Olga Zakharova: EU will get another punch from Makei

The West has a dialogue with itself by lifting sanctions from the Belarusian authorities.

Olga Zakharova, a representative of the Working Group on Investments of the Committee on International Control over the Human Rights Situation in Belarus, spoke to charter97.org about removing some Belarusian officials and companies from the EU blacklist.

“The EU added two persons to the list, though they earlier spoke about three persons. We need to check it. As for Peftiev's companies, the EU perhaps thought the owner had changed or the companies didn't work. To understand this decision we need to talk to the people who prepared the legal basis for lifting the sanctions from the companies, but they are unlikely to give public comments. It is more important that Beltechexport remains on the list. The West doesn't consider its formal sale, resale or repurchase to be a sufficient ground for removing the company from the list,” the human rights defender noted.

Olga Zakharova emphasised that the main question was why former heads of election commissions were removed from the blacklist.

“They stopped performing their functions, but they are still guilty of what they did. Whatever European politician say today, no one wants to completely worsen relations ahead of the Vilnius summit. On the other hand, I don't understand how many times the same mistake can be repeated. The European Union has a dialogue with itself, while Lukashenka just listens and does nothing. I am not happy about this. I'd like to see a real balance. I know that there were at least 10-15 candidates, not three. In this case it was because of the policy ahead of the Vilnius summit. I hope another punch from Makei, who will come to Vilnius, will make them sober. Now they want to demonstrate some progress,” the export supposes.

We remind that the European Union yesterday extended sanctions against official Minsk for a year. The list of persons and entities banned from entering the EU and subject to a freeze of the assets in Europe was updated. The EU sanctions are imposed on 232 persons and 25 entities. Earlier, the blacklist included 30 companies and 242 officials and oligarchs.