Riga summit: EU politician urges Belarusian opposition to unite

President for the European People's Party Joseph Daul met the representatives of Belarusian opposition structures before the Eastern Partnership summit in Riga on May 21. A lot of European politicians would like to forget about Belarusian political prisoners and simply do business in Belarus, he noted. It would be easier for the European Peoples’ Party to oppose them if the Belarusian opposition were united, Joseph Daul noted.

This is what leader of the Movement for Freedom Alyaksandr Milinkevich told journalists after the meeting:

"They said that unity was essential to be able to influence the Belarusian society and to be perceived as a subject of the Belarusian politics and of the European politics in European structures. A single [opposition] candidate is really important for it. I believe that everyone in our group understands that it is very important. But we have not managed to do it yet. There is such a problem. But nobody said that we did not need a single candidate that we ‘would make as a wide front and embrace everything’”.

Besides Milinkevich, United Civil Party leader Anatol Lyebedzka, head of the BPF Party Alyaksei Yanukevich, co-chairperson of the steering committee for the creation of the Belarusian Christian Democracy Vital Rymasheuski, Vice President of the European People's Party Jacek Saryusz-Wolski and Vice-Chair of the Group of the European People's Party in the European Parliament Sandra Kalniete participated in the meeting.

Photo: Zmitser Lukashuk, naviny.by