Yarmoshyna can't stop thinking about Paris

Travel banned head of the Central Election Commission (CEC) mentioned again the capital of France in her speech on sanctions.

Lidziya Yarmoshyna, the Chairman of the Central Election Commission of the Republic of Belarus, says that the imposition of the West sanctions against members of election commissions will not stop Belarus presidential "elections".

"The members of the election commissions are people so closely associated with the State system in the best sense of the word, that it is exactly what defines their behavior and plan of actions. Fatherland welfare for them is of highest value than a possibility to go to Paris. Therefore, the imposition of Western sanctions does not affect the electoral processes", Yarmoshyna said in the interview to the magazine "Belaruskaia dumka", Interfax reports.

She pointed out that sanctions mostly extended to members of the Central Electoral Commission and regional leaders.

"Definitely, it is not good... And, thank God, some part of them with respect to former Commissions' members, including the Central one, were lifted. The maintenance of sanctions would be an absurd. By the way, I have heard my colleagues saying they would be offended if sanctions were not imposed against them. This is unfair when the sanctions were imposed against the Chairman of the Central Election Commission, but not against them. You've worked badly then", the head of the CEC said.

"These sanctions are so minuscule for my colleagues! Perhaps, those pragmatic people, thinking of money and facilities as the highest priority, may consider the ban to visit the EU the most negative factor. But our elections are conducted by those, who do not share such views. We have different values in life", she added.

Yarmoshyna also noted that the presidential elections would probably take place on November 15.

It should be recalled that all election campaigns held in Belarus since 1996 have been recognized by the OSCE as non-free and unfair. This is the reason Lidziya Yarmoshyna is denied entry into the EU and the USA. After the extension of the EU sanctions in 2008 Yarmoshyna stated that she regretted that as she dreamed of visiting Paris.