APPEAL FROM EIGHT INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS

Vice President Al Gore
The White House
Via Fax: (202) 456-2461

Dear Vice President Gore,

We are a group of human rights organizations concerned about President Alexander Lukashenko's defiance of the rule of law and wholesale crackdown on civic and opposition groups and the independent media in Belarus, recently illustrated by the jailing of dissenters, threats to journalists, and harsh restrictions on freedom of association.

President Lukashenko's abrogation of international human rights agreements and increasingly autocratic rule have been accompanied by greater integration with neighboring Russia. Russia is Belarus' largest trading partner, and is the transit country through which much of Russia's cargo is delivered on its way to the West. The two nations have extensive cultural and linguistic ties. Belarusians rely extensively on Russian-owned television and radio broadcasting to Belarus as an alternative news source. President Lukashenko travels frequently to Russian provincial cities in an effort to gain support from conservative neocommunist and extreme right-wing movements in Russia.

Accordingly, we believe it is vital for you to raise the deteriorating human rights situation in Belarus in your forthcoming meeting with Russian Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin on July 27, as a matter of concern both to the U.S. and Russia. We hope that you can urge Russian leaders to use their good offices to promote and protect human rights and the rule of law in Belarus. With extensive trade relations and discussion of the formation of a Belarusian-Russian Union, Russia now has ample opportunity to raise with Belarus the international community's grave concerns about the absence of fundamental rights and freedoms in Belarus, and to intervene on specific cases of concern.

Since 1996, when President Alexander Lukashenko extended his term in office, shut down the elected parliament (the 13th Supreme Soviet), and defied the rulings of the Constitutional Court regarding his unlawful amendments to the 1994 Constitution by a national referendum, he has moved steadily to erode the rule of law which Belarus had begun to re-establish after gaining its independence in 1991. Independent media, such as the popular station Radio 101.2, have been closed, and independent newspapers such as Navyny, Imya, and Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta have been harassed. Numerous peaceful marchers and picketers have been jailed for short periods; academic freedom has been sharply curtailed; lawyers who obtained licenses to practice law privately have been outlawed by decree; workers who have engaged in free trade union activity have been persecuted. Members of the subsequently disbanded parliament who signed an impeachment appeal, including Vladimir Koudinov and Andrei Klimov, have been imprisoned on charges widely perceived as fabricated, or have been beaten, detained, or fined.

With the executive branch's control over the free flow of information and public discussion, social and economic rights have been severely impacted, notably issues regarding public health in the wake of the Chernobyl disaster; the metro stampede in May 1999 in which 57 people, mainly teenagers, were killed; the AIDs virus; domestic violence; and other women's issues. Even non-political forms of civic activity, for example addressing the needs of disabled children or working women, have been harshly discouraged as local officials refuse to allow groups of citizens to hold public meetings, or to advertise their gatherings, particularly in provincial areas.

International and domestic human rights groups have brought attention to a number of cases emblematic of the deterioration of the rule of law in Belarus:

* In May, when the opposition decided to conduct alternative presidential elections to call attention to their claim that President Lukashenko's term in office was to expire on July 20, 1999, authorities detained organizers and arrested one of two leading candidates, Mikhail Chigir, on trumped-up charges of embezzlement. The other candidate, Zyanon Paznyak, a political asylee in the U.S., did not return to Belarus due to concerns about his safety. The charges against Chigir have been widely discounted by Chigir's lawers, human rights groups, the OSCE Chair in Office, and the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. We urge his immediate and unconditional release.

* On May 7, Gen. Yuri Zakharenko, the former Minister of Internal Affairs, dismissed in 1996 after publicly opposing President Lukashenko, failed to return home after telephoning his wife to say he would be arriving shortly. Zakharenko was active in Chigir's presidential campaign, and had been under surveillance by the authorities. High-level officials have informed both human rights organizations and Western governments that they do not know Zakharenko's whereabouts, and fear he has become the victim of foul play. Periodically rumors are circulated that Gen. Zakharenko is in hiding, or was killed by the mafia over a bad debt, and yet the Belarusian government has failed to open up a prosecutor's criminal investigation into his disappearance or provide any evidence for the claims of mafia involvement. We urge the government to begin such an investigation immediately and to publicize its findings.

* Vera Stremkovskaya, a trial attorney who has taken up the defense of prominent persons who have fallen out of favor with the Lukashenko administration, such as collective farm chair Valery Starovoitov, has suffered harassment herself, through specious libel charges related to the practice of her profession. She has been frequently intimidated with threats that she will be disbarred, as three others lawyers who defended civil rights cases have been since 1996. Other attorneys who defend the numerous cases of demonstrators, independent newspaper editors, and other rights activists, have been forced to work silently and cautiously on behalf of their clients, in order not to add to their troubles. We urge that all harassment of Stremkovskaya and other attorneys cease immediately.

* Freedom of Association Recently human rights observers as well as administrators of development programs in Belarus have become particularly concerned with the President's decree of January 26, 1999, requiring all civic organizations, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), political parties, and trade unions, to re-register or face criminalization under the civil and criminal codes. The decree violates domestic and international law.

Although under international standards, freedom of association does not require a procedure for local registration (as distinct from tax-exemption), President Lukashenko's decree criminalizes any group which decides not to register. By instituting a system of discretionary registration, through a state commission under the Ministry of Justice, the decree does not implement freedom of association, but rather overregulates it by making registration contingent on the political arbitrariness of the state. And while many groups have registered under the decree, in some cases they have been compelled to change their leadership, the nature of their activities, or their names, and in some instances have been urged to swear loyalty to the 1996 version of the Constitution. In a further move to curb freedom of assembly and prevent competition during parliamentary elections scheduled in 2000, the National Assembly, the legislature appointed by President Lukashenko, passed amendments to the Law on Associations on June 30 banning the use of the words "Belarusian" or "popular" or "national" in the names of civic groups. The Council of Ministers is now proposing laws to jail non-registered activists.

Although the deadline was extended, and some groups rejected have been permitted to re-apply, we are concerned that by the end of the year, certain outspoken human rights, minority, or political opposition groups could be intimidated or outlawed. Currently, for example, on the eve of its annual congress, the largest political opposition movement, the Belarusian Popular Front, has been informed that it must remove the word "popular" from its name to be registered, despite its numerous chapters and activists in many cities. Polish community groups and Belarusian language associations have also been informed that they may not be registered. We call for the registration of civic groups under law consistent with international standards.

The U.S. government must send a clear signal to Russian leaders that tolerance of a mounting human rights crisis in Belarus, its close neighbor, is ultimately a threat to the level of democracy and human rights which Russia itself has achieved, and a threat to the human rights and security of the entire post-Soviet region of countries in transition, in which the U.S. has a vested interest.

Sincerely,
/Signed/

Maureen Greenwood, Advocacy Director for Europe and the Middle East,
Amnesty International USA
Chrystyna Lapychak, Europe Program Coordinator,
Committee to Protect Journalists
Holly Cartner, Executive Director, Europe and Central Asia Division,
Human Rights Watch
Aaron Rhodes, Executive Director,
International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights
Catherine A. Fitzpatrick, Executive Director,
International League for Human Rights
Felice Gaer, Executive Director,
Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights
Jeff Prescott
Lawyers Committee for Human Rights
Holly Burkhalter, Washington Representative
Physicians for Human Rights