Lukashenka's administration's IAC: Too few representatives of authorities in Internet

Belarusian officials have been offered a target to expand their presence on the web.

It has been stated by a leading expert of the Informational and Analytical centre under the president Alyaksei Vasilkou at the conference in Minsk dedicated to Internet technologies, Interfax informs.

"There are few representatives of the authorities in the internet. We are tackling this problem, but we would like their presence to be more visible," he said underlining that the problem of making presence of representatives of the authorities on the web and in blogs is vital at the moment.

The representative of the IAC noted that for instance, at present there are 5 blogs of representatives of the Belarusian government bodies, while in Russia this number is a sequence higher.

Vasilkou strongly contradicted an opinion that the regime in Belarus fears Internet. "We do not fear that or the reason that Internet is little used for political aims," Vasilkou said.

The representative of the IAC has also called upon not to connect the growing interest of the Belarusian authorities to Internet with the upcoming presidential election campaign. "We do not have such an aim to "sell" the candidate of the government. We are not engaged in political marketing," Vasilkou stressed. He confessed however that people on which the current regime is restng upon, and people who are constant users of the Internet are "different electorates".

At the same time, as said by him, "we should communicate via different channels". Vasilkou underlined that broadening presence on the web is important for the Belarusian authorities "not for tactical, but for strategic aims".

However, the IAC representative said with regret that "Belarusian internet community meets appearance of the authorities on the web extremely negatively or ironically: for instance, people ask in the blog of the Chief directorate of the Internal Affairs, when Belarus plans to extradite Kurmanbek Bakiyev". "Bynet is not ready to recognize the government. Bynet is a territory of freedom. But no one is going to take it away," the expert said. He attracted attention to the fact that "critisism of the current authorities is present on the web, however not a single website or blog has been closed".