OSCE PA human rights leaders raise alarms over new legislation on mass events and media in Belarus

COPENHAGEN, 4 June 2021 – Express­ing deep con­cern over the poten­tial ram­i­fi­ca­tions of amend­ments adopt­ed by the Belaru­sian Par­lia­ment on 24 May, which they said would fur­ther crim­i­nal­ize mass events and jour­nal­is­tic activ­i­ty in Belarus, the lead­ers of the OSCE Par­lia­men­tary Assembly’s human rights com­mit­tee today called for the legislation’s repeal and for height­ened inter­na­tion­al atten­tion to the sit­u­a­tion in the coun­try.

Kyr­i­akos Had­jiyian­ni (Cyprus), Michael Georg Link (Ger­many) and Kari Hen­rik­sen (Nor­way) – the Chair, Vice-Chair and Rap­por­teur, respec­tive­ly, of the OSCE PA’s Gen­er­al Com­mit­tee on Democ­ra­cy, Human Rights and Human­i­tar­i­an Ques­tions – issued the fol­low­ing joint state­ment:

“We very much regret that the amend­ments to the laws on mass events have been adopt­ed, threat­en­ing to fur­ther under­mine the right to peace­ful assem­bly and free­dom of the media. Mak­ing autho­riza­tion require­ments more strin­gent for mass events, the leg­is­la­tion also affects the right of media to cov­er them, ban­ning live report­ing from unau­tho­rized demon­stra­tions and pro­vid­ing author­i­ties legal jus­ti­fi­ca­tion to arrest jour­nal­ists for doing their jobs.”

Had­jiyian­ni, Link and Hen­rik­sen added: “We call on author­i­ties in Belarus to rethink their gen­er­al approach to dis­sent in the coun­try, end their repres­sive tac­tics, release all polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, engage with the oppo­si­tion, and allow the hold­ing of free and fair elec­tions with observers from the OSCE. In the spir­it of open dia­logue, we are hap­py to meet with mem­bers of the Belaru­sian Del­e­ga­tion to dis­cuss these mat­ters fur­ther.”

Accord­ing to the amend­ments, polit­i­cal par­ties and pub­lic asso­ci­a­tions will now be con­sid­ered respon­si­ble for calls to orga­nize mass events if they are made by their lead­ers before receiv­ing offi­cial autho­riza­tion for these events. The amend­ments also pro­vide for the ban of fundrais­ing activ­i­ties and the use of any funds or assets received to counter the cost of pros­e­cu­tion for vio­la­tions to the laws on mass events.

Jour­nal­ists are pro­hib­it­ed from live report­ing and live stream­ing of unau­tho­rized demon­stra­tions, and may now be stripped of their spe­cial sta­tus as mem­bers of the press at mass events.

On 13 April, Had­jiyian­ni, Link and Hen­rik­sen addressed a let­ter on this mat­ter to Chair of the Coun­cil of the Repub­lic of the Nation­al Assem­bly Natalya Kochano­va and Vladimir Andre­ichenko, Chair of the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Nation­al Assem­bly of the Repub­lic of Belarus. The let­ter urged the par­lia­men­tar­i­ans to recon­sid­er the pro­posed restric­tions and to ensure that the country’s leg­is­la­tion is in full com­pli­ance with inter­na­tion­al human rights com­mit­ments. The let­ter fur­ther sug­gest­ed seek­ing a review of the draft leg­is­la­tion by ODIHR experts before tak­ing any fur­ther steps.

So far, there has been no response to the let­ter from the Belaru­sian side.