BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
25/04/2008
European Parliament chief blasts Belarus 'dictatorship'
VILNIUS The president of the European Parliament blasted Belarus yesterday, saying the authoritarian ex-Soviet republic's 10 million people have a right to be free.
"Europe's last dictatorship exists in Belarus," Hans-Gert Poettering said in a speech to lawmakers in Lithuania. "We support the people of Belarus. They also have a right to freedom, democracy, the right to live in a free society, ruled by law and not by the lawlessness of a dictator," Poettering said.
"I would like to express our solidarity with the people of Belarus here, in Lithuania," he added.
Lithuania, a country of 3.4 million people which borders Belarus, broke free from the crumbling communist bloc in 1991 and joined the European Union in 2004.
Among the EU's 27 member states, it is one of the most vocal critics of Belarus' President Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled his country with an iron hand since 1994 and has regularly been dubbed in the West as "Europe's last dictator."
Western powers have long criticised Lukashenko's regime for imprisoning opposition leaders, preventing criticism in the state-controlled media and imposing severe restrictions on rallies in Belarus, which also became an independent country in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed.
Last month, Vilnius made an official protest over the assault and detention of two Lithuanian journalists who were covering an unsanctioned opposition rally in the Belarussian capital Minsk, where riot police beat protesters.
Meanwhile, the Belarus government said it has ordered the United States to further cut its embassy staff amid an escalating diplomatic row over alleged human rights abuses. The US embassy said it had been allowed to keep a staff of five in Minsk.
The foreign ministry said it had told the US ambassador to "carry out the recommendation of the Belarussian Foreign Ministry on mutual cuts of the American diplomatic presence in Minsk and that of Belarus in Washington."
In March, Belarus had already ordered a cut from 32 to 17 at the US embassy in protest at economic sanctions imposed over human rights violations. US ambassador, Karen Stewart, was also asked to leave. Belarus says that US sanctions against domestic oil monopoly Belneftekhim violate international law.
Washington imposed the sanctions on foreign assets of Belneftekhim to put pressure on the country's authoritarian leadership to allow democratic freedoms and release political prisoners.
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