Vital Rymasheuski: Fight against dictatorship is our common task

Fighting against dictatorship became a common task for all nations of Eastern Europe.

A co-head of the organising committee to create the Belarusian Christian Democracy party (BCD) spoke to charter97.org about the night attack on protesters in Kiev.

“Today's events in Kiev are in fact the continuation of what has been happening in Belarus since 1996. I think Ukrainian opposition leaders are careless in their statements comparing Ukraine and Belarus. They say Ukraine is not Belarus, Belarusians cannot struggle as Ukrainians can. Belarusians, like Ukrainians, showed their will to resistance, the European choice and democracy, but in 1996, Russia sanctioned and backed repressions against the people of Belarus, and continues to finance the Belarusian authoritarian regime,” the politician is convinced.

The BCD co-head thinks the same is happening now in Ukraine.

“Yanukovych obviously acts on Putin's consent. His actions are coordinated and legalised by the Russian authorities. It's clear that violence will continue. Yanukovych's refusal to talk and his spit in the face of Europe by refusing to sign an agreement with the EU confirm that Yanukovych's regime will turn to Russia. It is the choice of the regime, but not the democratic authorities. The brutal dispersal of demonstrators was the turning point,” Vital Rymasheuski underlined.

The politician thinks the Ukrainian opposition should prepared for a long struggle with the Yanukovych regime.

“I am sure to will be the common fight of the people of Ukraine and Belarus. Fighting against dictatorship is the common task for all people of Eastern Europe. One of the causes is the realpolitik carried out by certain European politicians, whose strategy was negotiations with dictators. The examples of Belarus of 2010 and Ukraine of 2013 demonstrate the results of this policy. Ordinary citizens have to pay for mistakes of politicians,” Rymasheuski summed up.