Posted on 09/07/2001 5:33:37 AM PDT by Zviadist
Most Americans, if told that several million of their tax dollars were being sent half way around the world to throw an election in favor of a senior member of the Soviet Communist Party, would go ballistic. At the least they might wonder whether Bill Clinton and his left-wing ideologues were somehow still running foreign policy in Washington. The strange truth is that President Bush's ambassador in the former Soviet Republic of Belarus, Michael Kozak, is doing his level best to do just that. He has set out to make sure that opposition leader Vladimir Goncharyk is elected president of Belarus this Sunday.
Goncharyk is being sold in the West as the new breed of politician to finally put an end to the "authoritarian" rule of current president Alexander Lukashenka. What his supporters in the Bush administration have tried to keep under the lid is the fact that Goncharyk, 14 years Lukaskenka's senior, is President of the Federation of Trade Unions and a former member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lukashenka, habitually referred to in the Western press as a "communist hard-liner," was in fact merely a collective farm manager during communist rule.
The US government has nevertheless long condemned Lukashenka as authoritarian for, in 1996, holding a referendum to expand the powers of the presidency, which was successful, and for disbanding a hard-line communist parliament that ignored legislation it was sent. When US-favored Russian president Boris Yeltsin did the same and more, he was praised in the US government and media as a "reformer."
Currently, the Bush administration and Western media continue to repeat the unsubstantiated but salacious rumor of "death squads" roaming the Belarusian countryside producing scores of "disappeared." In fact, of the three or four names claimed to be "the disappeared," one, Tamara Vinnikava, has already surfaced happy and healthy in London. Another of the celebrated "disappeared," Viktor Gonchar, is widely believed to be living comfortably in the United States. The other one or two may well have been given a similar welcome in the West. Nevertheless, the State Department as recently as August 28, repeated these dubious charges. Spokesperson Richard Boucher said then: "Although the connection between the disappearance of leading pro-democracy politicians over the last two years and government-run death squads has yet to be proven, we do take these charges seriously." If the US government has no evidence that there even are "disappeared" other than the claims of the opposition, on what basis does it "take these charges seriously"?
The US government and Western media have also decried Belarusian President Lukashenka's hesitation to allow the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and its 14,000 domestic observers to monitor the election. In last year's parliamentary elections the OSCE announced a month before the election that it would not bother to observe: they had decided in advance that the elections would be neither free nor fair. The several hundred international observers who actually did bother to monitor the elections in Belarus told a different story. The Belarusian president can be forgiven for questioning the impartiality of this monitoring body.
How did the West come to line up behind such an unlikely candidate as Goncharyk? Much of the credit must be given US ambassador Kozak, who Belarusian Television reported called a meeting last month between opposition candidates and told them to withdraw in favor of a single challenger, one Vladimir Goncharyk. This "pro-Western" member of the Soviet ruling elite even has a communist-sounding campaign slogan: "Vote for the agreed-upon candidate." Anything you say, comrade.
In all fairness to Ambassador Kozak, this kind of meddling in the internal affairs of sovereign countries has been the norm for post-Cold War US foreign policy. From Slovakia to Albania to Yugoslavia to Croatia, US foreign policy in the region has consisted of picking a candidate and making sure he wins. Anyone wondering why the United States is no longer widely admired in these former captive nations need look no further.
Though Belarusian voters hardly know candidate Goncharyk, he has been given at least two 30-minute slots on state television to make his case to the people. Another of the charges against Lukashenka is that he maintains an iron grip on the state media.
When a recent article in the London Times pointed out that Ambassador Kozak was acting in favor of the political opposition in Belarus, the ambassador denied it, in typical diplomat-speak, insisting that the millions sent to Belarus to "promote democracy and the civic sector" were not transferred to any political party. According to the official figures, the US government has sent some $4 million yearly for this purpose – a considerable sum in a poor country – and unofficially millions more have likely been spent. Much of this money ends up in the accounts of non-governmental organizations allied with the opposition.
While Ambassador Kozak denies that the US government funds any political parties in Belarus, one of the government's cut-out international assistance organizations, the International Republican Institute (IRI), makes less effort to hide the political nature of its activities in Belarus. According to that organization's website, in Belarus "IRI's USAID (U.S. Agency for International Development)-funded program provides specialized training for democratic youth, assistance to reform-oriented parties and literature development and distribution. The training is designed to bring activists into political party and NGO organizations and help prepare them for leadership roles" (emphasis added). The political opposition in this election happens to be Goncharyk, and such foreign support of political parties in the United States is, rightly, illegal. The USAID's own website says of President Lukashenka that he was "elected in 1994 in a vote judged to be free and fair." So, one may wonder, why are US tax dollars being spent to overthrow him in favor of a leading communist?
A Clinton appointee, Kozak's undiplomatic biases began before he even set foot on Belarusian soil. In a crude break with diplomatic protocol, Kozak pronounced Belarus "worse than Cuba" in advance of his arrival as ambassador. Some of us may have missed Castro's political opposition making its case to the Cuban voter on state television, or in numerous privately owned independent Cuban newspapers.
Most Americans should wonder why we are bothering to meddle in the elections of a sovereign country in the first place. As even rabidly anti-Lukashenka media like Radio Free Europe report that he is the most popular candidate in the contest, shouldn't the greatest democratic nation on earth allow the good citizens of Belarus to freely choose their own leader? Isn't that what the Cold War was about in the first place?
September 7, 2001
McAdams has monitored elections throughout the former communist world for the British Helsinki Human Rights Group, however the views expressed here are his own.
"Goncharyk is being sold in the West as the new breed of politician to finally put an end to the "authoritarian" rule of current president Alexander Lukashenka. "
Now, where have we seen that before?
"Anyone wondering why the United States is no longer widely admired in these former captive nations need look no further."
And that's one reason why this sort of thing should be important to ordinary Americans, who would normally leave foreign affairs for the lobby groups and power addicts in Washington. One day soon, America will wake up and find that their past reputation in the world as a decent nation, mostly minding their own business unless threatened, is gone completely. And instead of just being hated by Soviet fellow-travellers and other left-wing intellectuals (as was the case in the past), they will be hated by all patriotic people of foreign nations whose politics and economies have been endlessly meddled with by the US administration. In place of friends they will have only cronies, lackeys and henchmen around the world.
Wake up, America, and elect some principled isolationists, before it's too late. Empire beckons, and your Federal power structure is already too debased to resist the attendant corruption.
Text of report by Lithuanian radio on 6 September
[Presenter] Lithuanian parliament members, who have been invited by the Belarusian authorities to monitor presidential election [without proper authority from the Lithuanian parliament], may harm the image of our country, members of the official [monitoring] delegation said.
Three Lithuanian parliament members will take part in a short-term monitoring mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Meanwhile, other two parliament members, Mykolas Pronckus ir Vidas Baravykas, have been invited by the Belarusian authorities and intend to travel to Minsk [independently from the official delegation.
Janina Mateikiene has this report from a news conference held in the Seimas [parliament]
[Correspondent] Romanas Sedlickas, a member of the [official] parliamentary delegation soon to travel to Minsk, believes that members of the Social Democratic coalition, Mykolas Pronckus and Vidas Baravykas, having travelled to Belarus upon invitation of official Belarusian authorities, may be used for propaganda purposes.
[Sedlickas] The Belarusians, the Belarusian embassy, would not invite them and would not pay for their expenses if they did not think that they could be used for some kind of benefit.
They will say - look, Lithuanians are hugging us, they are shaking our hands, they support [Belarusian President Alyaksandr] Lukashenka.
[Correspondent] Another member of the official delegation, Vaclovas Stankevicius, believes that the trip of our parliament members by invitation of official Minsk government may affect Lithuania's image.
[Stankevicius] At the time when Lithuania is on the threshold of NATO and the European Union, it may damage our image if we stand out in the general picture.
Source: Lithuanian Radio, Vilnius, in Lithuanian 1100 gmt 6 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
Text of report by Russian NTV International television on 6 September
[Presenter] In Belarus there has been another twist in the scandal concerning the accusations against foreign special services. On the eve of the presidential elections it seems that the present republican leadership has decided to make a daily presentation of new evidence of the participation of foreign intelligence services in the activities of the opposition. Lukashenka's opponents deny everything and in their turn make their own accusations against the authorities. Here is our own correspondent Pavel Selin reporting from Minsk.
[Correspondent] Three days before the presidential elections, the situation in Belarus increasingly looks like a political detective story. And the key phrase in this detective story - "operation White Stork " - is striking and intriguing. It is not totally clear who thought up this beautiful name. At least, one of the candidates, the incumbent president, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, asserts that operation White Stork operation was drawn up by foreign special services - in particular by the intelligence services of the USA, Germany and Britain. And the main aim of White Stork is remove Alyaksandr Lukashenka from power during the September elections.
The detailed plan of the operation, the names of the participants, the figures for payments, measures to implement it and other interesting details have been published in the republic's main socio-political newspaper, Sovetskaya Belorussiya. This paper is completely under the control of the authorities. And over the past two days the edition reporting operation White Stork's plan has appeared free in every post box in every flat in every apartment block in Belarus.
It is not just the official newspapers, radio and television which write and speak about the West's plans to overthrow Alyaksandr Lukashenka. Today Belarus's foreign minister Mikhail Khvastow once again accused foreign organizations of complicity with the opposition.
[Khvastow] We have evidence of the use of diplomatic channels to put direct pressure on state administration structures. We know the mechanisms for giving direct financial aid to opposition structures and the radical press from a number of Western countries.
[Correspondent] Also at today's press conference Mikhail Khvastow stated that any poll carried out at the exits from polling stations and also the parallel counting of votes which the opposition will carry out with the aid of independent observers are illegal and antigovernment. There is nothing surprising in this statement. The Belarusian president right from the start of the election campaign has been stating that the opposition, with the support of the West, is trying to displace him precisely by means of parallel counting of votes. Alyaksandr Lukashenka believes that the so-called Yugoslav scenario will be played out. The figures collected by the opposition will not coincide with the official ones and then disturbances will begin.
Representatives of the civic initiative of independent observers and the coordinating council for the parallel counting of votes today held their own press conference. The opposition figures said that they, just like all the inhabitants of the republic, had learnt of operation White Stork operation from the pro-presidential newspapers. Nevertheless, their results for the early voting, which began the day before yesterday, are already markedly different from the official results.
The leader of the independent observers, Mechyslaw Hryb, said that the authorities' aim now was to ensure that over 50 per cent of the electorate should vote in advance over these few days. And the result of the voting is unimportant. Hryb asserts that the opposition is aware of the mechanism for falsifying the figures.
[Hryb] We have information that recommendations have been issued for making the ballot boxes with bottoms fixed on with self-tapping screws which can easily be unscrewed to remove the bottoms, replace the contents and replace the bottom.
[Correspondent] Representatives of the independent observers assert that such boxes have been supplied to virtually all polling stations. And the chairmen of the electoral commissions yesterday for some reason distributed extra blank voting slips.
Source: NTV International, Moscow, in Russian 1500 gmt 6 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
Text of report in English by Baltic news agency BNS
Riga, 7 September: Three officials from Latvia's central election commission will be headed for Belarus today ready to observe the Belarus presidential elections, reported the commission.
The delegation, including Arnis Cimdars, chairman, Guntis Zandbergs, deputy chairman and Inara Vaivode, commission member at the election commission, will be participating as observers from Eastern and Central European election committees. The Latvian delegation is expected to return on 10 September.
Five Latvian parliament members have also headed for Belarus as part of the OSCE mission.
The Belarus presidential elections will take place on 9 September, the current authoritarian Lukashenka expected to take victory over his opposition rivals.
Western and international organizations have warned that Belarus authorities are preparing to forge the voting results and restrict citizens' voting rights in an attempt at re-electing Lukashenka. Due to its poor level of democracy, Belarus has been in international diplomatic isolation for the past years.
Source: BNS news agency, Tallinn, in English 0750 gmt 7 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
Russian president praises Belarusian president
BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Sep 7, 2001
Text of report in English by Russian news agency Interfax
Kislovodsk, 7 September: President Vladimir Putin has said Russia cherishes the sincere attitude of Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka towards a union with Russia.
Responding to questions from the press on Friday, he refrained from making any assessments or forecasts on the forthcoming presidential elections in Belarus, but admitted that Russia "is not indifferent to what is happening" because the two countries are building a unified state.
"Only the Belarusian people can make the final choice," Putin said.
"Lukashenka and Russia's first president Boris Yeltsin initiated the formation of the unified state and we are convinced that this is Lukashenka's sincere stance and we highly appreciate it," he said.
Source: Interfax news agency, Moscow, in English 1020 gmt 7 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
All this was heart-tugging.
But, we also found out this man had been an (atheist) communist who had just recently turned to God. He stressed over and over again how the greatest need now that the communists were "gone" was to bring God back into their country. He said the government of Belarus was asking for and receiving help from American and other Christians to come into their schools and their government to bring God there!
I asked him if he thought/feared the communists would ever return to power in his country and the old Soviet Union reunite. He said: There are fools in every country.
How well we in America know this - for we have been taken over - in many area - by fools like these!
Text of report in English by Belarusian news agency Belapan
Minsk, 7 September. Today, the Minsk City Court began hearing a case against Italian businessman Angelo Antonio Piu, who is accused of espionage, and a Belarusian woman named Iryna Ushak, who faces the charge of high treason.
Piu, born 1951, and Ushak, born 1975, were arrested by the Belarusian Committee for State Security (KGB) back on 18 April allegedly while being handed "documents containing military information". They have been kept in a KGB prison since then. The charges they face incur seven to 15 years in jail under the Belarusian Criminal Code.
The judge declared right away that the entire trial would take place behind closed doors. Even the Italian defendant's relatives, who have come to Minsk for the trial, have been denied permission to attend.
The KGB disclosed nothing about the case until the investigation was over to avoid any harm to Belarusian-Italian relations, KGB spokesman Fyodar Kotaw told Belapan. The defendants' rights were fully respected, and Piu has been visited more than once by Italian embassy officials, he added.
Source: Belapan news agency, Minsk, in English 0925 gmt 7 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
Text of report by Belarusian news agency Belapan
Minsk, 7 September: The leader of Russia's Union of Right Forces, Boris Nemtsov, has written to the Belarusian [opposition] presidential candidate, Uladzimir Hancharyk. On behalf of Russian democrats, the well-known politician expressed his sincere support for Hancharyk in the presidential race.
"Taking into account the complex political situation in your country, it is necessary to pay tribute to the courage it took to openly challenge the incumbent," Nemtsov's letter says.
Nemtsov expresses the hope that the presidential election will be held in full accordance with the democratic procedure and that it will result in free expression of the Belarusian people's will. The Russian politician has no doubt that Hancharyk's victory will not only strengthen but will give new meaning to relations between Russian and Belarusian public associations and the two countries' people.
Source: Belapan news agency, Minsk, in Belarusian 1047 gmt 7 Sep 01
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
VRN
An international task force formed to crack down on money laundering on Friday removed a threat of economic sanctions made against Russia.
However, the Financial Action Task Force, a body set up by the G7 group of industrialised nations, said it would maintain threats of sanctions made against the Pacific island state of Nauru and the Philippines.
The news is the latest stage of a clampdown that began with the blacklisting of 15 financial centres last year for failing to co-operate in the fight against money laundering.
The task force said it was removing its threat against Russia, which was made in June, because the government had put in place "significant" anti-money-laundering laws. The move has averted a potentially explosive dispute over the issue with the G7 group of industrialised nations, but Russia will remain on the list of 'non-cooperative' countries pending "effective implementation" of the legislation.
The FATF said an anti-money laundering law act passed by Nauru last month contained "several deficiencies", adding that the centre would face sanctions if it failed to improve its rules by November 30. the centre would face sanctions if it failed to improve its rules by November 30.
The task force said the Philippines had put in place no laws on money laundering since June and would be subject to sanctions from September 30 unless it took action.
The FATF has also added Grenada and Ukraine to its list of 17 blacklisted centres, adding that none of the other jurisdictions on the list had done enough to merit removal.
The updated list of 'non-cooperative' countries is as follows: Cook Islands; Dominica; Egypt; Guatemala; Grenada; Hungary; Indonesia; Israel; Lebanon; Marshall Islands; Myanmar; Nauru; Nigeria; Niue; Philippines; Russia; St. Kitts and Nevis; St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Ukraine.
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