European Parliament does not intend to lift sanctions against Lukashenka’s regime

The delegation of the European Parliament which visited Belarus recently, has not express oneself in favour of lifting the ban for entry to the European Union of Belarusian officials.

Zivile Didzgalviene, an official of the press service of the European Parliament, stated that information of the Associated Press that allegedly European lawmakers believe that the ban imposed in 2006 should be lifted, was untrue.

Zivile Didzgalviene underlined that none of the members of the delegation, including MEP Laima Andrikienė, made such statements during their visit to Belarus.

The delegation underlined that human rights are still violated by the authorities in Belarus, and freedom of the press is limited.

The delegation of the European Parliament visited Belarus on a reconnaissance mission, and remained unsatisfied by the situation in the country, Radio Svaboda informs.

As the members of the delegation said, despite of the recent positive events like release of political prisoners, authorities in Belarus do not stop politically motivated crackdown on activists of the pro-democratic movements and intimidation of independent mass media.

Later the delegation is to provide to the European parliament an official report about their visit, basing on which the resolution on Belarus is to be adopted in April.

The head of the European Parliament delegation on Relations with Belarus Jacek Protasiewicz stated summing up the results of the visit to Minsk: “The decision which is to be adopted by the Council of the European Union, should be passed by a solid vote. If one out of 27 countries would decide that sanctions against Belarus shouldn’t be suspended any more, they won’t be suspended. The European Parliament will adopt its resolution two weeks before the decision of the Council of Foreign Ministers. When adopting our decision we shall refer to our previous resolutions with evaluation of what had been done in reality. Our conclusion whether the situation in Belarus is changing for the better or for the worse, could depend on that”.