On November 9, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya took part in a closed-door roundtable in Berlin on transnational repression carried out by the Lukashenka regime. The meeting was organized by Freedom House in cooperation with the German Marshall Fund, whose office hosted the event.
Participants included Freedom House President Jamie Fly, representatives of Germany’s Federal Foreign Office, German experts, Belarusian journalists, human rights defenders, and civil society representatives.
The event focused on how to protect Belarusians who have fled repression but continue to face threats even outside their home country.
Participants discussed the regime’s use of international wanted-person mechanisms, including Interpol; criminal cases brought in absentia; the cancellation of documents; pressure on relatives in Belarus; and attempts by security services to recruit and intimidate activists.
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya presented proposals to strengthen the protection of Belarusians at the national and international levels. Key proposals included:
- protection against politically motivated wanted notices. Additional scrutiny should be applied to requests from the Lukashenka regime, and the use of Interpol and other international wanted-person mechanisms to persecute Belarusian activists, journalists, and human rights defenders should be prevented. Extradition in politically motivated cases must be ruled out;
- simplified issuance of travel documents and residence permits. Procedures should be simplified to help Belarusians who cannot safely return to Belarus obtain travel documents and residence permits. A unified European approach to expired passports should be developed so that people are not dependent on decisions made by the regime;
- protection against threats from security services. Clear mechanisms should be established to allow Belarusians to safely report threats, surveillance, recruitment attempts, and blackmail targeting their relatives. Cooperation between law enforcement agencies across European countries should be strengthened;
- coordinated action at the EU, OSCE, and Council of Europe levels. Transnational repression should be recognized as a distinct security threat. Information-sharing between countries should be strengthened, and common guidelines developed to protect people targeted by authoritarian regimes;
- accountability for those responsible for persecution. Cases of transnational repression should be systematically documented, and the resulting evidence used to impose sanctions on security service officers and other regime officials responsible.
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya: “For many Belarusians, leaving the country does not mean leaving persecution behind. The regime continues to threaten them, open criminal cases against them, put pressure on their relatives, and create problems with their documents. In effect, it is trying to deprive people of any sense of security, even beyond Belarus’s borders.
That is why European countries should both provide refuge to Belarusians and protect them from transnational repression. Requests from the authorities in Belarus must not become grounds for detaining or extraditing people. Belarusians must be able to live, work, and travel freely without fearing for themselves or their loved ones.
We are grateful to Germany for taking this issue seriously and look forward to continued cooperation in finding concrete solutions”.
Germany’s Federal Foreign Office has already established a dedicated unit to address issues related to transnational repression.
