At a meeting of the Eurasian Economic Union in St. Petersburg, Russia, last week, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko publicly lambasted Russian President Vladimir Putin for his gas export prices. As with much of Europe, Belarus is dependent on Russian energy supplies. There’s an opportunity here for the U.S.

The Lukashenko-Putin exchange was quite remarkable. It takes a healthy dose of courage (see Chris Wallace) to aggressively challenge Putin to his face and on his home turf. But Lukashenko wasn’t hesitant. He railed against what he said was the excessive price that Russia charges Belarus in comparison to Germany. When Putin tried to shut him down, Lukashenko pushed back hard.

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