BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

05/04/2006

Freedom Fight

by OMER SHAHID

The right to freely elect the candidate of your choice in an election is certainly a well established article in a free and democratic society. Any government that denies this basic principle is illegitimate because it does not reflect the will of the people.

In recent elections around the world, political mobilization has caught up with people by helping them in realizing their political and social rights. The European Union and the United States have certainly taken the right course of action by siding with the Belarusian people in opposing the recent election outcomes.

The Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE), an international organization that is primarily concerned with security and of which Belarus is a member, has disapproved of the Belarusian presidential election by saying it "failed to meet OSCE commitments for democratic elections." Presidential winner Alexander Lukashenko garnered 82.6 percent of the votes, clearly destroying the other three candidates. But there have been complaints by the opposition that there was vote-rigging and threats of violence that contributed to a defective election.

Western countries are denying the results of the election. The EU and the United States have taken measures to sanction Belarus.

Although the elections have been marred by fraud and deceit, there is a bigger political issue here.

Although the Cold War is over, there is still a lingering aura of distrust around the mentalities of both the Western world and Russia. For example, a recent Pentagon report states that Russia provided intelligence to Iraq during the war through its Baghdad ambassador.

Although it is good to see that the United States and the Western world are on Lukashenko's case, they still have to be critical of those who are proponents of oppression around the world. If political mobilization takes place and there is no way of expressing dissent, chaos may ensue.

Source:

http://www.torchonline.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/04/05/443432ceccd49