PACE Rapporteur advises against resumption of Belarus's special guest status

The Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly has published a draft resolution on Belarus, which will be put on a vote on June 27 at the PACE summer session in Strasbourg.

The draft resolution is part of the report prepared by PACE Rapporteur Andrea Rigoni.

“The Committee deeply regrets that a positive trend of greater international openness and dialogue between Belarus and the Assembly has been undermined by the recent escalation of violence and harassment against peaceful protesters in the spring of 2017, and calls for the immediate release of still detained opposition activists and for an investigation into the allegations of ill-treatment and intimidation against them.

The Committee urges the Belarusian authorities to respect and uphold the right to freedom of assembly, association and expression, and it sets out a number of recommendations to ensure political pluralism and free and fair elections and a genuine political will on the issue of capital punishment and the administration of justice,” says the report.

Mr. Rigoni stresses that the Committee organized regular hearings in Strasbourg and in Paris, with the participation of Belarusian MPs, human rights activists and opposition leaders. The latest exchange of views took place during the January part-session on 24 January 2017.

“For the first time in twelve years, an elected represented from the opposition, Ms Hanna Kanopatskaya, from United Civic Party, attended along with Mr Andrei Naumovich, Chairman of the Standing Commission on Human Rights, National Relations and Mass Media, as well a representative of the Human Rights Centre Viasna, Mr Valiantsin Stefanovic,” the Rapporteur said.

During the event, Stefanovic offered his assessment of the country’s ​​human rights record in 2016, calling the government’s approach a ‘policy of soft practices’. Rigoni, in turn, said in his report that the Belarusian authorities had been implementing the policy up to March 2017. However, he states, “there has been no systematic improvement in the human rights situation in Belarus and government restrictions on political freedoms, in particular freedom of speech, association, peaceful assembly and religion, have remained in place.”

Speaking about the events of March 2017, as well as their impact on the Assembly’s cooperation with Belarus, Mr. Rigoni said that “the government’s success in achieving its objectives to ensure international acceptance, maintain neutrality and improve its economy will very much depend on the degree of political liberalisation and pluralism that the system is willing to accept, with a constructive opposition that has a stake in governance.”

Andrea Rigoni says that the issue of the death penalty is still strategic in shaping the Assembly’s relations with the Belarusian government and Parliament.

“I will repeat this tirelessly: a first and most urgent step for Belarus to show sincere openness to a meaningful dialogue with our Assembly would be an immediate moratorium on the use of the death penalty with a view to its permanent abolition,” he said.

“The absence of a moratorium on the use of the death penalty and of substantial, tangible and verifiable progress in terms of respect for the democratic values and principles upheld by the Council of Europe, the Assembly is not in a position to call on its Bureau to lift the suspension of the special guest status for the Parliament of Belarus,” concludes the Special Rapporteur.