Belarus

Legal policy starting point

The presidential elections in December 2010 were followed by civil protests and arrests of demonstrators and critics among the opposition, and the right to demonstrate and the freedom of the press were further restricted. Other laws such as in the regulations governing lawyers were tightened as well. Since then, there has been considerable reticence on the part of the Belarus partners with regard to international cooperation in the legal field.

The relations of Belarus with its European neighbouring states are tense. At the same time, Belarus is becoming more and more economically dependent on Russia while it is seeking for a way out of the present economic misery, accompanied by immense inflation rates. The customs union, the common economic area and the Eurasian Union are intensifying the inte-gration process with Russia. Against this background, the general political and legal policy framework for international legal cooperation has been unfavourable recently. What is more, there are further, as yet unclarified bureaucratic obstacles additionally hindering the offer made by the Federal Government to engage in international legal cooperation.

Cooperation to date - strategy

Cooperation with the Republic of Belarus has taken place in recent years in the framework of the overall project entitled “Rule of Law Dialogue”. Large numbers of topics which are rele-vant to the rule of law, as well as to commercial law, have been discussed in this framework with representatives of governmental and non-governmental institutions of the Republic of Belarus. No cooperation has been carried out with Belarus since 2011 because of the de facto and legal situation as described above.

Outlook

The IRZ Foundation intends to continue the Rule of Law Dialogue with the previous govern-mental and non-governmental partner institutions of Belarus as soon as the bureaucratic and legal policy obstacles are overcome. The IRZ is willing at any time to undertake joint steps towards enhancing democracy, the rule of law and civil society. Such cooperation should be an open and critical dialogue based on relevance and values - and should take place without hindrance.