MINSK, Belarus: International vote observers have condemned parliamentary elections in Belarus as lacking in competition and say potential candidates were denied the right to speak, organize and run for office.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSC) in Europe said in its postelection assessment yesterday that the vote did not meet international standards.
Belarus’ Parliament has long been considered a rubber-stamp body for President Alexander Lukashenko’s policies. He has ruled the former Soviet nation since 1994 and Western observers have criticized all recent elections in Belarus as undemocratic.
The OSCE’s critical assessment is likely to cement Belarus’ diplomatic isolation. The United States and the European Union have imposed economic and travel sanctions on the Belarusian government over its crackdown on opposition groups and independent news media.
The main opposition parties had boycotted the election to protest the detention of political prisoners and opportunities for election fraud.
Only deputies supporting the policies of Lukashenko won seats in the 110-seat legislature. “This election was not competitive from the start,” said Matteo Mecacci, leader of the OSCE’s short-term observer mission. “A free election depends on people being free to speak, organize and run for office, and we didn’t see that in this campaign.”
The OSCE’s critical assessment is likely to cement Belarus’ diplomatic isolation.
While the OSCE acknowledged recent improvements to the electoral law and noted that many election-day procedures were handled positively, it echoed complaints by local observers about the vote count.
“Observers were not given a meaningful opportunity to observe the count and evaluated the process negatively in a significant number of polling stations observed,” the OSCE said in a statement accompanying its report.
Local groups estimated the overall turnout as being almost 19 percent lower than the official 74.3 percent figure. The OSCE also lamented lack of media coverage of the entire range of candidates
Riot police meanwhile detained around 20 young activists who observed the process as part of a project on behalf of rights groups based outside the country, the Vyasna (Spring) rights group said.
An analysis of the list of those elected to the 110-seat chamber showed that only four candidates who were not part of the main pro-government faction had made parliament.
In a quirk typical of the regime of Lukashenko, who has ruled the ex-Soviet state for 18 years and was once dubbed Europe’s last dictator by Washington, there is no ruling party in Belarus.
But three of those new lawmakers belong to the largely pro-government Communist Party of Belarus while one is a member of the marginally opposition Agrarian Party. All four had pledged allegiance to Lukashenko’s policies.
International observers censure Belarus elections
