BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

03/02/2006

Plea to help unseat 'the last dictator in Europe'

By Daniel Dombey in Brussels

The opposition candidate in the Belarus presidential election next month has called on Europe and the US to help him unseat the country's authoritarian government.

Aliaksandr Milinkevich, candidate for the United Democratic Forces of Belarus, told the FT he had little hope of a fair vote on March 19 and was worried the European Union and Washington could turn their attention elsewhere once the election had passed.

He was speaking in the wake of an aborted effort by senior EU and US diplomats to deliver personally a warning on the consequences of unfair elections to the administration of President Alexander Lukashenko.

"It's very important for us that the EU and the US send a signal to the Belarus regime that there's a need to hold democratic elections and to inform them as well about the consequences of not doing so," Mr Milinkevich, a former physics teacher, said. You cannot divide life into periods before elections and after elections. We do not have true elections. Last year, Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, dubbed Mr Lukashenko's rule as "the last dictatorship in Europe" and US and European governments have encouraged Belarus' opposition parties' decision to unite around a single candidate.

EU foreign ministers recently also warned the government they were ready to impose sanctions, such as further visa bans on government officials, "in the event of failure to uphold international standards in the electoral process".

This week, two envoys from the US and the EU had intended to travel to Belarus to highlight their concerns - but Mr Lukashenko's administration refused to let both of them enter.

"They seem to be worried about the implications of European and US solidarity in favour of democracy," said Dan Fried, the US diplomat who had planned to go. "I don't know that he [Mr Lukashenko] would win an election I don't believe he would put it to the test."

However, many observers believe Mr Lukashenko would win a fair vote, because of the positive effect of high gas prices on the economy of Belarus. It profits from the transit of gas from Russia to central and western Europe. Last month the government said it would allow the vote to be witnessed by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which is expected to send over 400 observers.

Mr Milenkevich said he had increased his support from 2 per cent when he was chosen last year to 24 per cent and that he was ahead of Mr Lukashenko in Minsk, even though he had no access to Belarus radio and television. He added that an EU-backed effort to broadcast independent radio news to the country had been ineffective, because it was in Russian rather than Belarusian.

The EU is planning to begin a larger service, which will be 50/50 Russian and Belarusian, before the elections are held.

"The Belarusian language is a symbol of independence," he said. "When you try to tune your receiver and you find a Russian-language station you think it is a Russian station and you are not interested in it."

Source:

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/883ec306-9459-11da-82ea-0000779e2340.html