Organisers hope that Assembly will become a real focal point of meeting for all civic organisations and activists who work to democratise the Belarusian society. The main goals of the Assembly include discussions of current problems and reaction on challenges that NGOs and the Belarusian society are facing. In addition, a series of thematic round tables and a festival of NGOs with presentations on activities of various initiatives are planned. It is expected that during the Assembly a work will be started to create a union of non-governmental organisations.
A previous forum of this kind took place almost 5 years ago, in 2004. A need to meet for civic activists was rather pressing. Siarhei Matskevich, an Assembly organisational committee member and a Supolnaść Centre activist, explains urgency of the NGOs forum: “There are certain articles in the Criminal Code now that penalise for activities in a name of unregistered organisations. Civic organizations are denied fringe benefits. Harassment of activists is our everyday reality. However, recently a so-called liberalisation could be seen in the country. And we think there are opportune times for civic organisations to come together and discuss our problems and try to figure out our joint position.”
Regional meetings preceded ahead of the Assembly to deal with issues in a local third sector and prepare content for the main forum in March. Vital Vasilkou, a member of a Mahiliou based civic centre Koła, shared his impressions: “In our Mahiliou region we had a big gathering of more than 100 organisations. More than that we had a number of thematic round tables on various topics. There were environmentalists, youth organisations and many others. There even were several new civic initiatives such as new mass media.”
However, not everywhere regional meetings ran without obstacles. For instance, in Homel local authorities tried hamper a forum of regional civic activists by denying a conference space in the very last moment.
The Minsk forum organisers also encountered several problems. It is already known that not all of the foreign guests will be able to attend. Siarhei Matskevich commented: “By now two of them were refused Belarusian visas. David Hamilman a representative of the National Democratic Institute Office in Kyiv, and Agnieszka Komarowska, a Batory Foundation representative from Warsaw. I got a phone call from the Belarusian embassy in Kyiv and was told that they could not issue a visa to David Hamilman since he is on a persona non-grata list in Belarus. They advised us to contact KGB if we wish for David to get a visa. There are about 5 more people who have not yet received their visas. Perhaps, this list might include their names as well.”
