LITHUANIAN FORUM PARTICIPANTS DISCUSS SPREAD OF DEMOCRACY IN EAST

Vilnius BNS WWW-Text
03 May 2006

[“Participants In Vilnius Conference Discussing Western Policy Towards
East” – BNS headline]

VILNIUS, May 03, (BNS) – Famous political scientists, diplomats and
public figures who have gathered for an NGO forum in Vilnius are
discussing the trans-Atlantic community’s policy towards the East.

The NGO forum, held within the framework of Vilnius Conference 2006:
Common Vision for Common Neighbourhood, addressed the future of
democracy in Ukraine, the Caucasian countries of Georgia, Armenia and
Azerbaijan, as well as Russia and Belarus that have democracy problems.

The chairman of the Lithuania-based international historic justice
commission, MP Emanuelis Zingeris, noted the responsibility of
the European Union and the trans-Atlantic community for democratic
processes in Belarus, where authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko
had been reelected for a third term in presidential elections several
weeks ago, which were not recognized by the international democratic
community.

Much attention was given to Russia. Bruce Jackson, president of the
Project on Transitional Democracies, stated that the European Union
had been unable to pursue a principled policy of expanding democracy to
the East so far. He noted that, in terms of its definition, the policy
towards the East could not be anti-Russian, it could be anti-Putin
or anti-Kremlin, but an anti-Russian policy would not be successful.

Istvan Gyarmati, a famous Hungarian diplomat and expert in strategic
studies, said that relations with Russia had to be based on both
values and interests, as Russia would remain an important supplier
of natural and energy resources to Europe.

Boris Kuznecov, director of the St Petersburg-based Centre of
International and Regional Policy, said that the conference was
“anti-Russian.” He rhetorically asked where advocates of democracy were
over a decade ago when the then Russian president, Boris Yeltsin,
“stole an election victory,” and that international financial
assistance funds had allegedly been embezzled under his rule.

Andrei Illarionov, former economic adviser to Russian President
Vladimir Putin, strongly opposed him. In Illarionov’s words, on
the contrary, the Vilnius conference is very “pro-Russian,” as it
promotes significant values in Russia, which the country lacks, namely
democracy, human rights, freedom of press, free market and prosperity.

The NGO forum, the Agenda for Democracy in Europe’s East, is attended
by NGO representatives from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, the Czech
Republic, Georgia, the US, Latvia, Poland, Lithuania, Moldova,
the Netherlands, Norway, France, Russia, Slovakia, Finland, Sweden,
Ukraine, Hungary and Germany.

At the Heads of State Summit on Thursday, speeches will be made
by presidents of Lithuania, Poland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Georgia,
Latvia, Moldova, Romania, Ukraine, the US vice-president, the EU high
representative for common foreign and security policy, other EU and
Eastern European government representatives.

The presidents of Lithuania and Poland, Valdas Adamkus and Lech
Kaczynski, are patrons of Vilnius Conference 2006: Common Vision for
Common Neighbourhood.