BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

26/02/2009

Belarus: Press Secretary Andrei Popov responds to media questions following the briefing on 26 February 2009

Reuters: Today a group of human rights ombudsmen of four EU member countries is visiting Belarus. To what extent is this visit official? Who invited them? And what does Belarus expect from this visit?

Response: It would be wrong to say that the visit's been fully official. It is being held within the intensified dialogue between our country and the European Union. The visit has a working, as far as we understand, and fact-finding nature.

Meetings with the human rights ombudsmen from a number of European countries are expected to take place here, in the Foreign Ministry. As far as I know, our colleagues from Parliament are now meeting with these officials. I can say that an exchange of views on human rights is scheduled to take place in the Foreign Ministry. We will exchange views, respond to questions that the European ombudsmen might have interest in, etc. This is the reflection of that normal process of a dialogue which is being developed now between the European Union and the Republic of Belarus.

Svaboda Radio: The U.S. State Department has just released a regular [human rights] report. How would you comment on that?

Response: We have repeatedly spoken on that. In particular, I may indicate in principle that our position there has not changed. We believe that there are a number of reports on issues related to the human rights protection. Therefore, we do not consider advisable to comment in detail on just one paper on that subject.

Interfax: May I inquire about who - European or Belarusian side - was the initiator of the visit of the human rights ombudsmen?

Response: I think that was a suggestion of the European colleagues. But it seems that this issue, in general, is not the one of principle. The European colleagues addressed that proposition to us, requested such a visit, we agreed.

Interfax: During yesterday's briefing in the [U.S.] State Department, your colleague responding to a question over the prospects of improving relations with Belarus said that the United States was not changing anything in its policy towards Belarus. Does the Belarusian side regard that as a, sort of, slowdown in our mutual getting-closer process.

Response: It is hard for me to speculate on the intentions that my American colleague had when making such statements. If we translate his quotation closer to the original language, it would sound something like that: 'we have very clearly stated our position on the steps that Belarus needs to undertake to improve relations with the United States'.

This, perhaps, might be the case when we are ready to agree with our American colleagues but with a minor reservation. After the word 'Belarus' we would simply suggest to put 'and the United States of America'. So both Belarus and the United States of America need to do something to improve our bilateral relations. And even this wording, I must say, is a display of considerable flexibility on the Belarusian part because, as all know, it was not us, not Belarus who would spark off the situation in the bilateral Belarus-U.S. relations that has shaped to date.

BelaPAN: On 25 February, in Kiev there was a meeting between the State Secretaries of the Security Councils of Belarus and Ukraine that was followed by a statement that the priority of foreign policies of both countries (Belarus and Ukraine) was the integration into the European community. Is this statement a recognition that the Belarusian foreign policy has shifted from East to West?

Response: To be honest, I have not seen the original quotation to this effect and it is hard to say whether the quotation occurred or stemmed from certain journalists' interpretation of your Ukrainian colleagues. But I can say that, in general, this wording entails nothing revolutionary as we were consistent and never denied that normal, mutually beneficial and pragmatic relations with Europe were a key foreign policy priority of our country.

This priority is determined by geographical factors - location of the Republic of Belarus in the European context, and by a string of areas we have repeatedly talked about - where both the European Union and the Republic of Belarus have an obvious interest, mutual interest to develop relations.

With regard to somewhat 'shifting', we avoid extreme categories and jolts in our foreign policy rhetoric. You know that a sustainable and traditional concept that we suggest as a justification of the logic of our foreign policy is the commitment to building up normal relations across the frame pillars of our foreign policy, both close and remote, that include, apart from the European Union, Russian Federation and neighbouring countries, influential non-aligned countries. These are, strictly speaking, traditional Belarusian foreign policy priorities, we do not deviate from them.

Russian Koreans: Is Mikhail Khvostov [Belarus Ambassador to the US] back to Washington? If not, when is he coming back?

Response: No, Mikhail Mikhailovich is staying here. I reckon we have no grounds to go deep into discussing this issue. Take it as status-quo of the situation.

ONT: There was a message recently to the effect that Belarus had been made part of the Eastern Partnership initiative. What's the situation as it stands now? Can you confirm this information? What steps are Belarus and the EU expected to make to get closer?

Response: We made quite a few comments on the developments yesterday. I cannot but confirm that we clearly believe that it is rather more reasonable to put basic issues of how to interpret EU Foreign Ministers' statements to the European Union. Our standpoint is that, as far as we have learnt from our European colleagues, a recent decision in Brussels comes out to reiterate the original concept of the EU Eastern Partnership programme which is supposed to engage six countries including the Republic of Belarus.

We reckon the European side makes this step down the right path and are ready to debate the issue in a profound and substantive fashion, the way we have done so until today. But the bottom line of our standing still is that the programme when finalized should be entirely non-discriminatory and equal towards all of its likely members including our country. We have always stood our ground here.

As for specific steps, I think we'd rather not keep ahead of schedule. As I said, we will carry on with this work. Anyway, we are ready to keep on working here with our European partners.

Source:

http://www.isria.info/en/26_February_2009_82.htm

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