Verbatim Records & Video of the EP CSF National Platform’s Press Conference (March 18, 2011)

 

 

Photo: "Салідарнасць"

 

Moderator — Good morning, dear colleagues. Welcome at the press conference of the Eastern Partnership’s Civil Society Forum National Platform. It is dedicated to discussing the joint strategy of the democratically oriented forces in Belarus. A conference entitled "Civil Society Role & Place in the Future Strategy" had been scheduled for March 19-20 to have a wide discussion of the topic, however, the Conference Organising Committee was denied a venue to hold it, which is why the conference is postponed.

Today our press conference is attended by: Ulad Vialicka, Co-Chairperson of the Eastern Partnership’s Civil Society Forum, National Coordinator for Belarus and Chairperson of the International Consortium “EUROBELARUS”; Andrei Yahorau, Director of the European Transformation Centre; Alyaksandr Milinkevich, Chairperson of the Human Rights Public Association "Movement ‘For Freedom’"; Andrey Dmitriev, Deputy Manager of the Civil Campaign "Tell the Truth"; Uladzimir Kolas, Chairperson of the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council; and Uladzimir Mackievich, Head of the Humanitarian Technologies Agency.

A few words on the press conference format. To start with, we shall give the floor to our speakers, then you will be able to ask your questions and thereafter we shall have an opportunity for an informal communication during the coffee break.

And so, the floor goes to our speakers. You are welcome, Ulad Vialicka. 

 

 

Ulad Vialicka — Thank you.

I shall say a few words on the scheduled conference and on the situation we are in. As you understand, the events of the recent months in Belarus have significantly affected the issues which are today the most momentous and prioritised ones for the civil society. In this respect, today the participation in the Eastern Partnership programme is greatly obstructed for the Belarusian civil society, as a National Platform, by the December 19 events and the things which followed them. It means we are in a kind of new situation which has to provide in a certain sense a framework for us to build our plans and action strategies; the conference entitled "Civil Society Role & Place in the Future Strategy" had been conceived to assess the situation and look at it from the March 2011 perspective. In spite of the fact that the Conference Organising Committee consisting of the National Platform members had been considering the occasion primarily as an opportunity to discuss the current situation and the plans for the future  by the civil society subjects, we would like to do it, as opposed to the past period of time, with a participation on behalf of the expert community which is bound to have its assessments and proposals, as well as the Belarusian political subjects, their opinions and evaluations being of an utter interest to us, too. The idea was, above, all for the civil society to determine for itself the relationship principles vis-a-vis other society segment subjects, as well as the plans for the future.

I believe that although today we have no possibility to hold the conference within the timeframe scheduled, the need for this kind of conversation is still there. We do hope that we shall be granted an opportunity, after all, to hold the conference in our country, without going out anywhere, and in any case we are planning to continue the conversation. The questions as to how the Belarusian civil society sees its role and place in the future strategy must be answered.

Regretfully, today the future strategy problem is an unsolved and the most vexing one for various civil society subjects. There is no definitive unity in this respect, either. It is with the goal in mind of trying to reach the unity, that a series of events had been planned, the conference being meant, for sure, to become the major event. 

Moderator — Thank you. The floor goes to Andrei Yahorau.

 

 

Andrei Yahorau — Today, from our point of view, from the viewpoint of those who propose a strategic document entitled "Strategy-2012", the major problem is represented by the Belarusian nation’s divide. This country lacks the international accord and national dialogue institutions. And we, as the civil society, are unable of participating in the solution of the basic problems faced by this country. This situation is absurd and intolerable, and the strategy is exactly directed at restoring the national accord and dialogue in the country. It is the parliament, as a national accord institution, that must regain its normal functions in the Belarusian political system. Our offer, the National Platform’s offer, is to discuss the unified strategy of Belarus’ democratic forces for the nearest period to come.

The strategy skeleton plan is quite simple. It provides for three major stages.

Stage one: unification and consolidation of the civil society forces and all the democratic forces on the joint strategy basis. It is the united forces and we all together, only, that can engage the existing Belarusian regime and the Belarusian authorities in negotiations from a single position. The negotiations are to focus on the parliamentary election conditions. The new parliamentary elections to be announced in 2012 must be held freely and democratically. The preliminary negotiations alone will enable us to have guarantees that the elections will be held in a normal and decent way.

As for the elections themselves, if these are to be democratic and free, the objective of the civil society and democratic opposition forces will be to have elected as many deputies under these terms and conditions as they can assure today. If today we have behind us 20% of the voters, we shall be able to have 20% of our deputies elected. If more people are backing us, if we are supported by the majority, then we shall be able to have a majority elected.

At the next stage, in a new political situation, we shall be fighting for the parliament to regain its normal functions as a national accord institution.

 

Moderator — Thank you. The floor goes to Alyaksandr Milinkevich. 

 

 

Alyaksandr Milinkevich — I believe that the most popular word, which must be a boring one for some people, when we are talking about the activities of both the civil and political opposition is the word ‘consolidation’. We do a lot of talking about it, and one cannot say that we do nothing about it. We have some success records in our history, too. Speaking in terms of politics, in 2001 and 2006 we had single candidates. There are also some examples from the practical parliamentary election participation, when the actions were well coordinated. But there also are several big failures in this respect.

I believe that the recent events, the election and what followed it have resulted in everyone in this country being a loser. The opposition has lost, the authorities have lost and, most important of all, the Belarusian people have lost. I think we have been pushed several years back in our development. It is not the democracy alone, which is under a very big threat, the harsh repressions and the political prisoners give evidence of the fact. Today the independence is under a serious threat. The best example of it is provided by the nuclear power station agreement signed.

It looks like the consolidation should become an action, rather than a word. An action taken by the people who understand what is going on in the country, what possible prospects we have and understand their responsibility. The people referring to themselves as the civil society leaders, political leaders, media people and experts, just everything we call the democratic community, must understand that there is a colossal responsibility. For the country, rather than for themselves personally or for their organisations. This is why it is very significant that the civil society representatives, perhaps, for the first time in many years are telling everyone that it is of extreme importance to set up in the country a consolidated centre to be united on a certain platform. I am convinced that such a platform can be developed. This is a vision of Belarus’ future. And any such consolidated centre should elaborate its conduct strategy with the measure of responsibility that I am talking about. It is to have its action plan. Unless we work it out, we shall never become a real political subject. A serious subject which determines the live of the civil society. If there is no such strategy, we shall each play our game in our small organisations, on our tiny hillocks. And we shall lose, we shall lose all of us.

This is why I have supported the process from the very start, when the National Platform representatives developed a strategy, came up to see us and suggested that we should get down to work on the document, on a wide unification. I joint in the work with satisfaction, although I knew it was a very complicated process. I do not rule out that there may be other strategies; there may be many of them. The only thing I do rule out is the categorical position, when some are saying: “The people are in jail. Dozens of political prisoners. Serious prison terms will be announced. And here you are talking about some strategies and tactics. The time is not right for it!” I’ll repeat three times: “It’s the high time.” Yes, the political prisoners are in the first place. Yes, we shall fight to set them free and we shall keep on telling everyone about them. This is our moral duty. The country will have no future, if there are political prisoners here. But if the common strategy is not here, then it’s a waste of space, rather than a democratic community. Therefore, I am appealing to everyone, myself included, to overcome ambitions and look for the ways to unite. On the most generalised principles, but find them. And become a force which also assumes responsibility for the future of Belarus.

I request very much both the media people and the experts to get involved in the work. Many things depend on you, too. And, despite the complexity of the situation, I am convinced that we shall be a European, independent and democratic country.

 

Moderator — Thank you Mr. Milinkevich. The floor goes to Andrey Dmitriev of the Campaign “Tell the Truth”. 

 

Andrey Dmitriev — Today I am not just representing here the “Tell the Truth” Campaign, but I am also present here on the instructions from the National Coordination Council (National Coordination Council of the Belarus Democratic Forces — editor’ note), which set up within its structures approximately a week ago a strategic team and it has already had several meetings. There has been a meeting held, to participate in which the National Platform strategy authors were invited. A few paramount decisions have been made. For instance, today the Coordination Council believes, and it is an opinion shared by all, that a common strategy is really needed. At the same time, one should assume that two democratic society strategies mean no strategy. If we move again in separate columns, it means we are moving nowhere, that nothing has changed. Therefore, the objective is to form a common strategy. And the National Coordination Council is working today to formulate its position, and after it is developed, it will later be ready for an open and quite honest discussion with all the cards put up on the table and with clear and comprehensible positions.

There are a few principles, which have been defined by the Coordination Council.

Firstly, before the political prisoner problem is resolved, before they are set free, engaging in any other dialogue with the authorities on the elections et al is simply immoral. But it does not mean we should not be ready for such a dialogue. It should just make a part of the joint strategy adopted by all.

Secondly, a very important thing for us today is the consolidation of not just the political part of the opposition. We are very pleased to hear Andrej Jahorau saying ‘democratic forces’ or ‘strategy of the democratic forces’, which is already indicative of the strategy of both the politicians and the civil society. Today this kind of a common strategy is a must. The Coordination Council acknowledges it and is going to work with all the interested parties; and it will work out a joint position in an open discussion. There is no sole political leader today. Besides, while the major leaders have been put to jail or are under a house arrest, which can be equated with the jail, we cannot speak in terms of a personal political leadership. Yet, we can, for sure, work out a joint action plan for the nearest future, for 2012-2013.

And now the last thing we would like to say. We do believe that this conference is really a must, because, indeed, we lack dialogue among the subjects, we lack dialogue in the country as a whole. Andrej Jahorau has mentioned several items. But during a press conference we do not have an opportunity for a discussion. And we are going to keep on discussing, working on the concepts and getting the concepts closer together in order, as I hope, to bring them into line. There is an aim facing us within the National Council framework to develop our basic strategy version before the 1^st day of the next month, so that we could work further on these general versions.

 

Moderator — Thank you. You are welcome, Uladzimir Kolas of the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council.

 

 

Uladzimir Kolas — Thank you.

I am also representing here the Coordination Council of the Democratic Forces which are seeking unification, as well as the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council. I am grateful to the organisers of the conference, which has not yet been held and for an invitation for joint work.

As this is exactly what we have been busy doing since founded in 2003, for us, in principle, the situation does not have, regretfully, any novelties. If we look at the documents of the First Meeting of the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council, we can see there that the problems of the democratic community consolidation, and the honest election problems, and the dialogue problems, and the problems of looking for something which unites us, the Belarusians, rather than disunites, were put already then. Sadly enough, they are still momentous, because they have not been resolved. How are they to be addressed? This is something, beyond any doubt, we must think about and discuss, but discuss sincerely, because the banality of the situation is that we all are striving for a consolidation, but striving in a way that at the X time we go to the election in ten columns, that when we make ‘a single list’, then three or four candidates aspire for a parliamentary seat. This is exactly the basic problem which has not been solved yet. How can it be addressed? Much to my regret, we can see that the common sense or the basic logic does not work in this respect, that there are many factors used very successfully by the other side, and we are where we are.

Mr. Dmitriev has already said one should look at things frankly, one should foresee that again we shall be offered a kind of process imitation or a kind of dialogue imitation; they can again imitate the democratic procedure and the popular approval of what exists here under the name of elections, and, undoubtedly, it must not be tolerated.

We are aware that there is a problem which has been here since times immemorial when we are looking for a single strategy, when we are looking for some kind of truth and it is replaced with fighting for a political capital; and then correct proposals, if moved by the political rivals, are not accepted exactly because there is no desire to make preferences, to yield leadership to someone who is worth the leadership. Maybe, you are aware of the fact that prior to the presidential elections the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council had been meeting for a year and a half with all the potential candidates. They all used to agree that without a consolidation it is absolutely futile to think about the victory; however, the position was as follows: I am supporting consolidation, I am supporting a single candidacy, but I am the one to be the single candidate. Overcoming it is a big problem.

I believe that, certainly, the dialogue prospects and what we say, if we are called for a dialogue, can be put under discussion. However, one has to comprehend that we shall never be called for a serious dialogue, unless we represent a consolidated serious force, but someone ready for a separate dialogue participation will be picked out and called. And we are going to fall into the same trap and, after being hit with a stick in the head, wake up to a new country and begin grasping something till the new elections come. This is something to be done away with.

Thank you.

 

Moderator — Thank you. The floor goes to Uladzimir Mackievich of the Humanitarian Technologies Agency. 

 

Uladzimir Mackievich — Thank you.

I presume all the persons present here, the media people included, are familiar with the text marked with Andrei Jahorau, who is present here, and with Tatiana Vadalazhskaya as its authors, the text which has provided a basis for strategy debates.

In general, strategy is a thing difficult to describe in one document, albeit strategy as such is always formulated in a few words or in a few theses, while all the rest is made up of details, circumstances or principles put as a basis, etc. Therefore, proceeding from the fact that the persons present here had a chance to become familiar with the text which lays out the strategy, I shall get down right away to considering the objections.

Within the framework of the strategy, I am rather its promoter or negotiator, i.e. I begin negotiating with the politicians and other civil society representatives, who have not joined the Eastern Partnership’s Civil Society Forum National Platform, etc., and I have already got together over two dozen objections against the strategy in course of the negotiations, contacts and dialogues. Here I shall concentrate literally on a few objections under the succession of their presentation frequency.

In summary, the first objection: No negotiations, no dialogue as long as there are any political prisoners in this country.

At the fundamental level, I absolute agree to it. One cannot see as a dialogue the conversation between the investigator and the suspect, neither can one see as a dialogue the conversation between the jailer and the inmate. There may be no dialogue as long as the representatives of the democratic forces and the democratic opposition and just innocent people are in jail. But! The strategy provides for a dialogue in 2012, by summer 2012. Unless we start getting ready for a serious dialogue now, we shall not be able to prepare. Readiness is a result of the preparation process; therefore, without beginning the preparations now we shall be so unready in 2012, as ever before. This is the first response to the political prisoner objection.

The second response to the same objective. It is three months since we have found ourselves in the situation of mass-scale repressions with great many political prisoners. And what have we done to set the political prisoners free? I used to ask the question: “Tell me, what I specifically must do not to have any political prisoners in the country?” But nothing apart from abstract wishes, pia desideria, can be said about it, like: “Become a president and set the political prisoners free.” This is a total abstraction. The political prisoners are in jail today, while this nation does not have any institution or force which can raise its voice to demand from the authorities freeing the political prisoners or at least changing their detention conditions. There is a total lack of the necessary institutions in this country, including the destroyed advocacy institution, the oldest one of the institutions designed to defend innocent convicts and the rights of regular criminals; this institution has been demolished, too. And then I say that it is the strategy alone, only the consolidation of all the democratic forces and all the goodwill people that can lead to a force emerging in this country capable of asking questions and making demands to the authorities, also on setting the political prisoners free. And I do believe that as soon as we gain some kind of democratic forces unity shape, we shall demand it right away. We shall not demand right away a dialogue with the authorities on the elections and so on, because the time will be ripe to talk about it in 2012, but we shall commence the dialogue with the political prisoner issue. But to begin with, we need unity, so that more than one person demand, as we have been answered by the Prosecutor General’s Office when we made our first request concerning the tortures: like it is none of your business, because you have not been tortured, and our procedure is as follows: if a person is harmed, only the person in question may turn to the prosecutor’s office to have its rights restored. Thus, today the authorities do not regard and will not regard each separate civil society subject or political subject. But they will have to reckon with all of us together.

 

The second objection. It is declared very often and we come across it on a constant basis: Your strategy has been made as a good fit for Milinkevich; this is why Milinkevich was the first one you offered it to and he agreed.

It is wrong. In fact, we have begun with Milinkevich, because we single out various politicians among the politicians. All the politicians are different to us. Among other things, we divide them into those who are able of agreeing to deal and into egotistic politicians who always and everywhere pursue their own interests, only. Milinkevich seemed to us at that moment in time and seems now to be a political leader capable of reaching an agreement with. This is why we came up to see him and started talking, although we had a very negative interaction experience with Milinkevich in 2006, when a single candidate action strategy was also on the agenda, but both Alyaksandr and his entourage used to say: “We know enough to come in out of the rain, we can do without you.” This is why the strategy is not a good fit for Milinkevich, but it is a strategy to accommodate the general national democratic forces and it can engage (and is engaging) the expert and analysis structures, and Christians solidarising with the strategy (although the Christians do not have a clearly defined political position), and the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council, and, likewise, various political forces. It is not by chance, that you are seeing today here at one table facing you both Milinkevich and Dmitriev. And Dmitriev has said that he has instructions from the National Coordination Council at least to solidarise now with the consolidation and strategy formulation process. The same thing has also been said by Uladzimir Kolas. Therefore, this is not a strategy to make a good fit for Milinkevich, but for all the democratic forces. And if Milinkevich is the first one to respond, it’s alright!

The third objection: The authorities will not be involved in the negotiations.

Everyone keeps on explaining to us: “Well, you see what kind of authorities we have! How can one negotiate with them?” Do you really think we cannot see the authorities through! You see, there is no need teaching trivial lessons. We know that today the most agreement-incapable person among the Belarusians and among the state leaders is Alaksandr Lukashenka. This is why we understand that he will only get involved in talking under pressure, when he cannot help it. And the strategy is exactly aimed at creating a force in the country which cannot be ignored by him. While counting on his goodwill and his desire is something for utterly naive people to hope for. And, it seems to me, anyone speaking out this kind of objection should look at the strategy authors and the National Platform, etc., and ask himself a question: “Are they the naive people, as though they were born yesterday?” They do not look this way. It means they understand it.

The fourth objection: This is a civil society strategy, and each political force may have a strategy of its own.

No, it may not, dear colleagues. It may not. In this case it will neither be a strategy for the nation, nor a strategy for all the democratic forces, but a local strategy, which lays out the local action procedure for this political force alone. Therefore, a particular local force may not have a strategy for the country. We are one nation, we all share the same country and what we are proposing is a strategy taking into account the national interests and answering the nationwide challenges, and then it may only be one.

Further on: Every politician wants to be in charge and a leader for all, this is why politicians are unable of agreeing.

In this case let us evaluate these politicians. If a politician is pursuing his personal egotistic interests, then he is, save the mark, a cheapskate, something I had already been talking about within the preparation process to the past presidential elections indicating to the fact that the politicians who had chosen to take part in the elections, generally, did it not because they sought to achieve nationwide solutions, but in pursuit of their selfish, individual or corporate interests, and followed exclusively these interests. The same thing applies here: if the politicians are said to be unable of agreeing, it means they are ignoring the nationwide interests. Then let us look at the politicians and say that we are supporting those, who can give up their personal egotistic ambitions and for the sake of a common goal in mind are ready to postpone, for instance, reaching their personal objectives. It is only then that such a politician may be considered a politician at a national scale, rather than a kind of local activist.

Further on: Your strategy provides for bargaining with the regime. You want to engage in negotiations with the regime to bargain for a few seats in the parliament.

By no means. Read carefully the strategy we are offering, where we say it implies no bargaining with the regime for parliamentary seats. We do not need seats in the parliament for Milinkevich, Dmitriev, Kolas or any other politician. We need an elected, rather than appointed parliament! It is a savage thing to have in the 21^st centuary in the middle of Europe a parliament, or representative power, appointed by the president, or by executive power, instead of being elected! We are projecting the strategy to the negotiation process which is to modify the voting process procedure. Unless the procedure is changed, in this case the joint democratic forces should ignore this sham of election. However, it needs unity, too. This is why no seat bargaining. Negotiations must take place in order to have the parliament elected, rather than nominated! Various political science and political technology methods to achieve the goal are also described in our strategy, but these are not given an extensive coverage.

 

Further on: The authorities will by no means fulfil their promises, no matter what kind of crap they say at your negotiations. Your strategy does not take into account the authorities’ actions and conduct.

It is the other way around, dear colleagues: the strategy and strategy implementation realism and forethought are exactly based on the fact that we are quite well, attentively and continuously thinking the authorities’ acts several moves ahead. In this respect, the strategy is not just intended to unite the democratic forces but to give a momentum to the democratic forces to win the pace rather than follow the track of the steps taken by the authorities, and propose independently our steps, our actions to be responded by the authorities. When a major politician and a leader of the National Coordination Council tells me that nothing has to be done, because if the authorities agree to the negotiations, then our political leaders will reach an agreement within a few weeks and we shall work out a joint position. “But, my dear colleague,” I tell him, “then you will be following the scenario suggested by the authorities. The authorities will initiate the negotiations and you will get organised in course of the negotiations without being prepared in advance, without having a momentum of imposing your actions.” Therefore, there is no need waiting for the authorities to propose negotiations, but it is the democratic forces which are to propose them after their consolidation. It is pretty clear that the authorities’ first answer will be a rejection, but let us see what is going to follow. We have to accumulate our arguments and to act in the way that the authorities have no other answer to the negotiation proposal than being forced to accept it.

The other part of the more detailed objections will not be declared here by me, because it is the wrong place and there is no time for them. 

 

I shall announce a few positive theses about the strategy.

Still, we are one country, we are one nation and we must have one government. One government for one nation, for one country.

But if the nation is one, while the opinions and aspirations are different, then how can the same government make everyone happy? It may only be reached in a conventional way, only by a modern way of negotiations, agreements, interest coordination, etc. Therefore, today we have to agree on some common ground, and the common ground suggested by the strategy of the civil society and democratic forces is the following: We are one nation! And the authorities keep on further dividing our nation. Lukasenka used to say a few times: “You do not like what is going on in the country? Look around for the other homeland for yourselves!” No, this is our homeland. Our homeland! But it is ours not in the sense that it is not Lukasenka’s homeland. Lukasenka is also a Belarusian, and Lukashenka and we make one nation. Our nation, too, has its righteous heroes, on the one hand, and its criminal wrongdoers, on the other hand, yet, nonetheless, we are one nation. A nation may neither be a holy, nor God’s favoured one. A nation is a nation, it contains everything. And the burning tasks are to be attained by all the people in a democratic way. It means we shall have to reach an agreement also with those people who uphold the views which are absolutely unacceptable for us. Democracy is about giving an opportunity to speak out their convictions even to those, whose convictions are abhorring, but I am not to accept them, I shall fight, argue, etc. Lukashenka himself said in his New Year speech that there were 20% of people (I think they are more numerous, but let the figure remain), who do not agree with his policies. “We shall fight for your souls,” he said. Excuse us, it is we who will fight for your souls! And we must be strong, clever and aggressive (in a good sense of the word) to fight for the majority’s opinion. To achieve it, we must get a voice in the state-run media, a voice in the parliament, etc. This is what our strategy is directed at and this is something we are seeking.

 

One more positive aspect I would like to add is that developing any kind of documents, strategies, proposals, etc. is a highly skilled professional business. No more amateurism. No more premature decisions, no more hastily scribbled “Five Steps to a Better Life”, etc. These things should take time to be done on the basis of a good analytical work, on the basis of criticism and expertise. And it is not before they have been completed under all the professional standards, and withstand criticism and undergo wide-scale discussions, that they will be fit to be a strategy for the general democratic forces, to be something which unites, instead of something created ad hoc, a kind of self-made proposal. The strategy we are proposing has been made in a professional way.

Thank you.

 

Moderator — Thank you. Now we are proceeding to the questions. Please, ask your questions, but do not forget to introduce yourselves and say whom your question is addressed to.

 

 Pauluk Bykousky, “Belorusy i Rynok” (“The Belarusians & Market”) — Can you please explain who was to hold the conference, who filed the applications, what organisation, and what was the form of imposing a ban on the conference?

Ulad Vialicka — The conference has been initiated by its Organising Committee composed of a number of member organisations of the National Platform of the Eastern Partnership’s Civil Society Forum: International Consortium “EUROBELARUS”, European Transformation Centre, Belarusian Institute for Strategic Studies, “Solidarity” Committee for Protection of Persecuted Persons, Office for Democratic Belarus, National Association of Wheelchair Users, and “Movement ‘For Freedom’”. As the National Platform is, in its essence, a communication arena, then, correspondingly, initiating such a conference needs a different form of legal personality. This is why the Organising Committee has been set up. A proposal was made to hold the conference on the basis of the National Platform.

In the first place, we have addressed a request to the Minsk Johannes Rau International Educational Centre to provide us with an opportunity of discussing the joint strategy of the democratic forces. As the decisions taken at the Minsk International Education Centre are directly dependent on the opinion of the Minsk City Executive Committee as one of its co-founders, after some time we were informed that a decision has been taken at the Minsk City Executive Committee level to turn our request down. It happened on March 14. We have also made attempts to organise the conference using other acceptable venues. However, all our requests have been turned down for various reasons.

Today we have no answer in writing from the Minsk City Executive Committee, because we addressed the Minsk International Educational Centre. We have sent today in this respect a letter to the Minsk City Executive Committee asking it to clarify the position of the Minsk City Executive Committee as to the reasons why we have been denied the right of holding this kind of event at the Minsk International Educational Centre, although it has its premises available.

We also inform it on the alternative dates when we would like to suggest, it is the period between April 7 and 10.

We seem to be late discussing the strategy due to the fact what course the events in this country are taking. However, we do believe that one more attempt to do it in a maximum open and public way and in acceptable and decent conditions should be, after all, reacted to. We would like to make sure, in the least, about the official reaction: to learn for what reasons the authorities do not like the idea of having the conference or to achieve providing the premises, if the reasons are of ‘a purely technical nature’.

This is how the situation looks like in terms of the conference organising aspects.

 

Andrey Dmitriev — I would like to add something, if I may.

I will say right away that it has not been approved, but it seems to me that in view of the conference’s changing format (I mean that it has already undergone some changes; here I am present as a representative of the Coordination Council) it would be right if also a representative of the Coordination Council joined the Organising Committee.

One more thing. Mr. Uladzimir Mackevich was saying in his truly election campaign speech about the criticism of the document submitted by him. And in this case it would be great, if the conference did not discuss a separate document of the National Platform, but to have a previous attempt to bring together the initial positions of the Coordination Committee and the National Platform. And the conference would, indeed, become a real debate which would enable us to move closer to the purpose declared by all the participants of today’s event: moulding the democratic forces’ common strategy.

Such a conference must really take place. It seems to me that we must address not just the City Executive Committee, but we can also address directly Mr. Makiej who is a chairman of the Public Consultative Council. We should ask him: “If You are a person responsible for the dialogue, then we would like to know Your position as to this issue”.

 

Ulad Vialicka — In this case, I would like to make one more clarification. In principle, there has been so far no profound discussion within the National Platform, as to what the strategy should be like. We and a number of organisations have proposals on the strategy. They are even personified in the authors who have brought about the proposals. But a strategy does not become a strategy before it is backed by quite large and significant public forces. And the National Platform, in this sense, I shall reiterate, is an arena and a ground to have this kind of discussions, involving, in the first place, the civil society. However, judging by the way our communication develops, the conference seems to be in progress: in the mode of bilateral and multilateral consultations among various players, in the mode of this press conference and in the mode of the expert round table held on March 15. This is to say that it is a kind of mega-conference, although we would like it to have a more comprehensive and integrated nature. In this respect, probably the negotiation pathway with the PCC and its head is worth trying. This is what the public consultations in the national interests are all about.

 

Moderator — You are welcome, “Euroradio” representative.

 

Andrey Yeliseeu, “Euroradio” — Perhaps, it is not correct to ask who among the politicians is a cheapskate, but what other politicians have agreed to negotiations?

 

Andrey Dmitriev — Let me answer, probably, but not as to who is a cheapskate, but on those who have agreed.

Today we are saying that there is no strategy yet. The difference is a big one and it has to be borne in mind. We do not consider this particular document within the Coordination Council as the strategy. All the Coordination Council members (today it is more than 20 members) are not able to say that there is already a document available which is the strategy. It is not true. But there is a proposal on formulating a strategy. In this case, the discussion has been provoked by the proposal authors from the “EUROBELARUS”, for which they deserve an acknowledgement and gratitude. Now the Coordination Council is busy developing its proposals and its vision triggered by the proposal. Subsequently, we shall begin a general discussion. This is why, it seems to me, there is no politician today who would say that no common strategy is needed. At least, none within the National Council, for sure.

 

Uladzimir Kolas — I would also like to add something, because it is a painful subject for us, too. One has to say that this kind of egotism and ambitions is, indeed, the engine, the incentive which makes a politician fight and do what he is doing. In principle, in a normal democratic situation, this is something needed, when the politicians are struggling among themselves for the right to propose a better way and will deliver a better future for the people. But in our situation we have to unite to be able to create this possibility, but here so far no politician has been able to transgress his essence of this type. This is my opinion which is shared by the Belarusian Intellectuals’ Council.

 

Alyaksandr Milinkevich — I would like to add that the strategy has been reviewed at the “Belarusian Choice” meeting, which was founded, as you remember, at the onset of the election campaign and which includes the BPF, Navasiad’s Freedom & Progress Party, Greens’ Party, Mihalevich’s organisation “For Modernisation” and the “Movement ‘For Freedom’”. We have looked at the strategy and we quite agree with the basic provisions of the strategy, although some issues caused discussions. We have joined the organisation process of the conference which has not been allowed yet. There has been some talking with Siarhiej Kalakin. His reaction is approximately the same: he believes that such a strategy is needed. The paramount thing is that the strategy should not just be a strategy for a group of political parties, let us underline it. I believe it is a great chance; and the need is great to have it in the form of a consolidated centre of the political forces, social forces and expert community. This is something to aim.

 

Uladzimir Mackievich — As the question contained a word referring it to the one who said the word, I shall try to answer. Thanks to God, I am no politician as such, who seeks electoral support. I refer to myself as a cultural politician and work in this sense with the word and the ideas. I do not need a wide support from the people, who would lay their trust on me as their representative, would cast their votes for me, etc. The thing which matters to me is to be heard. And this is why I am in a position to name among the dozens of renowned and popularised by the media people referring to themselves as politicians quite a few persons, who are have been organically unable of reaching any agreements for many, many years. I can do it especially for the Euroradio beyond the framework of the press conference, not to have my personal opinion (my opinion as an analyst, expert and a cultural politician) associated with the opinions held by the people whom I respect and who are representing here this or that position.

This is why I can tell especially for the Euroradio who is who in the Belarusian political beau-monde today. But, in general, it is a thing for the media people to tell these things. A person, who has been for many years solidarising verbally with the democratic community, cannot be referred to as a politician, if his deeds are every time directed at destroying the consolidation. You know for yourselves many such people. And I think that the role of journalism and the role of the mass media is, among other things, to highlight who is who in the Belarusian politics. 

 

Volha Chvoin, “Novy Chas” (“The New Time”) — You have pointed out that the Lukasenka regime may only engage in negotiations under pressure. Please, name the pressure tools speculated by you? In other words, what do you mean?

 

Uladzimir Mackievich — Jean Sharp enumerated about 140 ways of non-violent resistance. The first and foremost pressure is consolidation, when we give our voice to a certain spokesman to speak in the name of us all, rather than having many, many separate voices heard. Today, even although the regime acknowledges the existence of the other part of the nation, which exists with other forces and with other views, and which has to be reckoned with, if dozens of people are speaking out of sync on behalf of this part of the nation, it may be ignored. But should they agree on at least one tiny position, then it may not be ignored.

Further on. The usual ways of exerting pressure are strikes for the workers and rallies and demonstrations, conferences included, to express their ideas. Besides, pressure can be exerted through our allies and partners: for instance, Europe and the Russian democrats, who are few and far between, but they are still a fact of life. The International Observer Mission of the International Control Committee for Human Rights Situation in Belarus mainly consists of the Russian and CIS nationals, for example. And, therefore, there are quite a few pressure methods available, in fact.

But all these are the tools. When we were told: “The square will decide on all things! or The rally will decide on all things!” — no such things exist. These are the means, the pressure means. And they are only used to serve a certain goal. Today many Belarusian politicians see the means as a goal in itself.

Therefore, there are many pressure means. They should only be used in a shrewd way.

 

Andrei Yahorau — I would like to add, that in this respect there may be no unequivocal simple answer. If we think, for instance, that the negotiations are to be held in two years’ time, then we have to monitor the situation on a permanent basis as to what is going on for the two years in question. And the pressure is a possibility in certain instrumental forms, and all the instruments are in place (one can read about them in the political struggle history), but which one is deployed, when the time is right, will depend on how the economic, external political and, beyond any doubt, the domestic political situation develops and, among other things, proceeding from the democratic forces consolidation level and their growing public support. All these things will dictate the specific form and the specific tool we shall choose as a means of pressure to make the regime get engaged in the negotiations. 

 

 

Press Office of the International Consortium “EUROBElARUS”