BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

23/06/2009

PACE to return Special Guest status to Belarus delegation

STRASBOURG, June 23 (Itar-Tass) - The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on Tuesday intends to return the Belarusian delegation to Strasbourg. The European parliamentarians will consider a draft resolution "on the situation in Belarus" with the appeal to the PACE Bureau to cancel the suspension of the Special Guest status of Belarus in the Assembly.

The Special Guest status was once granted to Minsk in 1992, but in 1997, the draft says, it was suspended "due to the lack of progress in the human rights sphere." Now PACE rapporteurs state positive changes in Belarus regarding the development of democratic rights and freedoms.

Among such changes PACE notes, in particular, Belarus' membership in the Eastern Partnership programme, the release of all internationally recognised political prisoners and the authorities' measures to grant freedom to organisations, assembly and the press, cooperation with the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) for reforming the national electoral law and consent for the opening of the Council of Europe's information office in Minsk. In particular, the PACE draft mentions the registration of opposition political movements and giving permission to independent printed media for publication in Belarus. The document says that the Parliamentary Assembly welcomes such considerable progress and calls for making it irreversible.

According to a PACE press release, in his opening address at the summer session, PACE President Lluis Maria de Puig said that he hoped the Assembly would adopt a resolution on Tuesday calling for the Belarusian parliament's Special Guest status to be restored. This was simply a first step and very strict conditions would be applied before even a second one could be contemplated, he said. Nevertheless, it was an "outstretched hand," to the authorities and the opposition, both of whom would have the opportunity to take part in the Assembly's activities.

He was hopeful that this opening would bear fruit. The Assembly was expected to adopt an important resolution during this session, he said, establishing a new "Partner for democracy" status for some of the Council of Europe's neighbouring countries. As with the parliaments enjoying Special Guest status, he said, the Assembly already had excellent relations with the Algerian, Kazakh, Moroccan and Tunisian parliaments, and with the Palestinian Legislative Council. It was now time to formalise these relationships and give them a clear framework and still greater substance, says the release.

The Assembly intends to continue monitoring of the process of Minsk's movement towards "the Council of Europe standards." In this connection PACE calls on the Belarusian authorities to prevent backslides in the issue of political prisoners, to overturn their conviction and to abstain from persecution and harassment of the opposition.

Belarus aims to restore its Special Guest status in PACE, said Deputy Chairman of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of Belarus Valery Ivanov as he met with Andrea Rigoni, PACE Rapporteur on Belarus in early June, the Belta news agency reported. "Taking into account the actions Belarus takes, the restoration of the Special Guest status would be a positive step on behalf of the Council of Europe. Belarus believes that PACE will make a positive decision on this on June 23," Ivanov noted. In his opinion, the future development of contacts with PACE will be faster and more productive after the opening of the Council of Europe information office in Minsk. Belarus is interested in acceding to several legal instruments of the Council of Europe, in particular, criminal law ones. Valery Ivanov underscored the importance of resuming regular meetings, contacts between the Belarusian parliament and PACE.

The Russian delegation will back the draft resolution on the return of the Belarusian delegation to PACE. "We have been for long consistently calling for this decision. The label of a rogue country in the Council of Europe space is not becoming to both Belarus and the Council of Europe," deputy head of the RF delegation, first deputy chairman of the international affairs committee of the State Duma lower house of Russia's parliament Leonid Slutsky said.

Maria de Puig also positively assessed the proposal to restore the Special Guest status of Belarus. According to him, if the decision is made it will mark the beginning of Belarus' integration in the future.

The Special Guest status was created by PACE in the 1990s to help countries meet the conditions to become full members of the Council of Europe. It enables parliamentarians to take part in Assembly activities, but without the right to vote.

The Parliament of Belarus held Special Guest status from 1992 to 1997, but it was suspended in 1997 following the Constitutional referendum of November 1996. Shortly after, Belarus' application to join the Council of Europe was frozen, and it remains the only European country that is not a member of the Organisation.

Source:

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=14078646&PageNum=0

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