To the Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus:

Belarus has been a member of the World Health Organization (WHO) and has been the party to its Constitution since the first day when it entered into the force on 7 April 1948.

On behalf of the Belarusian population, the Rada of the Belarusian Democratic Republic appeals to the WHO to urge the current Belarusian administration to follow its obligations to guarantee the fulfilment of the basic postulates of the ratified Constitution:

(1) to stop the mass discrimination of the population that is incarcerated due to their political beliefs in their access to the COVID health-related national polices as “the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition”;

(2) to take the responsibility for the health of its people by providing adequate health and social measures in the places of mass detention.

The people of Belarus call on the WHO to respond to the acute health emergency that has emerged in Belarus due to administrative neglect and refusal to deliver essential health services in the fragile settings, namely, to the mass-incarcerated population during the COVID-19 pandemics. The current Belarusian administration fails to take the necessary measures to prevent of the spread of the communicable disease of COVID-19 in the places of punishment and temporary detention, and we call on the WHO to urge that administration
to prioritize health in all policies and healthy settings equally for all its populations.

The Belarusian doctors have been raising the awareness of the massive physical and emotional tortures of thousands of individuals out of more than 30,000 people that have been arrested for political reasons since the presidential elections of Aug 9th, 2020. The doctors are publicly expressing their concerns about the mistreatment of the prisoners and of those waiting for their court decisions. The mistreatment consequences have led to many severe immediate and long-term health problems and even deaths.

The situation exacerbates when, despite the national COVID-19 response and prevention policy, COVID-19-positive detainees are put together with other individuals in overcrowded and often unventilated cells, exposing these others to the COVID-19 infection.

We refer to the WHO Constitution as the guarantor of the people’s participation in national health policies and ask the WHO to call on the current Belarusian administration to ensure an equal access to the national Belarusian COVID-19 emergency policy for those who are deprived of the liberty to protect themselves. We ask the WHO to assist in the mitigation of the spread of the COVID-19 in the Belarusian prisons and the places of the temporary detention and to help the prisoners with the access to the basic health protocols.

As one of the ways out of the created situation, we suggest calling on the Belarusian government to postpone the mass execution of the administrative punishments that include imprisonment till the end of the COVID pandemic.

The people of Belarus await your action.

Signed:

Dr. Palina Prysmakova
Secretary of the Rada of the Belarusian Democratic Republic

The media coverage of international sporting events is often colored by the fact that publications have spent a fortune buying TV rights to the events and sent journalists and photographers to cover them.

This year’s biggest Olympic sports event in Europe – the European Games in Minsk, which the state-owned Danish public service media company DR has purchased the broadcasting rights to – is no exception.

Last week’s Danish media coverage of the European games in Belarus, which is called “Europe’s last dictatorship”, has largely been influenced by the Danish reporters’ focus on the Danish athletes’ sporting ups and downs during the games.

On the other hand, criticism of the authoritarian host nation, which for 25 years has been ridden hard by president Alexander Lukashenka, a former Soviet military officer, has been absent in the media just as democracy is absent in Belarus, as Lukashenka’s critics believe.

In his welcome speech to the more than 4,000 athletes participating in the games in Minsk, including about 60 from Denmark, “Europe’s last dictator”, who for 13 years has been regarded as a national security threat in the United States, left with mentioning Belarus as “a beautiful, hospitable and cozy country”, “home to the most honest and friendly people”.

In comparison, international human rights and press freedom organizations such as Human Rights Watch and the Committee to Protect Journalists emphasize that Lukashenka’s authoritarian rule is severely hampering any political resistance and arresting journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders who are questioning his regime.

Therefore, Sportspressen.dk has asked one of the most persistent critics of Alexander Lukashenka’s government to comment on Belarus’s hosting of the European Games. The country’s more than 100-year-old democratic government, The Council of the Belarusian Democratic Republic, formed on March 25, 1918 in the middle of World War I and the Russian Revolution, was forced to emigrate in 1919 and has been functioning in exile ever since.

Political propaganda

The still existing government-in-exile continues to struggle for democratic reforms in Belarus. And it claims to be backed by thousands of Belarusians both inside Belarus and abroad, in countries such as Britain, the United States, Canada, the Czech Republic, Poland, Russia, Estonia and Belgium, who are a critical opposition to Alexander Lukashenka’s regime.

“Belarus, as an independent country in Europe, is certainly entitled to host major sporting events. We welcome both the event as such and the opportunities for developing international contacts it provides. On the other hand we categorically can’t welcome that the incumbent regime of Lukashenka seeks to exploit it as a political event”, says an official representative of the Belarusian exile government who wants to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from Lukashenka’s government.

“Ever since the 1936 Olympic Games, European dictatorships have seen sporting events as useful tools in political propaganda. Belarus is also today an authoritarian one-man regime. The human rights and political rights situation remains unacceptable. Trying to obscure it through an international sporting event, which aims to make the international community, especially in Europe, consider the situation in Belarus as normal, is not something to be accepted for a modern European country.”

Feel-good atmosphere

Three years ago, the European Games host was awarded to Minsk by the EOC, an association of half a hundred European Olympic Committees, which currently holds the Danish Sports Federation / Danish Olympic Committee Chairman, Niels Nygaard, as Vice President.

The EOC has constantly been criticized for placing the games in a country that does not respect international human rights. And Belarus’ exile government also does not believe that the European Games in Minsk do anything good for the democratic development in the country:

“Something that makes the existing government feel self-confident and internationally accepted, yet does not motivate it to undertake economic and democratic reforms, does not help re-establish democracy in Belarus,” said the exile government representative and elaborated on the criticism of Alexander Lukashenka’s regime:

“Under Lukashenka, over the years, the authorities in Belarus have spent a lot of money organizing sports events as a means of propaganda and self-promotion. A responsible democratic government would have prioritized other areas such as health, education, national culture and environment. For Lukashenka’s regime, the purpose of using public money on sporting events has been to control the country’s public life and shift its attention away from political affairs so that Lukashenka and his inner circle can maintain their power and economic control. It has created a feel-good atmosphere with the celebration of large mass festivities at the expense of material and social improvements to the people’s living conditions. This self-centered political strategy on international sporting events is not good for the development of democracy in Belarus.”

Fear of Russian annexation

Ever since the Belarusian democratic government was forced into exile a hundred years ago, it has had the reintroduction of democracy in the country as its overriding goal. Several presidents of the government have changed in exile, the present one is Ivonka Joanne Survilla, living in Canada. The exile government has, among other things, collaborated with and advised governments in democratic countries on political conditions in Belarus.

Currently, exile leaders are following the current political negotiations for increased cooperation between Belarus and Russia, which began six years ago by the presidents of the two countries, Alexander Lukashenka and Vladimir Putin.

In January this year, the negotiations led the exile government to issue a statement on its website warning of a possible Russian attempt to annex Belarus.

But even though Russia’s Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev stood at Alexander Lukashenka’s side during the European Games opening ceremony at Dynamo Stadium in Minsk last Friday, and Vladimir Putin is expected to attend the weekend’s closing ceremony, the exile government spokesman believes the timing is random:

“The negotiations have more or less been going on for over 20 years. Strategically, Belarus’s authoritarian regime seeks to benefit from the economic and political support of the West and the EU without showing any signs of progression in relation to democracy and human rights of the people of Belarus”, he says, continuing:

“For this purpose, the European Games are intended as a PR event both internationally and nationally. Unfortunately, the Olympic establishment has been reputed to ignore the host countries’ difficulties in complying with international human rights and laws ever since the 1936 and 1980 Olympic Games. In some European sports assemblies, human rights and democratic rights still seem to be more of a “matter of opinion” than about inalienable rights. Unfortunately, despite their persistent and well-documented human rights violations, the arrangement of major sporting events in Russia or Belarus has not changed this line of thought”.

Political game around Kadyrov

When the European Games opened last week, the Russian republic of Chechnya’s disputed political leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, was just behind Dmitri Medvedev in the VIP lodge. And just before the opening ceremony, the Chechen who was accused, among other things, of being behind murder of political opponents and of being responsible for violent attacks on homosexuals in Chechnya, received a Belarusian friendship order by Alexander Lukashenka.

Both these facts are considered by Belarus’s democratic government-in-exile as an expression of Lukashenka’s more than two decades of experience of playing complicated games with Russian top politicians and security professionals.

“It may have something to do with trying to navigate between different clans in Putin’s regime. Lukashenka’s behavior in relation to Kadyrov may be due to the fact that he has abandoned any hope of developing peaceful relations with the top leaders of the Russian army and the FSB in Moscow, and that he is now trying to find a new shortcut to influence Putin”, the exiled government representative explains.

“By aligning with Kadyrov, Lukashenka may be trying to find support in Putin’s inner circle outside of Moscow’s Federal Security Service and the military leadership in Russia. But the fact that Lukashenka assigns a state Belarusian order to a man like Kadyrov for political and tactical reasons to secure political support in Russia, is deeply regrettable. Unfortunately, this practice has been widely used in Belarus under Lukashenka’s one-man rule for over 20 years”.

The European Games will end on Sunday. But Alexander Lukashenka’s rule over Belarus will continue. Next month, the president celebrates his first 25 years of power.

By Lars Jørgensen

27 June 2019

(Translated from Danish)

http://sportspressen.dk/?p=1564

The Soviet terror was not limited to the events of 1937, which became the peak of the decades-long criminal Soviet policy in Belarus. Repressions against Belarusian politicians and activists, peasants, believers and all those who disagreed with the Communist regime began immediately after the Soviet occupation of Belarus in 1919. With various degrees of intensity, the repressions continued until the restoration of the independence of Belarus in 1991.

The Soviet policies towards Belarus were by their very nature the policies of a foreign occupant. The actions of the Soviet regime were aimed at assimilating the independent Belarusian nation, exploiting the natural and human resources of Belarus for the benefit of the aggressive Soviet empire. The regime brutally cracked down on any protest against its economic, cultural and international policies.

After the restoration of independence, the Soviet repressive apparatus has not been destroyed. It has been used by the authoritarian regime of Alaksandar Lukashenka, which has established itself in Belarus in 1995-1996 following a coup d’état.

Political repressions remain a reality in today’s Belarus. During the rule of Alaksandar Lukashenka, Belarus has seen many political mass repressions:

– The abductions and probable killings of opposition leaders;

– The incarceration of opposition leaders and activists; illegal military conscription;

– The beatings and torture of detained opposition activists;

– Politically motivated dismissals from job and expulsions from universities;

– The justification and support of political repression by nationwide state propaganda.

The BNR Rada states that the current perceived easing of the political climate in Belarus is mostly an illusion, which is being actively created by Lukashenka’s regime with the help of its propaganda organizations and lobbying in the West. The regime’s goal is to gain trust of the leaders of the Free World in the present conditions, as the Belarusian economic model continues its decay and as tensions increase between A. Lukashenka and his traditional political and economic sponsor – Vladimir Putin’s Russia. There are at least two political prisoners in Belarus – Zmicier Palijenka and Michail Žamčužny. The authorities brutally suppress peaceful protests and persecute people for political activity. Media are subject to censorship; state propaganda dominates the flow of news and information. The absence of progress of democratization is confirmed by international organizations, including the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Belarus, Miklós Haraszti.

The BNR Rada states that the tasks of a future democratic government of Belarus shouls be:

– to declassify and publicize information on repressions and the undercover agents’ activity of The VChK, the NKVD, the KGB and other Soviet repressive bodies, as it has been done in almost all neighbouring countries – Ukraine, Poland, the Baltic States;

– to memorize the crimes of the Soviet regime in Belarus; actively educate Belarusian society about Soviet repressions;

– to dissolve or radically reform the present state security services of Belarus and investigate their former involvement in political repressions and political persecution of citizens; introduce limitations for certain categories of former employees of the KGB of the Belarusian SSR, the KGB of the USSR and the KGB of the Republic of Belarus to occupy public service positions;

– to investigate the existence of connections between the KGB of the Republic of Belarus or its senior command with the Federal Security Service of Russia, which could harm the interests of the independence and democracy in Belarus, as well as of the role of such connections in the establishment and functioning of the regime of A. Lukashenka;

– to pass legislation which would give an appropriate legal assessment of Soviet repressions in Belarus in order to prevent their repetition.