Belarus and Russia in OSCE Ministerial Council focus

VILNIUS -  On Dec. 6-7, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and foreign ministers or their deputies from other OSCE member countries (Europe in the widest sense, North America and Central Asia) as well as some delegations from OSCE’s partner countries (Israel and Australia were represented by their foreign ministers) arrived at Vilnius’ Litexpo center to participate in the Ministerial Council of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which is chaired by Lithuania this year. Issues of human rights, freedom of media, Afghanistan and the Arab Spring were the most popular themes discussed during the meeting. The Minsk regime got a lot of criticism from Western participants due to political repressions in Belarus.

“It is vital that human rights and the fundamental principles of democracy would be transferred into national policies and practice. This applies to all human rights and fundamental freedoms - ranging from free elections to the safety of journalists,” Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite said, opening the OSCE Ministerial Council.
The biggest achievement of Lithuania’s 2011 OSCE chairmanship was the meeting of representatives of Moldova’s government and Moldova’s Soviet-style separatist region of Transdniestria - that meeting was held under the auspices of the OSCE, the EU, the U.S., Russia and Ukraine in Vilnius on Dec. 1. It was the first official meeting of Moldova’s government and separatists following a nearly six-year hiatus. Grybauskaite said that Lithuania is “an honest broker” in this case.

The OSCE, like the UN, is usually rather a talking corner because it is difficult to find consensus between democratic and authoritarian members of the organization. This was obvious in Vilnius when foreign ministers spoke about the Russian parliamentary elections of Dec. 4. Clinton told the OSCE meeting that the Russian Duma elections were “neither free, nor fair.” She accented that the People’s Freedom Party “For Russia without Lawlessness and Corruption” (known by its Russian abbreviation PARNAS), which was established by famous Russian Western-oriented liberals, was not allowed to take part in the elections. Lavrov, who spoke after Clinton, did not use the opportunity to answer her but spoke about some unnamed forces which seek to glorify Nazism in Europe. Westerwelle said that the Russian elections “do not fully meet the OSCE standards.”

“It is hard to make the conclusion that they were free and fair elections,” Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said in Vilnius about the elections in Russia. Lyudmila Alekseyeva, an 83-year old Soviet-era human rights campaigner and still head of Moscow Helsinki Group, also arrived to this OSCE meeting and criticized the decision of the Kremlin which, on Dec. 6, deployed the troops of the Russian Interior Ministry in Moscow streets to stop further protests against the fraudulent elections.

Clinton emphasized in her speech that the U.S. supports the “sovereignty and territorial integrity of Georgia.” Some 20 percent of Georgia’s territory now is occupied by the Russian army.
On Dec. 6, Clinton had mutual meetings with Grybauskaite and Lithuanian Foreign Minister Audronius Azubalis. He expressed his concern over the growing military power of Russia in the region and urged the U.S. to continue keeping American nuclear arms in Europe as well as turning the temporary NATO air-policing mission in the Baltics into a permanent mission.

Clinton also had a meeting with the Belarusian opposition’s representatives, who arrived from their country for this event. All speakers at the OSCE meeting expressed their support for the wish of Mongolia to become the 57th member of the OSCE. Next year the OSCE will be chaired by Ireland.