MOSCOW, 3 December (BelTA) – The OSCE's unilateral stance on Belarus has delivered a heavy blow to the organization's reputation, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov said in his address to the OSCE Ministerial Council. The text of the address was posted on the website of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, BelTA informs.
“A heavy blow to the OSCE's reputation was the erroneous refusal of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) to monitor the presidential election in Belarus, the subsequent one-sided criticism of the Belarusian authorities and the launch of the obsolete Moscow Mechanism. The bureau's political bias, its participation in campaigns against some countries and an impervious, cowardly silence about the situation in others discredit our organization,” the statement reads.
According to Sergey Lavrov, the unwillingness of Western countries to drop confrontational and bloc approaches, an arrogant attitude towards the legitimate interests of other states, which stems from a sense of their own ‘exclusiveness' remain the bone of contention. The policy of replacing international law with a kind of ‘rules-based order' is leading to an increasingly harsh and dishonest ‘game without rules' abounding in misinformation and ‘double standards'. The fewer real facts are behind these orchestrated media campaigns, the more aggressive they become.
“It is obvious that the OSCE is in urgent need of reforms,” the Russian minister is convinced. “Reforms should be aimed at increasing transparency and efficiency of the secretariat, institutions and grassroots presence, improving the methodology of election observation, optimizing the program of events and preparation for the Ministerial Council, balancing ‘the three baskets', and improving the budget process. It is necessary to draw up an updated agenda, to focus on what unites us rather than divides us, and strive to find compromises through open and equal dialogue,” Sergey Lavrov said.
“Building a community of equal and indivisible security in all dimensions remains our common goal,” the address stressed. “It is important to give a new lease of life to the interrelated OSCE commitments that have shaped up over the past decades. The organization will have no future if it is not needed by the participating states themselves. The proposals of Russia and its allies to reform the OSCE are well known and were made long ago. It is time for our Western colleagues to stop pretending that change is not needed, otherwise the future of the OSCE itself, which is rapidly losing its reputation and prestige in the eyes of its participating states, will be uncertain,” he added.
“Yellow vest protests in France, heightened inter-faith tensions, mass protests in other European countries, violent racial unrest in the USA with dozens of victims prove that one should not look for serious problems related to human rights only ‘to the west of Vienna',” Sergey Lavrov said. “We are calling for working out the OSCE commitments regarding public access to information. This principle was proclaimed in the early 1990s, but our western colleagues are trying to consign it to oblivion,” he added.
“The OSCE can return to its roots – its role as a fundamental European structure for discussing and making collective decisions about security in all its dimensions. It all depends on the member states that should exercise their political will to achieve compromises and promote equal and mutually respectful cooperation,” Sergey Lavrov noted.
