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OSCE Parliamentary Assembly adopts resolution on Belarus

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE PA) on July 9 adopted a resolution on Belarus during its 20th annual session in Belgrade, Serbia.

The resolution, proposed by Uta Zapf, chairperson of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Belarus, is aimed at renewing dialogue with Minsk and calls on the Belarusian authorities to release the former presidential candidates and other opposition activists imprisoned following the December 19, 2010 post-election protest in Minsk, who are called political prisoners, allow them legal counsel, family visits, and medical care, allow independent experts appointed under the Moscow Mechanism into the country, and to develop a media law in line with the country’s international commitments.

Viktar Huminski, deputy chairperson of Belarus’ House of Representatives, argued at the meeting that the adoption of the resolution might reduce the possibility of dialogue with Belarus to zero. He pointed out that the situation in the country was stable and predictable, and therefore there was no need to adopt such a resolution. The text is abundant in biased and vague wordings, he noted.

“The resolution is neither an invitation for dialogue nor a helping hand,” said Valyantsina Lyavonenka, a member of the House’s international affairs committee. She described the resolution as superficial, biased and subjective. //BelaPAN