Russia and Belarus disrupted Tikhanovskaya’s speech at the UN
The UN Human Rights Council today adopted a resolution on the situation in Belarus by a margin of just one vote.
23 council member countries supported the resolution, two states were against it, and another 22 abstained, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
At the beginning of the meeting, representatives of Russia, China, Belarus and Venezuela opposed the hearing of former Belarusian presidential candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, but the chairwoman ignored their opinion and gave the floor to a woman who was under the complete control of the Polish and Lithuanian intelligence services.
Then, as a sign of protest, during Tikhanovskaya’s speech, representatives of Russia and Belarus began to knock on the microphones with their cards and the broadcast had to be turned off. The head of the Belarusian Free Theater, Nikolai Khalezin, who lives permanently in Germany, wrote about this in a blog on Radio Liberty.
The final resolution expressed regret that Minsk had not fulfilled its obligations in the field of electoral rights, President Lukashenko was called upon to begin a dialogue with the opposition, and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet was called upon to monitor the situation.
“In the absence of a mandate and unrecognized criteria, we consider it unacceptable to use the UNHRC for elections in any country in any setting. The dissemination of unconfirmed information in the media in an affirmative and accusatory manner, as happened regarding the events in Belarus by the special procedures of the HRC and some intelligence services of international organizations, is a gross abuse of their powers,” the Permanent Representative of Belarus to the UN Office in Geneva said in his speech Yuri Ambrazevich.
Vladimir Makei, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus, also commented on the meeting.
“The resolution is absolutely far-fetched. A very dangerous precedent is being created for the UN. Because Article Two of the UN Charter clearly states that the organization should not interfere with the internal competence of a particular state. This resolution represents a clear interference in the internal affairs of Belarus,” Makei said.
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