German “expert” was invited to Minsk by head of OSCE office

Hans-Johan Schmidt was the initiator of Martin Finke’s visit to Minsk. Martin Finke issued an expert’s opinion on the case of Vaukavysk entrepreneurs.

Analyst Raman Yakauleuski told about that to Radio Racyja.

“This expert had been found by Mr Schmidt. It is not completely clear so far, whether it was a personal initiative or it was made at a bidding of Uladzimir Makei. But it is for sure that the initiator of this strange visit was Schmidt. It was done secretly. But it is interesting: whose official Mr Schmidt is?” asks the analyst.

Martin Finke in his interview to BelaPAN confirmed that he wrote an expert’s opinion on the case of entrepreneurs from Vaukavysk Mikalai Autukhovich,Yury Lyavonau and Uladzimir Asipenka on invitation of the OSCE, which received a request of the Belarusian government.

He stated that the necessity of an expert’s conclusion “hadn’t been explained in any way”, as the case is closed, and he cannot speak about his work. “I agreed to make an expert’s opinion and made a commitment not to speak about the case, as it contradicts the procedure of court proceeding, in particular, from the side of the defense,” Finke said.

As said by the expert, he issued the conclusion “basing upon opinions of relevant officials, which had been offered to him, and on the materials of the case”. Finke noted that he hadn’t read all the documents, as the case consists of “dozens of thousands of pages”. “But I have seen everything I wanted,” the expert underlined.

He waived reproaches that he was not disinterested enough. As said by Martin Finke, “the Belarusian government does not know him at all, and the OSCE knows him due to projects in different countries”.

The head of the OSCE office in Minsk Hans-Johan Schmidt declined comment on the situation. Comments from the Interior Ministry of Belarus haven’t been received so far.

Professor Martin Finke from the University of Passau (Germany) visited Minsk on June 8-10. This expert arrived incognito and issued a conclusion that there were no irregularities in judicial proceedings in the case of Vaukavysk entrepreneur Mikalai Autukhovich. The conclusion was sent out to embassies of EU countries in Minsk.

It should be noted that activities of the OSCE office are considered controversial. Belarusian pro-democracy activists believe that the current mandate of the OSCE office is extremely insufficient for its effective work in Belarus.

Before 2003 the OSCE was represented by the Consultative Observation Group in Minsk. The mandate of the OSCE group which worked in Minsk since 1998, included assistance to democratic institutions of Belarus. Since 2003 the OSCE office serves as the representation in Belarus.

Unlike the Consultative Observation Group, the mandate of the OSCE office was formulated on fundamentally different principles on demand of the Belarusian authorities. As the official Minsk demanded, the OSCE office was bound to “help to the Belarusian government” in the further strengthening the supremacy of law, development of the economy and nature protection. Changes in the mandate of the OSCE office have influenced its activities.

In 2008, for instance, the Belarusian OSCE office organized an exhibition of Belarusian artists, a literary and poetical evening, took part in organizing a seminar on energy effectiveness, a seminar on improving professional skills of Belarusian policemen. The OSCE office was also engaged in political issues, but was not so active in this sphere.

The former political prisoner and former candidate for presidency Alyaksandr Kazulin is sure that the OSCE mission in Belarus should be present, but the present work of the mission is called unsatisfactory. “Undoubtedly, there should be the OSCE mission in Belarus. But the mission should cooperate not only with state structures, but with the non-governmental sector, representatives of civil society, parties. Today we see that the latter is not happening,” Kazulin said in an interview to BDG.

He reminded that the OSCE Office in Belarus refused to cooperate with political parties on the issue of changing the electoral laws. “Mr Schmidt stated that he is ready to receive offers on this problem only from representatives of the government. But it shouldn’t be this way: political parties and public organisations take part in the elections. How can an electoral code be drafted without them?!” Alyaksandr Kazulin is puzzled.

According to the politician, the Belarusian OSCE Office has focused its attention on solving non-political questions. “Mr Schmidt is active in cultural sphere. It is possible he would be successful in that. We see no success in the political sphere,” Kazulin underlined.

The first secretary of the Belarusian Communist party Syarhei Kalyakin is also dissatisfied by the work of the SOEC Office. “The OSCE Office should work with the civil society, with political parties. However, today the Belarusian Office is not engaged in that. The Office works with the government mostly,” Syarhei Kalyakin said.