Going unpunished

Radio Polonia:

Poland’s ruling Left as well as the opposition parties are unanimous that Warsaw should not recognize the new leadership of the Union of Poles in Belarus. Poland should take steps to make the international community involved in the conflict around the Polish ethnic minority in Belarus.

The union’s new leaders were elected on Saturday at a meeting orchestrated by the Belarus authorities. They replaced democratically elected Angelica Borys and her associates, whom the Minsk regime accused of attempts to destabilize the state. Last month President Alexander Lukashenko declared illegal all public gatherings of ethnic Poles as part of persecutions which began earlier this year, after the Polish Union’s congress which elected independent-minded people. The Belarus president also started a crack-down on independent NGO’s which are supported by democratic forces outside the country.