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Officials behind economic crisis should be held liable, says opposition politician

The Political Council of the United Civic Party (UCP) held a meeting in Minsk on June 9 to discuss a short and long-term strategy, a draft statement on the authorities’ part in the ongoing economic crisis in Belarus and ways of promoting an anti-crisis plan drawn up by the party’s expert group.

In an interview with BelaPAN, UCP Chairman Anatol Lyabedzka suggested that the plan had prompted the authorities to propose their own plan, referring to the blueprint unveiled by the Council of Ministers on June 3.

“We now can compare our opinion on the situation to that held by the authorities,” Mr. Lyabedzka said. “But the most important thing is what will be done in the current conditions. I think the answer is obvious. We propose a program to get out of the crisis, while the authorities seek to perpetuate what exists today… They do not acknowledge one key thing: the economic model proposed to Belarus by Lukashenka and his team is a dead end and it is to blame for the harsh economic and financial crisis that our country is experiencing.”

The situation is paradoxical as the authorities try to put the blame for the crisis on the organizers of motorists’ protest, bloggers and the private newspaper Narodnaya Volya and Nasha Niva, Mr. Lyabedzka said.

“We demand that those who managed our country poorly or sat idle should be held liable under criminal laws,” he stressed.