On the Eastern Partnership

(Declaration)

We welcome the idea of the Eastern Partnership and express our gratitude to the European Union which has included the Republic of Belarus to this program.

We understand the importance of the general objects which is based the new approach by the European Union to the antidemocratic Lukashenka regime on. This regime is annihilating the civil society in Belarus.

But we consider that the safeguarding of the rights of the civil society and of every person has to be condition for the relations with the authoritarian administration of Aliaxandr Lukashenka and that this condition has to be included to the Protocol of the Partnership. The participation of the civil society in the Eastern Partnership will guarantee the positive tendencies, as well as present the possibilities of the positive choice to the acting authorities of Belarus. Without the participation of the civil society the Partnership will not achieve the positive results and will be used by the antidemocratic regime in order to justify its destructive activity.

We concentrate your attention on the nature of the Lukashenka regime which is hostile to the culture. This regime is liquidating the civil society and violating the human rights, as well as methodically annihilating the Belarusan culture, education and creativity, national historical science. The regime’s policy hostile to the culture is based on the brutal Russification. In the modern world the culture is one of the principal foundations of the sovereignty. The brutal Russification and the annihilation of the culture are reinforcing the negative influence of the Russian policy carried out by the pro-imperialist circles in Belarus.

We would like to see among the foreground aspects of the Eastern Partnership the following aspect: the support of the Belarusan culture in order to preserve it and to prevent its systematical annihilation by the anti-Belarusan regime. We propose to add the sixths position to five positions proposed by the European Union in the network of its 12 requirements to the Belarusan authorities: the position on the securing of the free development of the Belarusan culture, education and creativity.

We consider that the energy sector as well as the diversification of the deliveries of the energetic resources could be the foreground priorities of the economical cooperation, namely – the investments to the projects and the technological base of the transportation of the energetic resources (petrol, gas and electricity).

We consider also that it is necessary to remove all the obstacles made by the Belarusan authorities and to secure the access to the information as well as the cultural and educational projects to the Belarusan people. The simplification of the visa system and the reduction of the prices of the visas for the Belarusan citizens would promote the intellectual interchange and would made the democratic values more understandable.

We would like to draw attention of the politicians of the European Union to the facts which witness that Mr. Lukashenka is elaborating the common strategy in relation to the Eastern Partnership with his Eastern allies. In our opinion if this aspect of the regime’s resistance will be underestimated and all the forces of the Republic of Belarus (including the Belarusan emigration) will not be included in the program of the Eastern Partnership the perspectives of the Eastern Partnership would not develop, or brought to a standstill (which is much worse) on the level of the recognition and legitimization of the undemocratic regime.

We are responsible for our people. Because of that we are interested in the viability of this program of the partnership. We hope that the initiators and participants of the Eastern Partnership will hear and support our position.

May 6, 2009
Prague

Ivonka Surwila,
Chairperson of the Council of the Belarusan People’s Republic,
Zianon Pazniak,
Presidential candidate on the elections in Belarus in 1994,
Stanislau Shushkevich
Presidential candidate on the elections in Belarus in 1994,
Aliaxandr Kazulin,
Presidential candidate on the elections in Belarus in 2006.

5/5/2009 › English