Brussels
March 26, 2012
The Belarusian issue became one of the key themes at the Brussels Forum.
Andrei Sannikov, the coordinator of European Belarus civil campaign, has been representing Belarus for previous years at the prestigious Brussels Forum, the event uniting the world's political and economic elite. But at present time former presidential candidate has been in prison for over a year accused of organizing protests against the rigged election.
Due to the arrest of Andrei Sannikov, Belarus was represented for two years in succession by his sister Iryna Bahdanava, an initiator of a legal prosecution of Lukashenka; head of the Belarus Free Theatre - Natallia Kaliada and head of "We Remember" Foundation - Irina Krasouskaya.
This year's forum was attended by EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton; NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen; US Senator Jeanne Shaheen, who initiated hearing on Belarus in the US Senate; Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt; Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski; Belgian Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Didier Reynders; Ukrainian and Bulgarian Foreign Ministers Kostyantyn Gryshchenko and Nickolai Mladenov; Chair of the Board at the Centre for Liberal Strategies Ivan Krastev; Former Prime Minister of Libya Mahmoud Gebril; former President of Lebanon Amine Gemayel and others.
"We initiated a discussion on Belarus at the panel to discuss the situation in Syria in connection with Belarusian weapon supplies to the country," Natallia Kaliada said at the forum. "Bulgarian Foreign Minister Nickolay Mladenov spoke at the panel discussion. We asked the minister why the negotiations to involve dictatorial Belarus into European processes were initiated in spite of tortures of political prisoners in the country and weapon supplies to rogue states, including Syria. Mladenov replied he was ready to deal with such people like Lukashenko to save the lives of political prisoners. Andrei Sannikov's sister Iryna Bahdanava said political prisoners had faced even more severe tortures after Mladenov's visit to Belarus, but EU economic sanctions were not imposed due to Lukashenko's empty promise to release all prisoners of conscience."
The Belarusian issues was raised as a separate theme at the panel discussion The Eastern European Partners "Going East, West, or Nowhere?"
A moderator of the discussion was Bruce Jackson, the President of Project on Transitional Democracies. Kostantyn Gryshchenko, Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs, member of the US Congress Michael Turner and Natallia Kaliada took part in the discussion.
"As sanctions against the Lukashenko's regime were introduced on the day of arrival of the Belarusian delegation, we thanked Baroness Ashton for that step, but explained the EU should be even more strong and apply tough measures to release political prisoners. Asked by Bruce Jackson what sanctions should be imposed, Natallia Kaliada said That Europe should understand the dictatorship in Belarus will be strengthening anyway and that's why adequate measures should be applied. Natallia Kaliada presented an action plan for the world community in relation to Belarus:
1. Everything what is already done in relation to the Belarusian regime did not produce the desired result (to release political prisoners). Boundaries and rules need to be broken. As Vaclav Havel once said: "Politics is the art of the impossible."
2. Actions should be taken in time. In January 2011, Catherine Ashton said it was an issue of some days to impose EU sanctions on the Belarusian regime, as the United States did. We welcome the sanctions introduced, but they were imposed to the full extent only 13 months later. Had they been introduced in time, probably, all political prisoners would have been released, a metro bombing would not have happened and two young men Dmitriy Konovalov and Vladislav Kovalev (who possibly were not guilty) would not have been executed.
3. No dialogue or involving the authorities into cooperation with the EU can be discussed until all political prisoners are released and rehabilitated!
4. Old and stable democracies (such as Germany, the UK, France) should explain to new European democracies (such as Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria and Slovenia) that a construction of a hotel in Belarus is not worth the lives of political prisoners.
5. Think globally. If Belarus supplies weapons to Syria and Iran, it cannot be viewed outside of the global process.
6. A decision on issuing free EU visas to Belarusians should be taken in consideration to give them a possibility to compare what can be better: moving to the East or to the West, and at least, feeling the support from Europe at this minimum level.
7. If you think you did everything possible for Belarus, ask yourselves: "Were bodies of the kidnapped opposition members found? Was the death penalty abolished? Were political prisoners released?"
8. If Europe wants to position itself as a Union being rather ambitious to solve the problems of Syria and Iran, it should solve the Belarusian issue first. Belarus is in the heart of Europe.
Talking about sanctions we paid attention to imposing an embargo on oil products and expelling Belarusian ambassadors from European capitals as one of the variant of applying further pressure on the Belarusian authorities," Natallia Kaliada said.
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