OSCE praises Belarus for progress but gives bad mark for elections
Lidziya Yarmoshyna, the chairwoman of the Central Election Commission, noted that the conclusions of the OSCE “bring optimism and invite for a further dialogue”. But Alexander Bukhvostov, UDF’s election monitoring coordinator, does hot share her optimism.
“It sounds too soft, because this election was even more flawed than the 2004 polls”, he said.
Alexander Milinkevich, the leader of For Freedom movement agrees with those “positive moments” of the election, expressed in the OSCE report, but believes they did not change the essence of the campaign.
“There were positive moments. I know and can name them. But they did not play any practical role. Suffice it to say that independent candidates had no representatives in election commissions. In Belarus, falsifications are made in those district election commissions. Everything can be ideal, but the outcome is bad”, Milinkevich said.
He also brings actual facts of violations.
“I know that a pro-democracy candidate in Shklou managed to catch two protocols: one was empty and signed by the district election commission. In the second protocol, the numbers were put by a pencil, and it was also signed. This is a clear violation. In Minsk’s Uruccha district where Ales Mikhalevich was running, 60 unaccounted ballot papers were found in the box for early voting. Similar facts were reported from across Belarus”, says Milinkevich.
Alexander Bukhvostov thinks that the OSCE report may push Europe to thaw relations with Belarus, although it is not decisive in making a decision on the recognition or non-recognition of Belarus elections.
“I think there is a lot of political moments which are possibly more important than this report. However, this assessment may soften the attitude towards the regime, but this attitude will be formed according to the other political criteria. Since Belarus is at the center of Russia-West opposition, there will be “certain bargaining” for Belarus”, Bukhvostov said.
But Alexander Milinkevich believes that West’s intent to engage with the official Minsk is actually not bad. He says these contacts should not be stopped.
“For me as a citizen of Belarus, it is obvious that such contacts should be maintained. If Belarus becomes isolated from the European processes and programs, if there is a wall between us and Poland, we will simply lose our economic independence. Our debt to Russia is growing in a catastrophic manner. That’s why I think that the economic changes are possible with the participation of the European Union, and this dialogue should be continued. 12 EU conditions should be implemented so that no-one can say that it is amoral to collaborate with the regime and hold this kind of elections”.
Up to now, the opposition had a priority in dialogues with the European Union. But what is it going to do if the West begins talking to the official Minsk?
“The Belarusian opposition should understand that it has no veto power for the meetings between Europe and the authorities in Belarus. We should better focus on working with the people. This iis where there are total failures. Europe will not do it for us”, Milinkevich insists.
