There can be no Belarus-EU dialog without equal participation of the civil society

A detailed comment of the Coordinating Board of the Belarusan National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum on possible restoration of cooperation between Belarus and the EU.

On September 10 the Coordinating Board of the Belarusan National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum (EaP CSF) voiced its stance re possible restoration of cooperation between Belarus and the EU.

As Sviatlana Karaliova, the head of the Coordinating Board of the Belarusan National Platform, noted in the comment to the “EuroBelarus” Information Service, the document was quickly elaborated and adopted: “the members of the board had no global contradictions”. Sviatlana Karaliova emphasizes that for now the main thing is actualization of 12 EU’s demands, which has almost disappeared from the EU-Belarus political vocabulary over the last few years. “PACE representatives will personally receive our document; we will be waiting for the reaction hoping that Europe will listen to the opinion of the Belarusan civil society”, - said the head of the Coordinating Board.

Let us recall that on September 8-10 the delegation of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) visited Minsk. The visit resulted in adoption of a statement where PACE calls upon Belarusan authorities to “continue improving the situation with human rights”. The delegation “welcomes openness of the Belarusan authorities, who invited PACE representatives to the country for the first time over 14 years”.

Mihail Matskevich, the member of the Center for Legal Transformation, took part in the meeting with the representatives of the Belarusan civil society and human rights organizations. “Let me note that it was Elena Tonkacheva, the chairperson of the Center for Legal Transformation, who should have taken part in the meeting, but it didn’t happen since she was forced to leave Belarus for political reasons”, -said Mihail Matskevich in the interview with the “EuroBelarus” Information Service.

He emphasized that the Center for Legal Transformation “is consciously taking the position of non-participation in elections as an institution, i.e. we don’t organize observation and don’t participate in the electoral circle”. “It is our principal position. However, let me recall that after the former elections and after the Square 2010 we were taking part in working with the consequences of mass violations of human rights and with the monitoring of administrative detentions, criminal lawsuits re the so-called mass turmoil in particular”, - Matskevich said.

“At the meeting with PACE delegation Lawtrend voiced the following: the release of political prisoners is the demonstration of good will; but the fact of their release only after 5 years after the verdict is the consequence of weak European policy towards Belarus. The fact of their release cannot be the reason for changing strategy of European structures towards Belarus, - told Mihail Matskevich. – We believe that in the current situation change of European policy to Belarus in the human rights sphere will be inappropriate and strategically wrong. We have repeatedly paid attention to PACE representatives and Mr. Rigoni that human rights organizations need clear and transparent position of the PACE Special Rapporteur for human rights issues and democracy. However, until now we didn’t find any written and public document that would disclose the position of the Special Rapporteur. We recommended European structures to use reports of Miklós Haraszti, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus, when organizing dialog with the authorities since this is the only international document that is complex and that gives evaluation of situation with human rights in Belarus”.

Elena Tonkacheva, the chairperson of the Center for Legal Transformation and one of the authors of the statement made by the National Platform, commented upon its key points to the “EuroBelarus” Information Service.

She emphasized that “of course, the National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum should have react to the current political developments, such as the visit of the PACE representatives; the visit of the delegation in representative membership demonstrates that Belarus is now in the focus of European policy”.

Elena Tonkacheva notes: “current statements made by European politicians prove that renovation of relations goes to a quite active phase; unfortunately, this rhetoric has arguments that appeal to the improvements in the sphere of human rights and democracy; we need to understand that this rhetoric and these actions are placed on exclusively political level, which, as is well known, tends to ignore uncomfortable facts and circumstances”.

That’s why, Elena Tonkacheva highlights, now it’s crucial that we have a coordinated stance of the Belarusan civil society: “first, the stance towards the processes in the human rights sphere and democratic issues inside the country; and secondly, a quite active public stance that cannot be ignored by European institutions and should be supported by the European civil society”.

The head of Lawtrend recalls that “for now we received no document that would at least somehow describe the situation with human rights and democracy in Belarus from Andrea Rigoni since his appointment to the position of PACE Special Rapporteur for human rights issues and democracy”.

According to her, absence of such public document over such long period of time “questions Rigoni’s work, as well as his ability or independence in forming his stance or obvious indifference to this problem”. Human rights defendants, notes Elena Tonkacheva, considering all the above-stated, “insist on relying on the documents and reports prepared by Miklós Haraszti, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus, until complex independent evaluation of situation with human rights is made”. She emphasizes that Haraszti’s assessments are made “not to fit the changing political conditions, but are based on systematic measurements of situation during active communication with Belarusan human rights organizations”.

“We understand that the process of renovating relations has political nature; and we do not idealize this process. However, we insist on adhering to the real situation despite all the statements about the seeming improvement of human rights situation, - Elena Tonkacheva says. – Well, political prisoners are at large, it’s good; however, general situation with human rights in the country remains stably bad. By this we, first of all, mean political rights and freedoms: freedom of association, freedom of assembly, freedom of media, and independence of courts. If we assume that we refuse from the false rhetoric about the improvement in the situation with human rights, it gives us a chance to switch to search of concrete pragmatic decisions directed at the closest, medium-term and long-term change in the situation with human rights in the country. In particular, we believe that narrowing the agenda of demands to extremely insignificant – abolition of death penalty and introduction of an ombudsman’s position – is vicious and strategically wrong. We believe that we need to come back to the demands that were formulated in the documents known as “12 demands of the EU”.

According to the head of Lawtrend, in the near future a research that should be of equally important concern to the European politicians and Belarusan civil society: “a complex document for evaluating the real current situation through the 12 EU’s demands”.

According to Elena Tonkacheva, “we should get an instrument in accordance to which European institutions and Belarusan civil society will be able to perform actual measurements of changes using specific methodology”. It should happen no less than once a year – “and should be a starting point for any further assessments on the part of European politicians with respect to the human rights situation and issues of democracy”. It is only at the basis of these conclusions and common document that statements re improvement, worsening or stagnation in this sphere of relations can be made, assumes Elena Tonkacheva.

For real common work “we should get such mechanism of communication between the Belarusan civil society and European politicians that would guarantee the responsiveness of opinion of the Belarusan civil society, Belarusan human rights organizations, Belarusan entities oriented at the European vector of development”. And this opinion should become basic for assessing the situation inside the country, notes the head of Lawtrend.

Only after these suggestions are implemented that we can “move further, having enough trust between the parties, as well as have a stance that Belarusan state structures would find hard to ignore, hard to manipulate, and hard to juggle with”.

Elena Tonkacheva believes that “today significant or even crucial role should and can take the National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum, because this area and institution is able to gather leading civil society experts and opinions of civil society representatives, who can support their stances with their previous diligent professional activity”.

“I hope that the National Platform and the current membership of the Coordinating Board will adopt it as their main working task. I welcome the start of this process and is convinced that the National Platform will find possibilities to continue such activity in future”, - emphasized Elena Tonkacheva.