BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

31/03/2006

The beginning of the end?

The democratic opposition in Belarus did not win the presidential election but it made a large step towards victory, Belarussian opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich said in Warsaw, ahead of meetings with Polish leaders last Thursday.

Programme hosted by Krysia Kolosowska

01.04.06

Milinkevich was defeated in the March 19 poll, which was branded in the West as rigged. He came to Poland to tell the world what is going now in his country, ruled by the authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko.

The democratic opposition in Belarus did not win the presidential election but it made a large step towards victory, Belarussian opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich said in Warsaw, ahead of meetings with Polish leaders.

Milinkevich was defeated in the March 19 poll, which was branded in the West as rigged. He is now in Poland with an aim to tell the world what is going now in his country, ruled by the authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko. The democratic opposition in Belarus did not win the presidential election but it made a large step towards victory, Belarussian opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich said in Warsaw, ahead of meetings with Polish leaders.

Poland has no doubt that the European Union must condemn the Belarusian regime, which cracked down on the opposition after the presidential election arresting about one thousand people, among them Poland's former ambassador to Minsk and a Polish journalist.

Speaking after talks in Riga with the Latvian head of government Aigars Kalvitis, Polish prime minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz said that what happens in Belarus touches Poles directly. But he spoke against economic sanctions or a blockade of Minsk because that would affect the common people rather than the regime. This view is also expressed by Alexander Milinkevich.

"I am for sanctions directed against Belarusian officials rather than economic sanctions which harm the ordinary people and give the Lukashenko regime an excuse to launch an anti-western propaganda." Milinkevich told the Polish Parliament that help for the repressed in Belarus and independent information are crucial at the moment.

" No effort must be spared to support the civic society in Belarus. I mean NGOs, independent trade unions, local initiatives, youth organizations. They have good experience of cooperation with Polish organizations."

Jakub Boratynski, an eastern studies expert at the Batory Foundation in Warsaw, says that Poland has to be ready to launch long-term programs of support that would continue long after Belarus stops making the headlines in the newspapers.

"Poland should closely cooperate with neighbours of Belarus - Lithuania and Ukraine, as well as with the EU to set up a proper infrastructure for high quality at least 12 hour radio program beamed towards Belarus. It is very important, however, not to limit ourselves to such high profile projects as independent broadcasting but to extend the support to independent newspapers, which we expect to be increasingly forced to operate in the underground."

Poland is launching a scholarship program for Belarusian students repressed for their support for the opposition and expelled from universities. Jakub Boratynski says it is an important message of solidarity and believes that its scope should be even broader.

"It would be important to extend the program so that it does not cover only victims of persecutions but also other Belarusian students to enable as many young people as possible to receive alternative education and sources of information and be exposed to a reality that is very different from the one they live in in Belarus"

Observers in Poland are unanimous that things are changing fast in Belarus and the nervous reaction of its authoritarian ruler Alexander Lukashenko, who chose to crack down on the opposition and its supporters, only proves how scared he is.

Source:

http://www.polskieradio.pl/polonia/article.asp?tId=34888&j=2

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