Statement On Non-Discrimination and Closing the EU Space for Belarusian Citizens by EaP CSF BNP

The author­i­ties of the Repub­lic of Belarus have pro­vid­ed Russ­ian troops with a bridge­head for the inva­sion to Ukraine from the ter­ri­to­ry of Belarus. This fact makes them com­plic­it in this aggres­sion and draws a clear divi­sion line with­in the soci­ety of Belarus. The absolute major­i­ty of Belaru­sian cit­i­zens are against the war, against any par­tic­i­pa­tion of the Repub­lic of Belarus in an armed inva­sion, includ­ing against the pro­vi­sion of the ter­ri­to­ry of our coun­try for mil­i­tary oper­a­tions. Many cit­i­zens, orga­ni­za­tions, author­i­ta­tive peo­ple in the sphere of sci­ence, cul­ture, sports, a busi­ness of Belarus, despite the repres­sions and attempts to silence them, active­ly express their posi­tion against this war. After the repres­sions of 2020–2021 in Belarus, many of them chose Ukraine as their new home, and now, togeth­er with the Ukraini­ans, they are par­tic­i­pat­ing in coun­ter­ing aggres­sion, as well as in solv­ing numer­ous human­i­tar­i­an tasks relat­ed to the war. Sig­nif­i­cant sup­port for Ukraine was ini­ti­at­ed by Belaru­sian dias­po­ras in the EU coun­tries.

At the same time, we are increas­ing­ly wit­ness­ing when ordi­nary Belaru­sians fall under var­i­ous sanc­tions and dis­crim­i­na­to­ry mea­sures togeth­er with the de fac­to author­i­ties of Belarus. Our Belaru­sian friends and col­leagues abroad are increas­ing­ly being attacked only on the basis of belong­ing to Belarus, which is clear­ly caused by a poor under­stand­ing of the actu­al state of affairs in Belaru­sian soci­ety.

For two years already, our com­pa­tri­ots with an active civic posi­tion have not been able to ensure prop­er secu­ri­ty for them­selves and their fam­i­lies. Jus­tice has been com­plete­ly destroyed in Belarus, law enforce­ment agen­cies can break into any house with­out any legal grounds, there are more than 1,000 polit­i­cal pris­on­ers behind bars in the coun­try, and for any anti-war protests, the author­i­ties pun­ish peo­ple with reg­u­lar admin­is­tra­tive arrests.

In recent days, there have been calls from indi­vid­ual EU rep­re­sen­ta­tives to stop issu­ing Schen­gen and nation­al visas to Belaru­sian cit­i­zens. We believe that such actions will not help to cope with mil­i­tary aggres­sion but rather will fur­ther com­pli­cate the life and secu­ri­ty of ordi­nary cit­i­zens, who are actu­al­ly in a «closed room» any­way. Please note that the pos­si­ble refusal to issue visas to our fel­low cit­i­zens vio­lates the rights and jeop­ar­dizes Belaru­sian­swho con­tin­ue to tell the truth and share Euro­pean val­ues.

We wel­come the actions of indi­vid­ual Euro­pean politi­cians aimed at reduc­ing aggres­sion and hate speech against Belaru­sian cit­i­zens and call on oth­er Euro­pean politi­cians to fol­low their exam­ple.

We call on our Euro­pean part­ners to pro­vide the cit­i­zens of Belarus, who were forced to leave Belarus and Ukraine after the start of the war, equal rights with the cit­i­zens of Ukraine and addi­tion­al secu­ri­ty guar­an­tees in the Euro­pean Union with­in the frame­work of already launched legal instru­ments, as well as to main­tain the mech­a­nism for issu­ing Euro­pean and nation­al visas for cit­i­zens of Belarus.