Ales Bialiatski: “CIS countries rebuilding police states pact”

Human rights defender Ales Bialiatski has commented on his Facebook page on the meeting of the Council of Heads of Security Bodies and Special Services of the CIS member states, which is being held in Dushanbe, Tajikistan.

According to the Central Asian News Service, representatives of special services have gathered in the capital of Tajikistan “to discuss joint measures to ensure information security in the CIS space, ways to improve cooperation in the framework of the Council for the fight against terrorism and extremism, the question of extremist and other illegal activities of right-wing organizations (neo-Nazis) and their possible involvement in the implementation of technology of so called “color revolutions”.

“Within the framework of the CIS, there is less and less talking about the human being and his rights, but more talking on how to limit the freedom of access to information to citizens in the participating countries. And the function of controllers is once again assigned to the security services, as it was in the Soviet Union. CIS is rebuilding a pact of police states,” writes Ales Bialiatski.

An agreement on cooperation of the CIS states in the field of information security was ratified by Belarus on 24 June 2014. According to the then head of the Belarusian KGB Valery Vakulchik, the practical implementation of the treaty should contribute to “a more effective use of new information and communication technologies aimed at enhancing counteractions against threats to information security of the CIS countries in order to best ensure the implementation of fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens”.