Belarusian Foreign Ministry is indignant

The Belarusian foreign ministry’s spokesman slammed a critical resolution on abuses of the criminal justice system in Belarus adopted by the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) on April 15.

The resolution called on the Belarusian authorities to abolish the Criminal Code article that criminalizes activities on behalf of an unregistered organization and urgently introduce a moratorium on executions and abolish the death penalty.

“The practice of adopting critical PACE resolutions on Belarus that have no constructive elements for establishing real cooperation and dialogue is counterproductive and has no prospects,” Andrey Papow said on Wednesday.

He said that the adoption of “yet another biased resolution that fits into the years-long pattern” of discussions on Belarus and “the condemnation” of Belarus “came as no surprise” for the Belarusian foreign ministry.

Mr. Papow noted that the report on abuses of the criminal justice system in Belarus had been prepared by Christos Pourgourides. Minsk has the grounds to question the competence and impartiality of the Cypriot MP who “is guided by his personal political ambitions rather than the interests of the development of a constructive dialogue between Belarus and the Council of Europe in his activities,” the ministry’s spokesman stressed.

“The report prepared by him is based on a superficial, one-sided analysis of information, on distorted and unverified data and does not reflect the objective situation in the judicial system of the Republic of Belarus,” Mr. Papow said.

He said that the PACE’s debate on the resolution showed that “the Assembly has clear-headed politicians, pragmatic lawmakers who are ready to have an equal, mutually beneficial, partner dialogue proceeding from the shared interests of Belarus and the Council of Europe.” “We are ready to develop constructive cooperation with such European politicians and are open to a discussion of any issues of mutual interest,” he concluded.

In the resolution, PACE expressed “deep” regret over “the numerous politically-motivated abuses of the criminal justice system that have taken place in recent years and are still taking place in the Republic of Belarus.”

PACE suggested that Belarusian and international human rights defenders “keep a record, in a transparent and objective manner, of both the victims and the perpetrators of politically-motivated abuses of the criminal justice system.”

The Assembly recommended that the member states of the Council of Europe, “through their diplomatic representations in Minsk, and in collaboration with local and international human rights defenders, continue intervening with the authorities on behalf of political prisoners and their families, and to offer them temporary protection.”

The Assembly called on the European Union and the United States to continue imposing targeted sanctions, such as visa bans or the freezing of assets, on Belarusian officials responsible for serious human rights abuses. //BelaPAN