Czech foreign minister to visit Minsk next week

The foreign minister of the current EU Presidency holder Czech Republic, Karel Schwarzenberg, is scheduled to stay in Minsk on April 16 and 17, according to the press office of the Czech foreign ministry, BelaPAN said.

n October 2008, the ministry declared an intention to increase contact with Belarusian officials on the basis of Minsk’s progress toward democracy, the Czech Republic’s interest in the development of bilateral political and economic ties, and readiness to assist in rapprochement between Belarus and the European Union.

Tomas Pojar, the Czech Republic’s first deputy minister of foreign affairs, visited Minsk in late October. He met with government officials and leaders of the United Pro-democratic Forces.

That was the first visit of a senior Czech politician to Belarus in six years. Bilateral relations deteriorated after the Czech authorities denied Alyaksandr Lukashenka a visa to travel to Prague for a NATO summit in November 2002.

In 2006, the Belarusian government refused to issue a visa to Mr. Schwarzenberg, who was then a member of the Czech Senate. No reasons were given for the refusal. Mr. Schwarzenberg and another senator, Jaromir Stetina, planned to meet with presidential candidates, including opposition contender Aleksandr Milinkevich, representatives of non-governmental organizations, and journalists. They also wanted to find out why the Belarusian education ministry prohibits students from traveling to the Czech Republic for studies.

The Czech foreign minister said in late February that the issue of inviting Mr. Lukashenka to the EU’s Eastern Partnership launch summit in Prague would depend on how the Belarusian leader “will behave and what the developments will be in Belarus itself.”

Mr. Schwarzenberg warned that Minsk would have to “resist pressure” from Russia and refrain from recognizing the Georgian breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. “The Recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia would create a very difficult situation for Belarus. They would fall out of a European consensus,” he said.

In March, Mr. Schwarzenberg spoke for extending a moratorium on the EU’s entry ban against Mr. Lukashenka and other Belarusian officials.

Mr. Schwarzenberg has twice met with Belarusian Foreign Minister Syarhey Martynaw, during Belarus-EU Ministerial Troika meetings in Luxembourg in October 2008 and in Brussels in January 2009.