BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

10/10/2008

EU to start thaw with Belarus, doubt on Lukashenko

BRUSSELS, Oct 10 (Reuters) - The European Union will begin a cautious thaw in relations with Belarus on Monday, hosting its foreign minister in Luxembourg but probably maintaining a travel ban on President Alexander Lukashenko, diplomats said on Friday.

Relations with the former Soviet republic have warmed somewhat since August, when Belarus freed the last three detainees considered political prisoners and declined to follow Russia in recognising breakaway regions of Georgia as independent.

But those EU states that are strictest on human rights still oppose allowing Lukashenko, whose government was branded 'the last dictatorship in Europe' by the United States in 2005, out of quarantine.

The French EU presidency invited Foreign Minister Sergei Martynov to meet the so-called troika after the prisoner releases and a multi-party parliamentary election last month. European observers said the poll was an improvement on previous contests, but still not fully free or fair.

France has proposed the 27-nation bloc's sanctions against Minsk be cut back to isolate only those officials deemed directly involved in repression, diplomats said.

'The question is about President Lukashenko. There are some countries that have reservations about lifting the visa ban on him,' a presidency official said.

EU diplomats said the Netherlands, Sweden and Portugal had objected to removing the ban on Lukashenko, while other countries argued the EU could best achieve its objectives of democracy and human rights in Belarus now through dialogue.

In Minsk, a senior diplomat said Belarus was hoping all EU sanctions would be lifted at Monday's meeting.

'This is a movement in the right direction and we are expecting all limitations on cooperation with the EU to be removed,' Deputy Foreign Minister Valery Voronetsky told reporters.

'This concerns the system of (trade) preferences and visa issues which hold back cooperation.'

The European Parliament last month selected leading Belarussian activist Alexander Kozulin among three contenders for its top human rights award, the Sakharov Prize, shortly after he was released from jail.

Another prominent opposition leader, Alexander Milinkevich, won the prize in 2006.

(reporting by Paul Taylor and Mark John, editing by Matthew Jones)

Source:

http://www.forbes.com/afxnewslimited/feeds/afx/2008/10/10/afx5535162.html

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