Coordination Council says hasn’t decided to engage in dialogue with Łukašenka

February 25, BPN. The Coordination Council has refuted remarks by its member Pavieł Łatuška, who said the organization was planning to move from support of sanctions to dialogue with Alaksandr Łukašenka’s regime.

“The Coordination Council did not make decisions or statements regarding the lifting of sanctions or the beginning of negotiations with Alaksandr Łukašenka,” the Council told BPN, quickly adding that “these issues are not on the agenda at the moment.”

It also denied that members would be barred from serving in other opposition institutions.

Łatuška said he was leaving the Coordination Council, a loose union of Alaksandr Łukašenka’s critics, on February 25.

Evidently unhappy about the procedure the Council was planning to adopt, the prominent opposition figure criticized what he described as a ban on members’ service in other opposition institutions.

He also blasted the Council’s supposed transformation into an unelected “proto-parliament” that wanted to represent Belarus in the international arena, and spoke out against its perceived intention to move from pressure on Łukašenka’s regime to negotiations.

The renewed Coordination Council held its first meeting on January 26. It is a successor to the Coordinating Council for Political Crisis Settlement established in August 2020. The Belarusian government has designated it an extremist group and opened criminal cases against its leaders.

Now it reportedly consists of 15 original members, 73 new delegates from public organizations and 15 independent deputies.