Belarus was not mentioned in the first documents laying down the institutional framework for Slovak development assistance. Even in 2003, when the Mid-Term Strategy of Official Development Assistance for 2003-2008 was adopted, Ukraine and Belarus were not included as they were ineligible for ODA. Both countries were placed in the category of official assistance (OA), and in 2004 the government allocated SKK 10m from the national ODA budget to OA projects in both countries.
Democracy assistance officially became an integral part of Slovak foreign policy in Nov-ember 2004, when the Parliament approved the Mid-term Strategy of the Foreign Policy of the Slovak Republic until 2015. According to the Orientation of Slovakia’s Foreign Policy for 2007, adopted by the Slovak MFA and Parliament, the priority of Slovak policy towards Belarus was “to support democratic forces in Belarus in their endeavour to up-hold human and political rights and simultaneously develop bilateral relations within the framework of EU policies... The Slovak Republic shall continue to pursue a balanced policy of reacting to [Belarus’s] internal political situation, which suffers from a deficit of democratic principles and international isolation of the country. The Slovak Republic shall continue to lead a restricted dialogue with the government and support the development of democracy and civil society.” Efforts to bring Belarus closer to European values were also mentioned in the Orientation of Slovakia’s Foreign Policy for 2008.
Belarus plays an important role in Slovak democracy assistance policy. In 2004-2007, eight Slovak democracy assistance projects were implemented in Belarus. In fact, demo-cracy assistance projects were the only projects financed in Belarus in the framework of Slovak ODA, with no projects focused on either technical assistance or humanitarian aid.
Seven of them were implemented by NGOs, one by a university. The only countries where more Slovak democracy assistance projects were implemented were Serbia, including Kosovo (27), which is considered as the top priority country, the so-called “programme country”, and Ukraine (11).
In the case of Belarus, democracy assistance remained a priority of Slovak ODA even after its institutional reform and the establishment in 2007 of the Slovak Agency for Inter-national Development Co-operation (SAMRS) with its preference for more infrastructure
society in Central and Eastern Europe, and initiate public discussion on EU international policy in Poland and in Europe. Several projects are aimed at Belarus, focusing on the promotion of cross-border contacts and facilitation of the EU visa regime. Besides its own operational programmes, the foundation re-grants funds as the administrator of the OSI East-East Partnership Beyond Borders Programme, and the Citizens in Action Programme funded by the Ford Foundation, which runs from 2003-2009, providing grants in support of democratic change and the development of civil society in Belarus and Ukraine.
References
European Humanities University, trust fund. http://www.norden.org/hviterussland/sk/ehu.asp?lang=
Tatiana Poshevalova, Ulad Vialichka: Open letter of Belarusian experts to the participants of Belarus international implementers meeting, 11-12 April 2008 in Bratislava, Slovakia.
Balázs Jarábik, Vitali Silitski: Is the EU serious about democracy and human rights? The case of Belarus.
Unpublished manuscript, written for European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) and FRIDE.
How the West continues to lose Belarus. Belarus Brief. Bratislava, Pontis Foundation, 21 December 2006.
Yury Chavusau: One Year After the European Message: Reaction of the Official Minsk to the EU Twelve Demands. Belarusian Institute for the Strategic Studies. BISS Blitz #13/2007, 5 December 2007.
http://www.belinstitute.eu/images/stories/documents/blitz20071205eumessageen.pdf Eastern Partnership. Polish-Swedish proposal. Euractiv.com, 23 May 2008.
Presidency Conclusions of the Brussels European Council (19-20 June 2008), nr. 11018/08.
Meeting of the Ministers of Culture of the V4 in Cracow, Poland. 03-04/09/2006.
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Belarus. Country Strategy Paper 2007-2013 and National Indicative Programme 2007-2010. Brussels, European Commission
Balázs Jarábik and Alastair Rabagliati: Buffer Rus: New Challenges for EU Policy towards Belarus.
Madrid, FRIDE, March 2007.
Joerg Forbrig, David R. Marples and Pavol Demeš (eds.): Prospects for Democracy in Belarus. The German Marshall Fund of the United States, Washington D.C. 2006
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en. European Commission, IP/08/643, Brussels, 25 April 2008
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Foreign Operations Appropriated Assistance: Belarus. Fact Sheet. Washington D.C., State Department, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, April 28, 2008.
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A relatively small share of the total MFA assistance was assigned to Polish NGOs working in Belarus - a mere PLN 2.6m or 10% of the funds for projects in Belarus.
The largest number of projects was targeted at the development of independent media and the support of access to information (50% in 2008), followed by support for NGOs and civil society (25%), and support for education and youth projects (17%). Whereas co-operation with local government and projects aimed at regional development shaped 67% of the projects supported in 2004, in the next year it was only 10%. Since 2007, the Polish MFA has not financed any projects developed with local government or dedicated to the promotion of European integration (which was a major item in the programmes for the other post-Soviet priority countries, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine).
The overall amount of development assistance provided to Belarus in 2008 remained at the same level, standing at PLN 26m. This figure includes projects implemented by NGOs, as well as support for large projects implemented by the government, such as the Bela-rusian Radio Racyja, broadcasting in BelaBela-rusian on the territory of Belarus from Poland and Lithuania. Funding from the Polish state budget is also given to TV Belsat, which is managed by the public Polish TV. One of the most important programmes supported within the framework of Polish democracy assistance has been the Konstanty Kalinowski Scholarship Programme directed at students expelled from Belarusian universities due to their involvement in activities aimed at promoting democratic values.
Poland is Belarus’s only neighbour among the V4 countries. Therefore it has the best devel-oped network of co-operation with NGOs acting in the regions, particularly in the Grodno region in western Belarus. From the point of view of sustainability, it is worth singling out the unique project of the Belarus School of Journalism, implemented in co-operation with the Centre for Support and Development of Civic Initiatives Opus. The project has been underway for 11 years, focusing on the training of young journalists in the Grodno region and on the organisation of independent publishing activities. Its main impact can be measured in terms of the number of graduates working in local and regional media, while many of the graduates find work in NGOs.
Among Polish NGOs, the largest amount of assistance to promote democracy in Belarus is provided by the East European Democratic Center, which is focused on the support of independent media and on the support of the publication and distribution of independent literature in Belarus. The Poland-Belarus Citizen Education Centre Association from Bia-lystok has developed co-operation between Polish and Belarusian NGOs in the Grodno region.
The Stefan Batory Foundation, established by George Soros in 1998, is Poland’s largest non-governmental domestic grantmaker supporting democracy assistance programmes.
The foundation implements its own “International Co-operation Programme”, whose ob-jective is to support active EU policies towards the eastern neighbours, strengthen civil
Part II Visegrad Four Democracy Assistance Policies in Target Countries Belarus: Next Generation Democracy - Marian Kowalski Transition Promotion programme concept. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Czech Republic.
http://www.mzv.cz
Ihar Lalkov: “Európske perspektívy Bieloruska”. In: Zuzana Poláčková, Juraj Marušiak (eds.): Európske výzvy pre Slovensko. Bratislava, Veda, p. 208.
Andrei Liakhovich: Power Poker: An Examination into the Dynamics of the Current Relationship between Russia and Belarus. Bratislava, Pontis Foundation, The Belarus Public Policy Fund.
Visegrad Scholarship Programme. Approved in-coming scholars 2007. Bratislava, International Visegrad Fund 2007. http://www.visegradfund.org/approved/VSP_2007_INCOMING.pdf
Posol Vengrii vyvesit v Minske samyj boľšoj flag Evrosojuza. Naviny.by, 2. 6. 2008
Padtrymka hramadzianskaj supoľnasci u Belarusi. Pohliad znutry. Belarusian-European Cooperation And Partnership http://eurobelarus.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=950&Itemid=52 Background on the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR)
http://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/where/worldwide/eidhr/index_en.htm People in Need, Belarus - http://www.clovekvtisni.cz/index2en.php?id=536
A Diplomat’s Handbook For Democracy Development Support. Washington D.C., Council for a Community of Democracies 2008.
http://www.diplomatshandbook.org/pdf/Diplomat’s%20Handbook.pdf Stefan Batory Foundation, http://batory.org.pl
Endnotes
1 Speech by Condoleezza Rice to Belarusian dissidents, Vilnius, Lithuania, at a side-meeting during NATO foreign ministers’’ summit, 21 April 2005