Riga Forum With Participation of Belarusian Democrats :: Charter'97 :: News

One of the most representative international forums devoted to the Belarusian themes, it to be held in the capital of Latvia today. The conference’s name is “Future of the Democracy outside Baltic states”. More than 200 people participate in it. Among them three senators and two members of the House of Representatives Chamber of the US Congress, ambassadors of the countries of the Baltic states and Scandinavia, representatives of the parliaments of Ukraine, Poland and the Czech Republic. Several dozens of representatives of the largest media of the world – «New York Times», «Financial Times», «CNN», «The Economist», «Radio Free Europe» and others cover the work of the forum. 22 participants represent the Belarusian opposition. There are no representatives of official authorities at the conference.

It is planned that the forum is to be opened by several speeches, in particular, of US Senator John McCain. John McCain is one of the senators who support the “Act On Democracy In Belarus”, which is under consideration in the US Congress now. He is known by his tough position towards Lukashenka regime, was one of the initiators of the conference “Axis of Evil: Belarus – the Missing Link” which was held in the USA in the end of 2002. It is also of no small importance that among the speeches opening the conference, there will be the speech of the activist of Belarusian civil initiative “We Remember” of Iryna Krasowskaya, wife of the abducted Businessman Anatol Krasowsky.

In the first half of the day representatives of the Foreign Ministries of all the countries of Baltic region, Scandinavia and Ukraine are to share their understanding of the situation on the theme “Democratic development in the region, last tendencies and perspectives”.

The main part of the Riga forum’s name is “Democracy in Belarus: Elections of 2004 and further”. In its framework the discussion on the situation in Belarus in the light of the imminent parliamentary elections is to be held. Three persons representing three most important political forces – coordinator of the European coalition “Free Belarus” Nikolay Statkevich, one of the leaders of the People’s Coalition Five Plus Anatol Lyabedzka, and Valery Fralow, head of the MPs group “Respublika” are to take the floor. Meetings of the Belarusians with the foreign guests of the forum, by the way, started even after the end of the forum.

Forum organized at a so high level and with support of the Latvian FM gave rise to distinctly negative reaction of the Belarusian authorities. “Preventive” attacks in the form of articles and TV comments were made by the Belarusian state-run TV channel and the newspaper of the Presidential administration “Sovetskaya Byelorussia”. Yesterday an infuriated reaction of the Belarusian FM followed as well. As press secretary of the Belarusian FM Andrey Savinych informed on Thursday, the “invitations to the forum were addressed only to those people in Belarus and other countries whose views are previously known”. The event itself was called “suspicious”.

Before the departure from the airport Minsk to Riga two Belarusian participants of the conference – Nikolay Statkevich, coordinator of the European coalition “Free Belarus” and the Chater’97 coordinator Zmitser Bandarenka were searched thoroughly. People who made examination, asked them about the papers taken with them, in particular, about the texts of their speeches.

Today we plan to inform you about key speeches made at the forum in Riga.