Belarusian MP slams PACE resolution as ‘criminal in its content'

MINSK, 29 April (BelTA) – The document is criminal in its content, Chairman of the Standing Committee on International Affairs of the House of Representatives Andrei Savinykh told reporters as he commented on the PACE resolution titled “Deportations and forcible transfers of Ukrainian children and other civilians to Russian Federation” which contains unfounded accusations against Belarus, BelTA has learned.

"The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has adopted a very bizarre document that calls for punishing those responsible for the deportation of children and civilians from the zone of armed conflict in Ukraine. Moreover, this document holds Belarusian head of state directly responsible for this deportation," Andrei Savinykh said. “We are deeply perplexed. We are well aware that there are a large number of civilians and children in the combat zone, in the zone of contact between the Ukrainian and Russian military. Moreover, we also know that it is the Ukrainian military that prevents them from leaving the line of contact."

This puts their lives at serious risk, the MP stressed. "When the Russian military advances they certainly take these people to a safe place. To call it a forced deportation, to compare the rescue, the removal of people from the zone of military conflicts with genocide means turning everything upside down," he said.

" I believe this document is criminal in its content. It demands the return of these people to a zone where they may die. I consider such actions simply unacceptable. We very much regret that the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, a body that is designed to protect human rights, takes such a terrible, inhumane position," Andrei Savinykh added. “We believe that this testifies not just to the crisis of key political institutions of the EU. This completely undermines the legitimacy of these organizations. They discredit the very notion of humanitarian interaction and international law."