BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

06/07/2005

Brussels waves trade stick at Belarus

06.07.2005 - 17:24 CET | By Andrew Rettman

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The European Commission on Wednesday (6 July) kick-started a process that could see Belarus expelled from the EU's General System of Preferences (GSP), effectively cutting off trade links with the eastern European country.

The commission asked the GSP committee to launch a monitoring process on Minsk's compliance with International Labour Organisation (ILO) conventions on trade unions.

Under the GSP process, Belarus now has six to eight months to begin implementing ILO standards or face suspension of GSP privileges a further six to eight months after the deadline, giving a potential expulsion date of late 2006.

"The investigation may ultimately result in the withdrawal of Belarus' access to the benefits of the GSP scheme", external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner confirmed with MEPs in Strasbourg on Tuesday (5 July).

A suspension would put Belarus on par with only Burma in terms of GSP pariah status, subjecting its exporters to potentially crippling EU tariffs.

Belarus exported 2.7EUR billion worth of goods to the EU in 2004 and imported 2.6EUR billion worth, according to Eurostat.

The commission's move follows ILO reports over the past eight months that the Minsk regime is throwing labour activists in gaol and blocking attempts to organise public protests constituting a "serious breach" of human and labour rights.

Searching for a way out

"The government of Belarus will continue to cooperate with the EU to find a way out of this situation. But it will require a lot of work on both sides", Belarus' Brussels envoy Valdimir Serpikov told EUobserver.

A European commission spokeswoman confirmed that 23 out of 25 member states are keen to see Minsk thrown out into the cold, while two other countries would like Brussels to take a more moderate approach.

"In the past, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland were against the suspension of GSP preferences", a Lithuanian EU delegation spokesman indicated, declining to make clear who stands in the way of the GSP move today.

"For the time being this [Wednesday's GSP move] satisfies Lithuania, then we'll see if they are complying or not complying with the rules of the [ILO] convention", he added.

A Polish delegation spokesman explained that Warsaw wants to see Brussels continue its dialogue with both the Belarusian regime and opposition parties "for the good of the Belarusian people".

Member states will take the final decision by qualified majority, as in most trade-related cases.

MEPs repeat radio plea

The trade move comes one day before the European Parliament is due to vote on a new resolution condemning president Alexander Lukashenko's repression of Belarusian journalists and calling on Brussels to give concrete support for an independent radio station broadcasting into Belarus from Lithuania, Poland and possibly the Ukraine.

The resolution has reportedly received the backing of all the major parliamentary factions, despite the fact that Mrs Ferrero-Waldner all but ruled out the radio station move in her Tuesday address.

"There is no straightforward funding solution for radio broadcasting under the rules and procedures that bind the commission", she said, adding "But I assure you that I am doing the utmost to find a solution".

Belarusian opposition NGO Civil Initiative We Remember (Belarus) has organised small-scale demonstrations outside the parliament's Strasbourg headquarters and the commission's Brussels building for Thursday (8 July).

Demonstrations planned

The demonstrations will bring together Belarusian political refugees living in exile in the Netherlands, calling for action on the radio station plan and marking the sixth anniversary of the disappearance of Belarusian reporter Dimitrij Zawadzki.

"The EU has developed negative measures such as visa bans and strong statements of condemnation pretty well, but has not developed any positive moves so far", the NGO's Brussels envoy Olga Stuzhinskaya said.

Ms Stuzhinskaya indicated she would welcome any GSP moves to isolate the Lukashenko regime further so long as this coincided with greater support for Belarusian opposition on the ground.

"We have had wonderful statements from the EU and the US of what can be done, but nothing is being done", she said. "We need to translate things off the page and into action".

Source:

http://euobserver.com/?aid=19505&rk=1