BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
10/03/2010
EP condemns Belarusian Polish minority crackdown
The European Parliament has condemned the recent imprisonment of activists of a Polish minority organization in Belarus.
MEPs also demanded, Wednesday, that the closing down of independent internet news sites and forums be reversed by the authoritarian regime under President Aleksander Lukashenko, and leaders of the opposition movement, such as Andrei Bandarenko, Ivan Mikhailau and Aristyom Dubski be released from prison.
In February, Belarusian police arrested members of the independent Union of Poles in Belarus, including its leader Angelika Borys (pictured). President Lukashenko has continually accused the organization of being part of a "fifth column" which hostile countries have been using to try and develop an "Orange Revolution" style popular protest to bring down his regime.
Four years ago his government set up a rival union of Poles, which the government in Warsaw has refused to recognize.
Jacek Protoszewicz, one of the EU observers sent to Belarus to look into the allegations of harassment of the Union of Poles says that this merely confirms that human rights are deteriorating in the ex-Soviet state.
"The conditions in Belarus for civic activity, democratic opposition and independent media has worsened in the last year. This is mainly due to the elections to be held this year," he told Polish Radio today.
Local elections are scheduled for April and Lukashenko will be seeking re-election for a third term in the autumn.
Olive branch
Lukashenko has been trying to being Belarus closer to the EU as he tries to when the country off its economic reliance on Russia. Brussels too has been trying to use economic incentives to encourage Minsk to improve its human rights record.
"The main recommendation [the EU observer team made] is to create a kind of road map to install conditionality on the further development of EU-Belarusian economic relations, which are of upmost importance to the [Minsk] authorities," says Protoszewicz . "Simply speaking, if they want financial support, if they want money from European banks they need to make real progress in the fields of democracy, media freedom and human rights."
The olive branch being offered by Brussels includes financial instruments such as the European Investment Bank (EIB) and European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI), an extension of projects by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).
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