 1917 in the village of Soly located near Smorgon, an armistice which became the prologue to the end of the war. As a result of the slaughter which occurred here, along with the mass bloodshed in thousands of similar mourning places, the German, Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and Russian Empires disintegrated after several social revolutions. As a result, the world map changed beyond recognition. However, citizens of the Union State have to learn about this anew. After all, for many decades the First World War was in the ideological shade of the Second World War — more wellknown as the Great Patriotic War to the populations of the PostSoviet States. Recently, people have started to openly discuss the necessity of restoring the historical truth, and among the first of those was the Standing Committee of the Union State. It supported the initiative introduced by the Smorgon Region Executive Committee in 2006 to create a memorial complex on the 1915-1917 line. A competition of art projects was held and 9 collectives and separate authors took part. The winner became a collective with the participation of well-known Belarusian sculptors Anatoly Artimovich, Vladimir Terebun and architect Alexander Bozhiday. In October 2009, three sculptural compositions, a map of the line of the opposition of armies, a dome with a cross and a bell for a chapel and medallions with First World War markings were made from bronze according to their project and financed with funds allocated by the Standing Committee of the Union State, a powerful amount of around $750,000. After several years, the construction of the memorial complex in honour of the victims and heroes of the First World War was started in Smorgon. The sculptural compositions, made by order of the Standing Committee of the Union State, will become its dominant feature and the memorial is conceived as a place of reconciliation, for the sake that humankind will, never again, have such wars. Its uniqueness lies in the fact that the memorial is erected on a 130 hectare area that is the actual place of real battles. While the project has not yet finished, all that has been so far, made an imperishable impression on the thousands of participants of the remembrance service which took place here on August, 1st, 2014 on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the First World War. The avenue of memory which will pass through the whole territory of the memorial park is already vivid. Sculptural compositions

of Refugees, Soldiers of the First World War and Winged Genius of Soldier's Glory are mounted on pedestals. Strains of Ave Maria, a guard of honour and the mournful words of people induced once again to reflect on tragedy of any armed conflict are also present. The Chairman of the organising committee on the carrying out of the actions dated to the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the war, the Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus, Anatoly Tozik, noted, “The memorial is created in honour of heroes and all the victims of the First World War. Hundreds of thousands of Russian, Belarusians and representatives of other nations which were part of the Russian Empire died here. We hope to complete the memorial by the 100th anniversary of the end of the war. It is logical, if it will be our general monument.” The scale of the memorial is impressive. It is supposed that the museum of the First World War will appear in Smorgon and dozens of concrete German pillboxes, which even today show the line of opposition on suburban fields, will become exhibits of the museum. The State Secretary of the Union State, Grigory Rapota was deeply touched and Grigory Alexeevich highly estimated the artistic qualities of the architectural complex before sharing his thoughts with journalists on the main point — how to avoid the repetition of the horrors which happened 100 years ago in Belarus. “The First World War became one of the most tragic events of the 20th century. It is very important to understand what started that war and for whom it was necessary? I adhere to that point of view that any war is senseless. But when it comes to your territory then, according to the historian, it turns into tragic necessity. It concerns also Russia. Here in Smorgon, during those 810 days, its best units deterred the enemies and did not let them go, despite the application of poison gases and other innovations unprecedented in military history at that time. The best forces of the Russian guards died here, but the German and AustroHungarian armies broke here too. It is necessary to understand the sources of that war, so that we do not repeat it in the future.” That day, Smorgon held a military-dramatized representation which recreated one of the battles of that time and the unique exhibition — Belarus in the First World War — opened there. Hundreds of real exhibits were on display: weapons and objects of life, photos and documents. The Minister of Culture of Belarus, Boris Svetlov, explained that the exhibition will also be shown in Minsk and other cities. A number of other activities, planned together with the Standing Committee of the Union State, and devoted to the 100 anniversary of the First World War, will be held. By Vladimir Bibikov

2014 беларусь.belarus

On its own orbit Space programmes are unique instrument for scientific and technical co-operation

n the Union State, some joint scientific and technical programmes of space subjects have been successfully carried out. Pyotr Vityaz, a member of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, explains what they give to Belarus and Russia and what the prospects of co-operation are. “Above all, the forming of union programmes depends on people who participate in this process. There, where the priority has been chosen rightly, aren’t any questions. The Academy of Sciences of Belarus annually leads from 4 to 6 programmes. Currently we are carrying out four programmes and two programmes have come to the end in the last year. Programmes in the spheres of space and information technologies are one of our priorities. At the bottom, they have become a visiting card of the Union State. We have already carried out 4 programmes on space research. Currently, the Monitoring-SG project is being carried out successfully. The programme is aimed at improving the quality of survey and equipment, of informational technologies and the ‘vitality’ of space satellites. We are solving the problem together with Roscosmos. There are inter-governmental agreements on co-operation. Three meetings of the joint working group, where we have discussed dozens of programmes for the long term, have already been held. For example, Skif-Nedra, a new programme, should be approved at the meeting of the Union Council of Ministers. The Technologies-SG programme has been also laid down. There are new materials and technologies of space technics. We should also prepare the Standardisation-SG programme, to be able to speak one technical language. It is important not only for Russia and Belarus, but for the whole of international space, for space co-operation. The necessity of extending participation of scientific and industrial organisations of Belarus in union programmes of space sphere is being discussed. About forty percent of scientific and industrial organisations of our country participate in co-operation in the space direction. And, properly speaking, all ministries are consumers of space information. There should be the whole system of monitoring, of improving of the information, the ability to handle it, to set the right task. беларусь.belarus 2014

Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus Pyotr Vityaz

With 11 ministries, we have created points of reception of space information. First of all, there is Ministry for Emergency Situations, Ministry of Agriculture and Food, Ministry of Forestry, and Ministry of Defence. Aviation and remote-piloted vehicles, which are being also designed today, are used in space research. Innovation technologies and supercomputers are necessarily needed for solving these tasks. Besides, it’s necessary to prepare personnel, so work with universities is being conducted. July 22nd, 2014, marked two years since the first Belarusian satellite was launched, but it shows up over every point of survey every 16 days. So we can get information regularly; but it’s not enough. Together with the Belarusian satellite of Earth’s remote sensing, ‘Kanopus-B’ Russian apparatus has also been launched. So we have created a grouping of these two satellites. There is a task to extend it. For example, it’s necessary to evaluate productivity, to assess how harvesting is going. So it’s necessary to conduct systematic observations, and it’s advisable to have not less than 12 satellites in orbit to make three hourly monitoring on one or another point. Certainly, we wish to have such a grouping with Russia. Currently, a lot of consumers want to get space images with the resolution of one metre — for cartography, town-planning and appraisal of property. We are working on it. For two and a half years, with citizens of the Russian Federation we could create, taking into account groundwork and experiences, a new satellite, possessing these necessary characteristics.” By Vladimir Fedorov

ILEX-2014 International Exhibition of Arms and Military Machinery that took place in Minsk showed an obvious example of the effective co-operation of the Belarusian and Russian defence industries. Some figures: about hundred Belarusian enterprises deliver about 2,000 different products to 300 enterprises in Russia. In their turn, 70 enterprises of Belarusian defence sphere are interested in products of Russian production workers. Mikhail Myasnikovich, the Prime Minister of Belarus, thinks that our countries should go further and create joint companies in the militaryindustrial complex. Positive trends are already visible.

Effect of double defense

Belarus and Russia build up co-operation in the defense sphere

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Some joint Russian-Belarusian projects have already received the highest appraisal. For example, presented at the exhibition, ‘Lis’ armoured cars, produced by

Minsk Wheel Tractor Plant, is Russian ‘Tigr’ with Belarusian filling. It differs through increased mobility and strong armour, which isn’t bothered by bursts of sub-machine gun fire. The car withstands even hits by bullets with a steel thermo sealable core. And there is no impassibility for such armoured vehicles. And on the track, ‘Lis’ easily travels at 120 kilometres per hour. According to Vitaly Vovk, the Director General of Minsk Wheel Tractor Plant, this technique can’t only swim. They also intend to create the whole range of light armoured vehicles that will be equipped with a system of counter-mining. The creation of our own air defence system is an actual task for the defence industry of Belarus. There is already some groundwork: Belarusian ‘Alebarda’ — the modernised variant of the Russian ‘Pechora-2BM’ complex — was presented at the exhibition. Experts think that it can become a sort of ‘locomotive’ of the Belarusian military-industrial complex. This air defence system differs through increased mobility, high noise immunity, vitality and fast response to the situation. A new ‘day-night’ optical system has been worked out and all adjustments are carried out automatically. When the complex has been created, units and components, produced by Belarusian enterprises, have been used. Perhaps, in due course, air defence systems will be produced in our country. Currently, all technical issues are decided in co-operation with Russia. A full-scale specimen of the T-72B modernised tank aroused big interest at the exhibition. In negotiations with representatives of Uralvagonmash Russian Scientific and Production Corporation, the opportunity of co-operation on modernisation of such techniques, which is in the inventory of the Belarusian army, was discussed. Modernisation is planned to be carried out on the base of enterprises of Belarus. The Belarusian military-industrial complex intends also to co-operate actively with the Russian United Aircraft Corporation. According to Sergey Gurulev, Chairman of the State Military and Industrial Committee, we can produce, for example, element bases for planes or helicopters. Thanks to co-operation and joint groundwork, the potential of the Belarusian army is growing. By Dmitry Umpirovich

2014 беларусь.belarus

Belarusian nuclear power station becomes a union student construction

his year, construction of the nuclear power station and objects of its infrastructure in Ostrovets, received the status of All-Belarusian Youth Construction Site. For almost two months, the Single consolidated student Belarusian-Russian group, named after the Hero of the Soviet Union, Ivan Lebedev has worked here. The student group did not get this name by accident. Ivan Danilovich Lebedev has been credited as its honorable fighter. A native of Russia and a participant of the Victory Day Parade in June 1945 on Red Square, he has served after war in Grodno and here, the former front-line soldier lives to this day. 210 fighters from Minsk and all regions of Belarus, as well as from two regions of Russia have been within the student labor landing troops. The Russian guys have been presented by the ‘Power Engineer’ student construction brigade of Obninsk Institute of Atomic Energetics and the ‘Current Strength’ brigade of Nizhny Novgorod Alexeev State Technical University. There have been 47 people in all. “All people have worked with full dedication and conducted various works — enforcement of concrete constructions, making hardware items, concreting, stonework etc. We have attentively got the measure of everybody to invite some of them to the Power Plant as future specialists,” says Mikhail Filimonov, the Director General of RUE Belarusian Nuclear Power Plant. The guys don’t hide the fact that they have come to the construction not only for romanticism. For students, it’s important to be financially independent of parents and to earn their own money. Mikhail Yanshin, a student of Obninsk Institute, has told that he has come here already for the second summer in a row. “We have worked 10 hours a day. Sunday is a holiday. According to the concluded contract, we have hourly pay. For overtime — it is double time,” Mikhail told. Nearby, their Belarusian counterparts have worked too. They, like the guys from Russia, are ready to come here next беларусь.belarus 2014

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Group performs the task year. “They have created perfect conditions for us,” the commander of the consolidated group, a fourth-year student of the Engineering and Construction Faculty of Grodno State University (named after Yanka Kupala), Andrey Skolota says. “All the members of the student group have been accommodated in the new multiple family dwellings. At the cost of the receiving organisations we have been provided with refrigerators, the necessary furniture, crockery, and medicine chests.” Special buses have brought members of the consolidated group to work and back. The nutrition of the fighters has been organised in a canteen on the territory of the future power station. A half of its cost has been recompensed by subcontracting organisations. Russian students, who have come to the Belarusian construction, get in their native land, core specialties, connected with atomic energetics. Working at the nuclear power station in Ostrovets is, for them, a peculiar practical training. Certainly, not all today’s members of the student group will come back here to work after the completion of the course, but they will have an immediate conception about their future profession. Mikhail Kiselev, Commander of the Central Headquarters of the Russian Student Groups youth public association, thinks that this factor is of no small importance. “Our guys have received the necessary experience and have seen how the branch develops. It’s also important that young people see how projects of the Union State are realised in real life.” The joint student construction brigade movement gains momentum. If, in the last year in Belarus only one Russian student construction brigade of 20 people had worked, this year there have been several. This year, Russian students have worked at the construction of the Minsk Underground, the Student Village, and other venues in the capital of Belarus. It has become possible thanks to the joint agreement between Belarusian Republican Youth Union and Russian Student Groups public associations. By Gennady Gil

Warm meeting at the Black Sea

Two bright accords finish this summer — the Creativity of the Young Festival and the cadet military-patriotic session The Creativity of the Young Festival, which is actively developed with assistance from the Union State Standing Committee, has already occupied its own niche among dozens of children’s cultural events. Out of all international festivals, which have taken root on the Anapa land, this event is the most ‘starry’ in the number of talents, the ‘largest’ in the level of stage performances and the ‘richest’ in its programme of entertaining events. Where else could you see how the best children groups of the two countries work, and visit master classes of artistes whose performances were previously seen by the youngsters only on TV? The young musicians had a chance to listen to competent opinions during the creative contest, as this year, the jury was again headed by the author of the famous Plasticine Crow, the Honoured Figure of Arts of Russia, Grigory Gladkov. The composer is convinced that the major task of adults is to give children hope for a peaceful future. “Only peace is the foundation for the whole of life. Another obligation of adults is to give children an impulse to work and to achieve new heights. In my opinion, the Creativity of Young Festival facilitates this in the best possible way,” he noted. One more important task of the festival is to involve the growing generation of both States into the process of construction of the Union State. It’s not by accident that the Creativity of the Young occupies a vital place among the events of the Standing Committee. The State Secretary of the Union State, Grigory

Rapota, calls the forum one of the brightest Russian-Belarusian projects in the sphere of upbringing and development of creativity among the growing generation. “The festival unites and enables children to become familiar with deep national traditions, while also making new friends and simply having a good rest. Moreover, the Creativity of the Young helps young talent, as well as their teachers, to establish and strengthen friendly and creative contacts. Many artistes and groups also receive proposals to take part in other events of the Union State,” he said. Laying flowers at the monument of the Great Patriotic War heroes on the eve of the holiday became a good tradition. The par-

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uring the penultimate week of August, Anapa lived in the sparkling whirlpool of children’s holidays. The famous Black Sea resort hosted the international musical festival — Creativity of the Young — for 8th time. Winners of regional contests from all corners of Belarus and Russia arrived here to compete in their vocal and choreographic talents. Young starlets lived, rehearsed, performed and recuperated as one big company, since, from their first meeting, the children felt themselves as a single family team rather than rivals. By their example, the children again proved to the adults that all existing differences can be easily overcome with the help of creative activity.

ticipants of the forum didn’t change their ritual and the honour of perished soldiers was commemorated by the youngsters together with residents of the city. The Deputy Mayor of Anapa, Lyudmila Murashova, named the Black Sea resort a ‘centre of Russian-Belarusian ties’ and the festival as ‘the most important on the Black Sea coast’. “Definitely, there won’t be losers in this contest of talent, since there’s enough sun, sea and warmth here for everyone.” Moreover, on the opening day, the wearisome two-month heat suddenly changed to cloudier weather. Local residents breathed freely, while the guests grumbled uncomfortably. Nevertheless, an hour before the festive concert the sky cleared again and organisers saw this as a good sign. The First events of the big concert sounded at sunset, on the city’s Teatralnaya Square. The guests and residents of Anapa were welcomed by young talent from Moscow and Mogilev, Ulyanovsk and Belarusian Volkovysk, Moscow Region’s Klin and Grodno Region’s Mir. In total, there were almost 150 performers, including the TeremOk! vocal instrumental ensemble from St. Petersburg. “We’re united by our love for Russian culture,” noted the artistic leaders of TeremOk!, Anna Pokidina and Alexander Shirunov. “The ensemble was created just three years ago, but has already achieved much. It became a winner of a whole range of regional festivals and performed at the most famous concert grounds of the city.” 2014 беларусь.belarus

The audience also heartily welcomed the VI-ZA-VI dance group from Orsha, which gained popularity in Belarus, as well as far beyond its borders, which is shown by four Gran Prixes from international choreography festivals. We can endlessly speak about children talent at the Creativity of the Young Festival. ArtLiga, the children’s pop group from Gomel and Ulyanovsk’s Solovushka pop song group were awarded with loud applause in Anapa, as were the Aquarelle vocal group from the Brest Region and the Lapushki dance group from Klin. The winners were awarded diplomas and valuable prizes. In line with the decision of the jury and organising committee, the most original perform-

Vita as an ordinary pupil of the military school and here became a ‘minister of justice’ and now teach at Moscow Suvorov Military School.” The Day of the Union State is the major holiday of the small, but friendly ‘Vitalia’. As is traditional, it started with performing of the anthems of Russia and Belarus, the ceremony of carrying-out of the Andreevsky flag and the flags of the neighbouring States. Last year, a monument was unveiled in Vita to Generalissimo Alexander Suvorov. Now, another monument has appeared nearby — that to Admiral Pavel Nakhimov. Pupils of the military schools commemorated the memory of the Hero of Sevastopol Defence with a minute’s silence.

ances were also given special awards. The Creativity of the Young Union State project again helped to set up hundreds of new bridges of friendship between Russian and Belarusian cities and towns, thus laying the foundation of mutual understanding, trust and friendship. The Union State’s Creativity of the Young Festival was first held in 2005 in Moscow. Its founders were the Parliamentary Assembly of Belarus-Russia Union State, the Union State Standing Committee, and the culture ministries of the two counties. In 2006, it was decided to make the musical holiday an annual event and move it to Anapa, where it has taken roots and has been organised for eights year in a row. Alongside the Creativity of the Young Festival, Anapa’s Vita clinic has also hosted these days the 8th military-patriotic session of cadets, and those studying in Nakhimov and Suvorov military schools from Belarus and Russia. This is already a good tradition and the would-be military elite have been recuperating in Vita since 2007. All these years, the country ‘Vitalia’ has existed here, which is indissoluble union with Russia and Belarus. Actually, ‘Vitalia’ is a children’s game model of the Union State, with its own Mayor’s Office, deputies and speakers. Everything is like in real life. “The major goal of such sessions is the upbringing of elite for the 21st century army,” notes Ruslan Kofanov. “I’ve come to

The holiday was opened by a guards’ parade of the pupils of Minsk Suvorov School. Among its graduates are four Heroes of Russia and dozens of generals. After Minskers, cadets of Yekaterinburg Suvorov Military School and those of St. Petersburg Nakhimov Naval School followed. Then the amphitheatre welcomed Kazan, Ussuriysk, Ulyanovsk, Tver, Moscow and St. Petersburg Suvorov schools. Spectators could also see Aksai Cossack Cadet Corps — the only participant of the annual Victory Parades in Red Square among Cossack children’s corps. 28 cadets of Grozny Military School at the Russian Interior Ministry closed the parade. The final accord of the holiday is the prolongation of the symbolic treaty of the joining of the ‘Republic of Vitalia’ to the Union State. The document was signed by clinic director, Vasily Dimoev and Responsible Secretary of the Parliamentary Assembly of Belarus-Russia Union State, Sergey Strelchenko. In its turn, the Parliamentary Assembly obliged to recognise all residents of ‘Vitalia’ as citizens of the Union State and provide fruitful rest and creative development for them. The congratulatory greeting of the Great Duchess, Maria Vladimirovna, was also addressed to the youngsters: ‘Be responsible for the future of the State from your youth — its fate is in your hands’.

беларусь.belarus 2014

By Anna Orlova

Youth pick up the patriotic baton from veterans near the Mound of Friendship

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Memory without borders

he Mound of Friendship is a unique place. It was built in 1959 in commemoration of the fighting commonwealth of veterans of the Great Patriotic War, the guerrillas and resistance of Belarus, Russia, Latvia at the joint of three states. This summer, when Belarus celebrated the 70th anniversary of the date of liberation from fascist aggressors, symbolic activities were carried out near the Mound of Friendship. At first, with the participation of veterans a capsule with a message to descendants was laid there. And then the traditional international youth camp Be-La-Rus was opened. The Chairman of the Vitebsk Region Executive Committee, Alexander Kosinets and temporarily Acting Governor of the Pskov District, Andrey Turchak took part in the laying of the capsule containing a message. In the message, it is said that young people should remember the ordeal which fell to the lot of their ancestors and to protect the friendship between the people. Perhaps, one of the most vivid examples of friendship between young Belarusians, Russians and Latvians is the international camp Be-La-Rus. This year, it opened for the 23rd time. 500 most active, talented and creative members of such public associations, as the Belarusian Republican Youth Union, the Youth Progress Union of Latvia and the Russian Youth Union gathered near the mound. According to Igor Buzovsky, the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Republican Youth Union, the guys consider participation in patriotic activities an honour. “The Mound of Friendship and the monument to the Hero of Soviet Union, Imants Sudmalis, are located today in Latvian territory. It is impossible to approach them, but we transfer flowers there via the Latvian frontier guards. As for the museum of fighting glory, and also monuments to the Komsomol-underground members of the

village Proshki and to the Hero of Soviet Union Maria Pynto, they are located in the territory of Belarus and Russia. We visit them, we keep them in order. In the year when Belarus and the Pskov Region marked the 70th anniversary of liberation from fascist aggressors, the camp gave special attention to the patriotic theme.” The Russians were responsible for the organisation of BeLa-Rus this year. They chose ‘The Cultural Revolution’ as the main theme — a contest-entertaining programme dated to the Year of Culture in Russia. A habitual parade of bivouacs in a camp was transformed into a competition — Come to My House... Participants of the camp got acquainted with Russian traditions and heard sincere Russian songs. A competition for married couples — Belarusian Dawns, Reloading was also carried out. In it, Yana Kurzanova and Alexander Kurzanov from Yaroslavl, who brought their six nice children to the camp, shared their secrets of family happiness. And, certainly, a camp cannot do without a special dish. According to Alexander Shlyk from Bobruisk, it is boiled rice porridge with raisins, based on condensed milk. Football and volleyball matches are also traditional. The Chairman of the Russian Youth Union, Pavel Krasnorutsky, considers that the ideas of Be-La-Rus need to be developed even further, “Our main purpose is to unite young people from the different countries. We want ideas of the camp to continue to live beyond its limits. We have already discussed with colleagues from Belarus and Latvia more than ten directions, among which are educational programmes, sports, volunteering, patriotic education and student’s self-management. We will choose one or two of the most significant from them and will try to develop and realise them within a year. By Sergey Golesnik

2014 беларусь.belarus

CYCLE PATHS

Minsk bid to become bike friendly

y 2015, Minsk may enter the top-twenty of world cities based on their cyclist network. This forecast was made by the Deputy Director on development of Velozona network, Igor Davydenko. According to him, the total length of arterial and combined cycle tracks in Minsk may, by 2015, reach 500 kilometres, giving the city one of the most extended cycle path networks in post-Soviet territory. It recently passed Moscow, where cyclists have about 150km of dedicated paths. The Belarusian capital may surpass many European cities, including Madrid, Budapest, Milan, Brussels, Prague and Barcelona. Minsk also will leave behind Singapore, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires. At the same time, the city will still concede to them on number of physical cyclists. The most extended networks of cycle tracks are in Copenhagen, New York and Vienna, with each of these cities having more than one thousand kilometres of dedicated cycle paths, with cycle networks in Berlin and Montreal, extending over 700km, developing quickly. The Parisian network will reach the same length by the end of this year. “The feature of Minsk consists of a considerable quantity of combined paths on which bicycles are compelled to divide the space with pedestrians. If in the European Union countries cyclists more often go on separately allocated strip of road, then in Belarus they cycle on the pavements,” the expert noted. The basic obstacles for cyclists are high curbs. “Partly it is the reason for the big popularity of mountain bicycles among Minsk residents. While interest in city bicycles, on the contrary, is not high. Belarusians prefer unpretentious bicycles which can be used both in a city, and outside its limits,” Igor Davydenko explained. Infrastructure development promotes the growth of the number of cyclists. Now, more than 400 thousand people беларусь.belarus 2014

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Minsk can enter the top twenty of cities with the most cycle paths

— every fifth — use a bicycle in Minsk, with their number increasing by 40 thousand annually. Whilst Minsk is in the lead in Belarus with the number of cyclists (20 percent against 16 percent in all country), active cyclists — those who regularly use two-wheeled transport in the capital — are only slightly more than 1 percent. The expert pointed out several indicators on which it is possible to create friendly cities for cyclists. Among them is the extent of cycle paths, the number of bicycle parking points, hire stations, routes and relation to cyclists. “Minsk has succeeded on all indicators during the recent years. As a result, we have more cyclists and the average distance of a trip has grown. More and more people use a bicycle to go to work or to spend their days off with a family. With this plan, we have come nearer to the leading cities of Europe,” Igor Davydenko is convinced. In the summer, over 200 cyclists an hour travel on separate areas of Minsk cycle paths. “It is high indicator which specifies the popularity of this type of transport. And if the overwhelming majority of Minsk residents use a bicycle, even only once a week, people will begin to perceive a bicycle as convenient means for daily trips and we would need more time than required on arrangement of cycle paths,” noted the Deputy Director of the Velozona network. By Mikhail Svetlichny

ACCENTS OF BEHAVIOUR

Notes

of a young mother

Ivan Zhdanovich

t times, in the media, we see enthusiastic, ‘showy’ reflexions of young mothers about what happiness is to be a mother. But the price for the bringing up a child and the internal emotional experiences of this or that mother, one more likely can read in literary works on this subject. A letter which arrived at the editorial office seemed a sincere reflexion of the feelings of a young mother which she experienced during her period of maternity leave. We publish it entirely, without changes. Probably, in the future, our respondent will become a writer, and in her works there will be a place for lines which affect us. Style, utmost openness and the ability to comprehend and express her own inner world — is it not the beginning of literary career? So what are they, young mums who make up this percentage of the birth rate? How do they live and feel, bringing up the future citizens of our country? To one of them, Alisa Krasovska, we gave the possibility to express her opinion.For certain, I, a young mum, in time, which will bring me new life experiences, will understand more deeply, not in theory, everything that the psychologists write about. They say that parents bear the fears and problems from their own childhood and shift them onto the shoulders of their children, while the latter in turn, onto the shoulders of theirs; and that this may 2014 беларусь.belarus

ACCENTS OF BEHAVIOUR continue infinitely, until someone in this chain stops and thinks about how to correct the situation. It seems to me that I have approached this point. But I am sure about one thing; children, whatever happens to them, will come through crises in life less painfully, when they feel from their parents love, support, understanding and the ability to forgive imperfections. While such moments happen pretty often, it is necessary to look around and see them.

To become a mum When I was eighteen, I was sure that I know all about motherhood. After all, the much of my life included active help in the upbringing of two younger sisters. I fondly believed that the formula of a mum’s actions in this or that situation was extremely simple — if temperatures were raised, it was necessary to give febrifuge or to wipe the head with vinegar, if a baby cries and cannot fall asleep, then one must rock the baby and sing a lullaby. My self-confidence in this question remained at the threshold of the maternity ward. I learnt by heart the technique of breathing during contractions, could not concentrate and ‘bear down into the belly, instead of into the eyes’. It seemed to me, that I did everything correctly, but for some reason the obstetrician grumbled at me. Yes, life is a school, only without a bell for a break. Therefore, when they brought me my baby-girl ‘sealed up’ in her sleeping bag, I felt no lesser shock than from the childbirth itself. My God, this small wrinkled miracle appeared much smaller, than I assumed. The girl slept, and I secretly prayed, that this silence lasted longer. After all, I not only wanted to examine in details her face and to be convinced of daddy’s eyebrows and mother’s lips, but also to gather my thoughts as a whole. After all, I had become a mum, and, as they say, there is no turning back. I remember how the baby smiled at me for the first time with her wide toothless smile. And at that time, her eyes accurately focused on me, despite her just being three days old. This look ‘eye to eye’, I will carry in my heart for the whole of беларусь.belarus 2014

 This year, indicators characterising the demographic situation in Belarus, continue to grow. According to the Main Department of Services and Demographic Statistics of the National Statistical Committee, the mortality rate has fallen, while the birth rate rises. In January-March 2014, Belarus saw 21,051 new-borns — 3.8 percent more than in the previous year. This fact is expected by the State policy provide social and financial support for young families with children. Thus, for example, maternity and childbirth benefits have raised and laws motivating the birth rate of children in full officially registered families are issued. In other words, everything possible has been made in order that each woman has the desire to realise their main mission in life (according to materials of the media). my life as the first silent dialogue of two related souls — of the mum, who is nervous and thinks she is doing everything wrong, and a child who loves her mum simply because she is a mother. During that moment I understood — everything is good and my baby is happy! And two years later, to the day, I gave birth to a son. And again I worried, whether I should approach him from the right side, whether I wrapped him in the right way — my hands were shaking all over again.

Appearance of maternal instinct It is said that maternal instinct is inherent in each woman and that it wakes up at the moment of birth of a child or even earlier. I will add something — not always! At first, you look at your still slim reflexion in the mirror and understand why people joke about you being ‘a little bit pregnant’. And really, how is it possible to believe in this diagnosis made by the doctor, when you do not see any visible changes in your appearance and the sensation of life is the same. But suddenly, your favourite kebab ceases to smell tasty and in the morning, you wake up not because of the barking of a neighbours’ dog, but an unknown attack of rising nausea. Also time of expectation starts — when the sickness ends, when the sex of the child is defined on the ultrasound, when the belly starts growing, when the baby takes the correct position in the womb the when

signs of childbirth start. Then you wait for the appearance of mother’s milk. You wait for the round of doctors. You wait for the reaction to vaccinations. You wait, when the navel heals, when the snivels at last cease to flow from the child’s small nose, when the child is old enough to wear clothes that someone has gifted. Do you not think that this sequence of everyday life reminds us of run of the squirrel in a wheel, who does it without understanding? Awareness of what had happened in my life — that a great happiness occurred in my life, that of becoming a mother, came to me nearly three months after the birth of my first child. The postnatal depression had ended, but I did not pay attention to it because I had no time. The baby’s skin became smooth and her eyelashes appeared. The baby was already able to show pleasure from taking milk. The baby was chubby and so sweet, therefore you wanted to embrace, stroke, tickle, bite and kiss your child all the time.

Nuances of upbringing Once, I was told a parable which modern psychologists have added to their arsenal — a young couple came with their new-born child to a wise man and asked a question. ‘When it is necessary to start the upbringing of a child?’ ‘You are nine months and ten days late’, the wise man answered. I suppose that the majority of us are late, and that we hasten to catch up, to correct all that we wasted and, when it is corrected, we

think ‘if only we knew…’ But, as they say, history does not remember wishes. How to bring up future geniuses? Each mum faces such question. After all, her child is the ‘very best’ and unique. We go deep into studying western and eastern methods and we rush for help to psychologists, forgetting the simple truth — that children are a reflexion of ourselves. I remember how, after the birth of our second child, for a long time, the older daughter simulated my behaviour in the first trimester of pregnancy. It was funny (and at the same time a little sad) to observe, how she opened the toilet seat lid, coughed, and then in a business-like manner, left the toilet in order after some time, to return again, as a mum. Very often, trying to do ten things simultaneously, I do not always completely control my behaviour; but my daughter helps me to do this. Copying me, she in the same manner as I, takes a toy mobile phone in her hand and, walking up and down the room, says to an imaginary someone, ‘Well, gosh!, it is impossible!’ Here it is true — little pitchers have long ears — as the English (or possibly Japanese) proverb says. This picture certainly, distracts me from work about the house and forces me to reflect on what I am in dialogue with the world around me, whether I always speak beautifully and correctly and on many other things. And it becomes clear for me, why children are so different. Someone in the street sits with a computer tablet and plays first-person shooter games, while another searches for a lilac branch in order to bring it home and to watch it blossom.

Nadezhda Ponkratova

ACCENTS OF BEHAVIOUR

Time of discoveries All people are united by common businesses and have their own jokes. Programmers speak about ‘software’, doctors talk of patients, while mums discuss the paradoxical expression ‘to be on maternity leave’. Because at this time, away from the working environment, it is possible to do everything: to not get enough sleep, to not eat enough, to not have enough time,

to be late for ever ything, and also to feed, clean, wash, clothe, walk and to do ever ything… except sit down. Paradox, is not it? But maternity leave is also a time of discoveries. For example, I suddenly understood that in everyday life, we use not just a little of our brain, as the

scientists say, but also our knees, heels, elbows, fingers and toes. For example, using one’s knees, it is possible to hold one child, while dressing another child. On ten fingers it is possible to simultaneously hang an umbrella, and a bag, a children’s shovel with a bucket and one’s keys. It is possible to feed a child with one hand, while using 2014 беларусь.belarus

ACCENTS OF BEHAVIOUR I really like those several seconds which happen every day. It is that period of time between when I hear the loud bang of a bedroom door opening to the moment when a child appears at the kitchen threshold (where I am, sipping something hot and fragrant in pleasured silence). Probably, it is the daughter, but sometimes the son. Occasionally, it is both. While the little feet shuffle from bedroom to kitchen, I try to guess who is coming… Sometimes I am mistaken. And then I see the full picture, thanks to which I understand — here is the true meaning of life! Slightly reeling because of their recent awakening, the two tots look at me smiling happily. Both of them have protruding bellies and dishevelled hair. ‘Mum, I woke up!’ the daughter reports. ‘Muuum!’ the son echoes. And then both run up to me, knowing that each of my hands is intended directly for her and him, therefore we do not have quarrels on this theme.

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the other hand to feed yourself, and at the same time, use a foot to rock a pram containing a new-born. And how magically the time frame enlarges during maternity leave! It turns out that fifteen minutes, while a child bathes in the bathroom, can be so long! During the two minutes that the wind-up mobile, suspended over a cot, беларусь.belarus 2014

lasts, it is possible to warm up a meal and even to do the dishes. In general, a pile of tableware is an indicator of busyness. If it is washed once a day, then it means that the children are small. But once, I noticed that I was approaching the kitchen sink three times a day. I looked at the children — yes, they had grown up noticeably.

Certainly, each mum has special memories on their first pregnancy and about the first child’s attempts to crawl, then to walk, about their first sounds and words. But all mothers are united by a boundless feeling of love, care and responsibility for our children. And this feeling is verbally inexpressible. It is similar to the flow of the wind: it cannot be touched or seen, only felt. Love for a child is as a pressing heartache, because of the strong desire to save them from all misfortunes, understanding at the same time that it is impossible, and even wrong. It is anxiety and constant self-control: whether I make everything well and whether it is possible to make it even better? The love for a child, while it is absolute and unconditional, pushes on feats and even self-sacrifices. History knows many examples of that. And from our children we sincerely wait for ‘thanks’, because to see happiness in our children’s eyes is the greatest gratitude and real happiness for each mum. By Alisa Krasovska

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At a recent exhibition at the National Art Museum — Ten Centuries of Art in Belarus — Zoya Litvinova was displayed among a number of artists. Certainly, it is a great honour, deserved by the bright, expressive creativity of the artist.

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he picturesque canvases and watercolours of Zoya Litvinova are stored in the National Art Museum of the Republic of Belarus. It is due recognition of her as an artist — after all, works are do not accepted into the museum without reason. Litvinova’s pictures are also stored at the Museum of Modern Fine Art in Minsk and at the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, in the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, in museums of Riga, Novosibirsk and Bishkek, and also in private collections and municipal collections of Austria, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Holland, Republic of South Africa, Israel, the USA and Canada. In 2005, Litvinova was awarded the order of the Ministry of Culture of France for merits in the field of art. The author herself considers art as international, and is happy that her work is spread all over the world. At the same time, she highly estimates the national school of painting, though she believes that this school is still

in the formation stage, but already has a certain importance. The Honoured Figure of Arts of Belarus, Zoya Litvinova likes the prepared spectator because philosophy is put into the work of an artist. Here is one of her statements: “I am a traditional artist. I am a contemplator, who ‘feeds’ on reality, and consequently, I do not see sense in breaking ties with it. I do not see an occasion to refuse figuration, though abstract is also very interesting to me. And in general, painting for me is a unique means for the embodiment of spiritual reality existing around us, but not visible to the eye.” And how do you treat such a forgotten and even neglected aesthetic category in art, as ‘beauty’? Well really, this concept has ceased to be used in our life. Well, who if not an artist should think of Beauty, to create Beauty. Beauty is harmony. And what is life without harmony? In 1986, in Minsk, the group of artists created the creative association Nemiga17. Adherents set before themselves the task, as critics then noticed, to update po-

etics and the plastic language of domestic painting. On the wave of the first reorganisation years, artists of all republics of the former Soviet Union, more than ever, sharply felt the urgency of the problem of national-cultural identity. The period of formation of Nemiga as a uniform (at all variety of individualities entering into it) creative collective, the formation of its concept fell just on these years. Even in the name of the group, the artists aspired to underline ties with deep layers of national history and culture. Nemiga is not only a street with a workshop where the idea of the association arose, it is also the name of a river which no longer exists, the bank of which in 1067 became the field of an historical battle between the armed forces of Polotsk and Kievan dukes. The Battle of Nemiga is described by the author of the Tale of Igor’s Campaign and the first mention in ancient annals of Minsk is connected with this particular event. Nevertheless, in the development of national problematics, Nemiga artists never rejected the historical or ethno2014 беларусь.belarus

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work of the soul graphic theme and plot. The decision of this task they transferred into the sphere of exclusively plastic searches. They expressed the recognition of their own national identity in aspiration to find an artistic language which, with all its modernity, would be genetically connected with the traditions of culture of Belarusians. Already, at that early stage, a creatively oriented attitude to national tradition, to world culture as a whole was peculiar to members of Nemiga. Nemiga brought into Belarusian painting an interest and taste to expressional, plastically rich pictorial form, to associative metaphoric speech. Colour has always been and is the basic formbuilding component for painters of this creative commonwealth. After all, it is the space of colour-plastic experiments where the search for possibilities of special expression and vivification of form happens. Differently, colour for them is the main graphic and expressive means in achievement of ideologically-emotional depth and the substantiveness of artistic image. беларусь.belarus 2014

Unlike their younger colleagues, Litvinova was included into the composition of the association as a mature master. But at this particular time (and most likely it is not casual) radical changes happened in her creativity. Her artistic vision became emotional; her concept of colouring became complete, while her plastically-constructive solutions of canvases gained verified logic and impressive monumentalism. Litvinova does not refuse figuration, but she deprives the form of reality, consistently and organically connects figurative forms with abstract and places them into conditional space. Her main task is the consecutive penetration into the deep essence of things and phenomena. She is not a concrete artist, impressionistically short moment of life, but a philosopher who comprehends the world. Therefore, her reference to bible themes or to themes of love and human loneliness is organic and not so banal in her creativity. For the same reason, this or that creative means which at times are absolutely cloying, get a novel and surprising power of transformation of the images in her canvases.

What forces feed the creativity of Litvinova? She considers that when a person dares to become an artist, he or she should remember that art will be the master, the only master, and that it is necessary to renounce much in life. And maybe the force of creativity lies in the background? She was born in a village in the Vetka District of the Gomel Region. Her childhood fell during the difficult war and post-war time. It was terrible in the days of the war. During the post-war years there was nothing to eat and people lived very poorly. And all the same, childhood is childhood: life and pleasure won, feelings were strong and bright. Also, there was something very important in her life, as if in understanding of a secret. “I grew among the fields, woods and water,” Zoya Litvinova tells. “I perceive the nature of Belarus through these symbols. All was alive and mobile. At times in the shine of water or the trembling of foliage I saw sliding, arising and disappearing airy transparent beings. I absorbed everything — both nature, and people, and those tales, which surrounded us. I very

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much liked simple old women, they gathered in the evenings at our place and told fairy tales about different miracles, sang and told fortunes. They came after work, when twilight came. Since then, twilight has been a special time for me. Here is an almost imperceptible facet meaning a transition from one condition into another, from one form of existence into another. It is an exciting and painful, mysterious and intriguing moment. It is as though I have passed a through a special threshold. It was interesting to me, what was behind it. And it was terrible. I wanted it to proceed, but I sometimes escaped and hid.” After all, in the content of these fairy tales and stories, in their secrets is my imagination which has become a special means of children’s clairvoyance, I began to see through the forms and I began to paint. While today, already being a person with big life experience, Zoya Litvinova estimates her creative youth rather favourably “I have always known what I need and want. I have never come to

Nemiga is not only a street with a workshop where the idea of the association arose, it is also the name of a river which no longer exists, the bank of which in 1067 became the field of an historical battle between the armed forces of Polotsk and Kievan dukes. The Battle of Nemiga is described by the author of the Tale of Igor’s Campaign and the first mention in ancient annals of Minsk is connected with this particular event

terms with my conscience. Therefore my life, I will tell openly, was rather difficult. I graduated at the monumental department of the Minsk Theatre and Art Institute and orders somehow supported my life. I solved problems directly in the workshop — alone with my painting. But I have never done what I did not like, what was not interesting to me — especially now. It is necessary to get used to my painting, it is not so simple to perceive it. In due course, it gained greater light and brighter colours. It is connected with the development of the soul, I think. I am a person who is interested in myths, legends and religious themes. It is not casually that throughout the last 20 years, bible themes have been the basis of my creativity. Paintings change, it is natural. I have always tried to open something in myself, something to overcome and not to follow already found plastic solutions. I very much like fresco.” Your creative manner is often called fresco. Yes, I am fond of spiritual painting. It seems to me that nothing higher than fresco was created in the world. I consider that it is a realistic manner. After all, we depict reality not only in the way we see, but also a reality in which we feel a spiritual reality. It is everywhere, but we feel it inside. And how we express it is another matter. So my painting is realistic, while I am a realist. Probably, there would also be those who would argue with this statement, who would disagree with it. I never turn away from nature. Another thing is how I process it. What it gives me and what I can express through nature. Do you convey in your works the reality how you see it? Yes — and also how I feel it. After all, physical sight is identical at all people. For me it is important what means I will use to express it. Even if their form is far from realistic? Certainly. Reality will be more interesting at the expense of life. And when we copy off, we receive an imitation. It is not correct. 2014 беларусь.belarus

ART But let’s take the portraits which you created. They are more realistic. Naturally. In a portrait, I express the character of the person. Certainly, the portrait should look like a person. How I feel it? What I want to underline in it? How to express it? I want to a find plastic solution to all of these. I have always been interested in portraits. I have painted a lot of them. And yet you are known more as a compositional painter. I changed, but I am always recognised. I changed because I had new experiences, felt something new. We become different with life experiences. Now I don’t paint subject painting, but all the same, I am knowable, because it is my form, my colour, my plastic methods. Do you attach great value to colour in your works? For me colour is of great importance in the solution of the theme. The colours which are most present in your pictures, are they in keeping with you? I love light and cheerful colours. I consider that our life is so difficult, that we should help people to find pleasure in it. It seems to me that this task is required for the artist. In the 80s, people were not ready to perceive you and other artists. Has the perception of your creativity changed? Yes, certainly. We are not young people anymore. And if we established ourselves as artists, then we are successful. If not, then not. I was invited to Nemiga when I was already a famous artist. In those years, we were exhibited in groups. But then the time came when group exhibitions become less in vogue and personal exhibitions were more interesting. What exactly affected choice of your creative manner. It is the result of my daily work. Painting needs to be experienced, it needs to be felt. Everyone discovers something for oneself as we are all different. Everyone finds what he or she wants. And is there an excessive aspiration to individualism in your manner? Does such circumstance — that your manner беларусь.belarus 2014

should be distinct from others — weigh upon you? Everything is absolutely involuntary. It does not disturb me. Though nearly fifteen years ago I put before myself other tasks — it was interesting to me to solve important things. I have come to other plastic language — abstract, not subject. But it is recognised. It is my language with my special profound philosophical importance of symbols. Symbols are repeated all over the world, they are known. For this reason, art is probably international. Wherever you show a picture, people who are interested in it, are able to read the content. Has abstract painting become basic for you? No. It does not mean that I am not interested in humans. I still do portraits. In due course, abstraction emasculates and we can come down to simplification — I do not want that. I do not want to lose my ties with the real world. It is very important for me, because I am fed by the reality in which I live, which I feel.

Actually, it is work of soul — that important part of creativity. After all, when we just copy off nature, we become slaves, and we should not allow that. But after all, abstract painting as if transfers to another world? Yes. It is very interesting. But it is possible to go overboard… For me, as I’ve already said, it is very important not to lose ties with reality. Let’s talk about traditionalism. All the same art is based on places where the artist lives, on the atmosphere connected with reality. All of us are products of our time and products of our place. Because we love it, we have absorbed it. I, in spite of the fact that I like to travel, cannot remain somewhere more than a month. I want to go home. I consider myself a character national artist. I hear about myself: ‘Character artist’. It means that there is something in my painting belonging to Belarusian art, despite my internationality. It seems to me, that our national school of painting is still in the

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formation stage. We can speak about the Russian school, about the French. All artists who studied in St. Petersburg or Moscow after the war, they left the Russian school. And we are its followers. I consider myself a representative of the Russian school on the basis of which the Belarusian school starts to develop. After all there were artists — natives of Belarus — like Chagall, and Soutine. We say with pleasure that such geniuses worked here. Certainly, there is an interference of all schools; especially at this time, when we are so connected with the world. Now, Belarusian artists are different, at times it is difficult to distinguish them from European artists. It seems to me, that we should not give great attention to that. If an artist becomes more considerable they also become also more national. What is more in your works, figuration or figurativeness? Figurativeness should be present in every work. If you set a task, you should solve it figuratively. And it is not necessary to divide the stages of an artist. All the tasks which you set and solve are

different. Abstract painting also bears in itself a figurative beginning, but images are different, not real. During recent years, I began to paint flowers. Earlier, it seemed to me that it was boring, but now I have started to do that and it is very interesting to me — just like daily exercises for a pianist. But it is possible to do them even creatively. I will repeat once again — I attach great importance to colour, the conditional language of painting, because it is the whole world, a special reality on a canvas. In the late 80s, gold appeared in my painting. I introduced it as an element of the sun, as the power of spirit. Near to the gold it is necessary to put such a colour which would sustain this strong, bright power accent. Painting becomes more conditional and richer with colour. For me it is very important. Do abstract works have a more philosophical comprehension? Yes, there is another philosophy. In one of my works, the world is spiritual — a world of the sky and the earth. There are signs of power which penetrate into these both worlds, but how does one

depict them? How to find concrete real plasticity? How do we experience it? Preparation and general knowledge are very important here — philosophy, erudition and wide reading. All these demand work of the soul; not only mine, but also of the spectators. Is it possible to say that you always interpret in your works? Yes. I never copy. Even if I paint a landscape from nature, I move or remove something, it is impossible without that. It is a creative process. At what level do you think Belarusian fine art has reached? On what stage is it now? It’s on a good level. Today, Belarusian fine art is very much quoted. The national school is gaining in importance, but the school is created by individualities; each one bringing originality into this school. When the artist is healthy, the artist works and hopes that they will paint something very important. I think that if the work of the soul has not stopped and if you are alive inside, then you are capable of creating. By Vktor Mikhailov

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