Uladzimir Kobets: “Economic benefits from cooperation with Belarus should be coordinated with human rights issues”

On October 20 a coordinator of civil campaign “European Belarus” as a member of Belarusian democrats’ delegation has met with the Foreign Minister of Estonia Urmas Paet.

Former chairman of the Supreme Council of Belarus, chairman of the Belarusian Social Democratic Hramada Stanislau Shushkevich, a coordinator of the civil campaign “European Belarus” Uladzimir Kobets, United Civil party leader Anatol Lyabedzka, deputy chairman of “For Freedom” movement Viktar Karneenka, co-chairman of the Belarusian Christian Democracy party Paval Sevyarynets and others took part in the meeting.

“It is important that during the meeting we have heard from mister Paet setting forth Estonia’s firm position on observation of human rights in Belarus. Urmas Paet has informed us about the meeting of representatives of the Baltic states and the Benelux countries in Vilnius, at which they had come to a conclusion that no visible steps in the sphere of human rights have been done,” Uladzimir Kobets said to www.charter97.org website.

“Essentially, this position has coincided with the point of view and conclusions which had been done by us at the meeting with the head of Estonian Foreign Ministry. In particular, we conveyed information about harsh dispersals of protest rallies on September 9, 16 and October 16, abut unmotivated brutality against peaceful demonstrators. Besides, the situation with mass media was discussed, and that it is not enough to return three newspapers into the distribution network in order to make far-reaching conclusions about the progress in this sphere,” the politician noted.

As said by the “European Belarus” coordinator, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet underlined that the stand of his country is: “everything that could contribute to development of the civil society in Belarus should be done”.

“And it is obvious that in the run-up to the EU foreign ministers meeting in November the position of Estonia is to extend the sanctions against Belarusian officials, as there is no visible progress in the sphere of human rights,” Kobets said.

The coordinator of “European Belarus” noted that it was important for Belarusian democrats to learn that Estonia painstakingly concerns itself with the issue of facilitating Schengen visa regime for citizens of Belarus.

“We have noted that the situation when Belarusian citizens pay large sum of money and face such obstacles when receiving a visa to the EU countries is far from normal. We have expressed our position that the visas should be as cheap as possible or even free, and this issue should be solved as soon as possible,” Kobets said.

“Today development of relations of the European Union with the Belarusian regime considerably surpasses the movement of the Belarusian authorities toward the European Union, especially in the issues of democracy. We do not see obvious progress, in particular as far as release of political prisoners, ending of crackdown on the opposition, decriminalization of activities on behalf of unregistered organisation are concerned. The article of the Criminal Code punishing such activities is still in force. It concerns laws on mass media, electoral code, capital punishment abolition. All these issues are not solved for today. Economic benefits from cooperation with Belarus should be coordinated with human rights issues., as the European Union is founded on the basis of values, and not only on mutual economic advantage. And that meets interests of the Republic of Belarus and Belarusian nation. And we have been said in response that the Estonian position coincides with the position of the democratic forces of Belarus,” stated the coordinator of “European Belarus”.