EMBASSY MINSK WEEKLY POL/ECON REPORT - December 8, 2006

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 MINSK 001272 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM ECON BO SUBJECT: EMBASSY MINSK WEEKLY POL/ECON REPORT - December 8, 2006 ¶1. The following are brief items of interest compiled by Embassy Minsk. TABLE OF CONTENTS ELECTIONS -------------- - Nomination Stage in Local Elections Over (para. 2) - Ten Members of BPC Withdraw From Local Elections (para. 3) CIVIL SOCIETY -------------- - Milinkevich Urges G8 Leaders to Save Kozulin's Life (para. 4) - Police Briefly Detain Opposition Leader Milinkevich (para. 5) - Charge Against Human Rights Defender Dropped (para. 6) - Landlord Gives Private Paper Two Days to Move Out (para. 7) - Polish Priests and Nuns Forced to Leave Belarus (para. 8) - Catholic Hunger Strikers Allowed to Build Church (para. 9) - Minsk Hare Krishna Community Forced Out of Office (para. 10) - Almost 3,000 Corruption Offenses Detected in Belarus (para. 11) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS -------------- - International Helsinki Federation Appeals to E.U. (para.12) - UNDP/GEF to Help Reduce CO2 Emissions in Belarus (para. 13) - NATO's Allied Command Operations Visit Belarus (para. 14) - EU to Consider Again GSP Suspension for Belarus (para. 15) - QUOTE OF THE WEEK (para. 16) -------------- ELECTIONS -------------- ¶2. Nomination Stage in Local Elections Over On December 4, Central Election Commission Secretary Nikolay Lozovik stated that the nomination stage in the elections for local councils is complete with 24,397 people having applied as candidates for 22,658 seats. The deadline for election commissions to verify the application papers is December 14. Nominees who receive a candidate's certificate will then be able to start their campaigns. According to Lozovik, each of the candidates for village councils will receive USD 14.50 for their campaigns; the candidates for district and city soviets, USD 58; and, the candidates for regional councils and the Minsk City council, USD 116. ¶3. Ten Members of BPC Withdraw From Local Elections On December 8, independent media reported that ten members of the Belarusian party of Communists (BPC) in the Gomel region have decided not to run in January's local elections. They claimed that they found it "immoral" to run in the election as not a single opposition party member has been included on any district election commissions. -------------- CIVIL SOCIETY -------------- ¶4. Milinkevich Urges G8 Leaders to Save Kozulin's Life On December 7, Belarusian opposition leader Aleksandr Milinkevich sent an open letter to the heads of state of France, Russia, the United States, and Germany urging them to "do everything possible to save the life of Aleksandr Kozulin and release all political prisoners in Belarus." Milinkevich recalled that Kozulin promised to end his protest as soon as at least one G8 nation expressed an intention to put Belarus' human rights situation on the United Nations Security Council agenda. ¶5. Police Briefly Detain Opposition Leader Milinkevich On December 4, police in Beloozyorsk, Brest region briefly detained the car of the leader of Belarus' united democratic forces Aleksandr Milinkevich. According to Milinkevich spokesman Pavel Mozheiko, the police explained that they had received an anonymous phone tip that the car was being used to transport and distribute narcotics and alcohol. Police examined the car and released Milinkevich one hour later. Mozheiko noted that police interrogated Milinkevich about his political activities in the region, not about the drug allegations. Milinkevich was collecting nomination signatures for local opposition activists. ¶6. Charge Against Human Rights Defender Dropped On December 7, a Minsk judge dismissed the administrative case MINSK 00001272 002 OF 003 against human rights defender Oleg Volchek because the statute of limitation had expired. On September 3, customs officers found several copies of a book on the 2006 presidential elections in Volchek's luggage to Germany this past September. The books allegedly contained materials that "could cause damage to the country's political interests." Volchek was tried in absentia earlier for attempting to bring the book to the Netherlands this past October and fined USD 725. ¶7. Landlord Gives Private Paper Two Days to Move Out On December 6, the Vitebsk-based independent newspaper Vitebskiy Kuryer received official word from the building administration that the newspaper staff had until December 8 to vacate its office. The building administration declared that the office lease is "null and void," given the paper's ongoing legal dispute with the local authorities. Separately, on December 8, the Ministry of Information delivered a written warning to Vitebskiy Kuryer editor Vladimir Bazan for having failed to register the paper's legal address. ¶8. Polish Priests and Nuns Forced to Leave Belarus On December 6, independent media reported that seven Polish priests and five Polish nuns working in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Grodno have to leave Belarus by the end of the year. The Committee on Religious and National Affairs refused to renew their work permits this past August citing the need to provide Belarusian graduates of the Roman Catholic seminaries in Grodno and Pinsk with jobs. According to a Grodno diocese priest Antony Khanko, approximately 30 local Roman Catholic communities do not have clergy despite the fact that graduates of the seminaries are annually conferred. Approximately 180 priests, including 72 foreign nationals, currently work in local communities. ¶9. Catholic Hunger Strikers Allowed to Build Church On December 6, Grodno Regional Executive Committee chair Vladimir Savchenko sent a letter to the head of the Grodno Diocese Aleksandr Kashkevich allowing the Blessed Virgin Mary Mother of Mercy community to build a church. The priest of the Roman Catholic community Aleksandr Shemet stated that the protestors would start taking food but stressed that the end of the strike did not mean an end to struggle against the "oppression of Christian churches." Shemet and 11 parishioners went on a hunger strike on December 1 in protest against the local authorities' refusal to permit them to construct a church. ¶10. Minsk Hare Krishna Community Forced Out of Office On December 4, the Minsk-based community of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness is facing closure over the absence of a registered legal address. The Hare Krishna community has been looking for an office to register as its legal address for two years since they were ordered to leave the office they had been renting. Presently, there are eight Hare Krishna communities operating in the country. ¶11. Almost 3,000 Corruption Offenses Detected in Belarus On December 5, Prosecutor General Pyotr Miklashevich reported that prosecutorial agencies detected approximately 3,000 corruption-related offenses from January to October 2006. Almost one-third of these corruption crimes were connected with bribery. According to Miklashevich, the prosecutors office drafted a 2007- 2010 anti-corruption program aimed at reducing corruption. -------------- INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS -------------- ¶12. International Helsinki Federation Appeals to E.U. On December 6, International Helsinki Federation Executive Director Aaron Rhodes appealed to the European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to help the Belarusian Helsinki Committee and all human rights defenders in Belarus. Rhodes noted that without human rights groups, the government would face no civil control or accountability in its quest to gain absolute power. ¶13. UNDP/GEF to Help Reduce CO2 Emissions in Belarus On December 5, the UNDP and Global Environment Facility (GEF) project director Vladimir Voitekhovich predicted at a seminar in Minsk that carbon dioxide emissions will be reduced by 1.08 million tons in Belarus over 15 years thanks to the use of biomass for heating in Belarus. Belarus is one of the countries where annual forest growth exceeds annual harvest, thus making it ideal for such a project. MINSK 00001272 003 OF 003 ¶14. NATO's Allied Command Operations Visit Belarus On December 4, a delegation of NATO's Allied Command Operations arrived in Minsk on a four-day visit to inform Belarusian defense officials about exercise plans, the involvement of partner countries in operations, and the deployment of peacekeeping units with communication and computer equipment. The NATO officials are also expected to discuss prospects for cooperation with Belarus in operations conducted as part of the Partnership for Peace program. ¶15. EU to Consider Again GSP Suspension for Belarus On December 5, the expert committee under the European Commission approved the proposal to temporarily suspend Belarus' benefits under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). The approval could clear the way for the EU Foreign Ministers to formally announce in December the plan to impose tariffs on imports of Belarusian wood, textiles and minerals in summer 2007. The withdrawal of GSP benefits would result in the loss of several hundred million dollars for Belarus. -------------- QUOTE OF THE WEEK -------------- ¶16. On December 5, Belarusian opposition leader Aleksandr Milinkevich announced that he will nominate imprisoned opposition activist Aleksandr Kozulin for the 2007 Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders, which is presented to individuals or organizations who have displayed exceptional courage in combating human rights violations and offered the following observation: "The courage and vigor that Aleksandr Kozulin shows in his struggle for his rights is admirable. His hunger strike is today a symbol of all Belarusians' aspirations to live in a free and democratic state. The entire world should know of it. This award will above all be a strong message of the international community to the Belarusian regime that it should start releasing political prisoners." Moore