Civil society: Cooperation in Emigration, Loyalist Hierarchy, Nobel Prize Behind the Bars

Summary

Belarusian civil society organizations (CSOs) experienced an increase in already severe repressions from the side of the state in 2022. Active civil society (CSO) actors who remain in Belarus tend to operate discreetly, avoiding attention and sensitive topics. Emigrated CSOs have begun to rebuild their infrastructure from scratch, forming new configurations and achieving stronger political representation. Meanwhile, the government has been establishing a hierarchy of GONGOs, controlled pseudo-civil organizations that imitate genuine CSOs. These developments took place in the context of a historic event: the 2022 Noble Peace Prize was awarded to Ales Bialiatski, a political prisoner and the leader of the country's human rights center "Viasna".

Trends:

• Total widespread liquidation of CSOs that began in 2021 increased by more than 25 percent;

• Successful cooperation and increased political representation of relocated CSOs;

• Many CSOs, especially those still operating in Belarus, maintain a low profile, with some even remaining anonymous;

• The state is Building a hierarchical system of loyal Governmental Organizations (GOs), ranging from fully controlled GONGOs to local initiatives with almost all the features of ordinary CSO.

Total repression: civil society purge in all directions

In the summer of 2022, Lukashenko stated that "society should be purged of these scoundrels" from CSOs. According to him, under the "fashionable banner" of non-governmental organizations for the “protection of dogs and cats”, these entities "absorbed all that we had to fight against". He emphasized that "politically motivated people were thrown in," leading to their prominence in the front lines of the 2020 protests.1

Despite the fact that the current scouring of Belarusian CSOs has been going on since 2021, it only seems to grow in scale. About 670 civil society organizations were liquidated in 2022 alone, an almost 25% increase compared to 2020-2021.

As in 2021, CSOs of all legal forms and areas of work were subjected to government persecution. For a long time, three significant categories of organizations managed to avoid mass liquidation: independent trade unions, religious organizations, and political parties. However, repressions against trade unions began in the spring and summer of 2022. Mass detentions of independent trade union activists occurred in April. In June, the Prosecutor General’s Office petitioned the Supreme Court for the termination of trade union activities. In July, the court dissolved the Belarusian Congress of Democratic Trade Unions2 and all its member trade union organizations.

The liquidation of almost all political parties (including pro-government parties) only transpired in 2023. To date, only religious CSOs have escaped mass liquidation but it seems to be just a matter of time. With no one to protect them, those communities may either fall victim to a new wave of CSO purges or follow the path of the Belarusian Orthodox Church, which in 2022 increasingly exhibited characteristics of a GONGO, engaging activities unusual for the clergy, such as the Metropolitan’s visits to the army.

After 2020, the relatively peaceful symbiosis between the state and the Catholic Church was shattered Authorities labeled Metropolitan Kondrusiewicz an agent of Poland, and only Vatican diplomacy managed to avert a prolonged conflict between Lukashenko and the church.3 Sergey Oleinik, who has been the Ambassador of Belarus to the Holy See and the Order of Malta since 2002, continued to hold this rank alongside all public service positions for twenty years). In February 2022, Oleinik was appointed the first deputy head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and in December, he assumed leadership of Belarusian foreign policy. In the autumn of 2022, authorities began blackmailing the Vatican when, following a suspicious fire, the Red Church was closed to priests and parishioners.4

CSOs in emigration: cooperation, regionalization and distancing

In 2022, CSOs, displaced by repression across the borders of Belarus, developed new spaces, (re)registered their organizations in the host countries, and rebuilt sector infrastructure in new configurations.

The main hubs of Belarusian CSOs became Poland (Warsaw and Białystok), Lithuania (Vilnius), and Georgia (Batumi and Tbilisi). Regionalization is becoming an important factor in networking and cooperating with other relocated CSOs exemplified by the difficulty of traveling from Georgia to Poland as opposed to within Belarus. In 2022, Tbilisi hosted the "Citizens Meetings", which gathered dozens of Belarusian CSOs that had moved to Georgia, and the "Dzyakui" award ceremony, which replaced the awards "Zrabili" and "RADA AWARDS" previously held in Belarus.

Emigrant CSOs were able to respond to public requests for change in the main representative political body of the democratic forces - the Coordinating Council (CC). The reconstituted CC now predominantly consists of CSO representatives, with 73 delegates, compared to only 25 from the first composition, and an additional 15 who were directly elected.5 Although assessing the CC’s effectiveness is outside of the scope of this analysis, the successful cooperation and increased political representation of CSOs are evident.

At the same time, the question remains whether such CSOs remain fully Belarusian or become purely diasporic. The difference in legal regimes, logistics, and organizational interests makes these CSOs, like the ones in Warsaw and Tbilisi, very different even from each other. This distinction is even more pronounced when compared to CSOs in Minsk or Vitsebsk.

Positive despite

Historically, the main event of Belarusian CSOs in 2022 was undoubtedly the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Ales Bialiatski, the founder and leader of the human rights center "Viasna". Bialiatski shared the prize with Ukrainian colleagues from the "Center for Civil Liberties" and Russians from the "Memorial". This honor symbolizes the crucial role of CSOs in bringing people together in times of war around common human rights values. Unfortunately, it needs to be noted that Bialiatski received the prize while incarcerated, and this fact did not affect his impending - 10-year sentence.

In 2022, the Belarusian Rada of Culture launched "Magistrates",a community of donors providing stable funding for cultural projects, replacing the crowdfunding initiative destroyed by the authorities in 2020. The first such project was "Knigauka", an initiative to revive the Belarusian publishing house "Yanushkevich" in Poland, which was dismantled by the Lukashenko regime in 2022. The State Control Committee seized the publishing house’s equipment, froze its bank accounts, and labeled some of the books as "extremist materials". An attempt by the publisher to open a bookstore resulted in a raid on the opening day, May 16, 2022, by propagandists and security forces who conducted a search and arrested the publisher, Andrey Yanushkevich, for one month, similar to his colleague Nasta Karnatskaya.

Resistance does not advocate

CSOs in emigration often feel unable to influence the situation within Belarus. There is also a question of what CSOs that still remain in Belarus can do inside the country to reach their target audiences: most lack access to media and educational institutions, as well as the willingness to engage in public activities. In 2022, Belarusian CSOs did not conduct advocacy campaigns within the country, even with regard to the laws "On Public Associations" and "On the Basics of Civil Society" which directly affected their functioning (only GONGOs participated in discussing them with the authorities).

Some CSOs continued their existence and activities in Belarus with limited publicity: “League of Youth Voluntary Service (LYVS)”, “World without Borders”, “Ecomonitoring” (liquidated in May 2023), “Belarusian Guides”, “Belarusian Association of UNESCO Clubs”, “Republican Association of Wheelchair Users”, “Lifeguide” (PA "Belarusian Association for Assistance to Disabled Children and Young People with Disabilities"), animal protection societies “Egida” и “Kind Heart”, and even LGBTQ+ initiative from Mahilyou “New Regions”. Others held events but categorically avoided any publicity for fear of losing their already critically narrow windows of opportunities for working in the country

In such circumstances, it is questionable whether an organization can remain a genuine CSO Regardless of the strategies employed. Public organizations, wary of discussing sensitive issues and criticizing authorities, are prevented from carrying out their mission and advocating for the interests of their target groups. An organization operating as a secret cell of the ideological underground, working with a narrow circle of members may be useful for very specific target groups, but without public engagement and transparency it cannot be deemed a true CSO.

I do (not) know this mask

What unites CSOs both in Belarus and in emigration is a common practice of anonymity. Information about their teams has been removed from their websites and social networks, activists decline to give public comments to the media, and events are held without disclosing the names of the organizers, coupled with a ban on photography. This trend spans a diverse range of events, from the “Dzyakui” award ceremony in Tbilisi to a queer picnic by "New Regions" in Mahilyou.

While this anonymity is a response to valid security concerns, it also hampers the image and credibility of CSOs. It is simply impossible to find information about many CSOs and their activities in open sources.

The partnership of civil society organizations ByNGO is a notable example. The only publicly available information about the organization is its role as one of the five representatives of the Council of Europe’s contact group on relations with Belarus (alongside "Viasna", BAJ, BHC, and RADA), and it is the only entity among these that does not disclose the name of its delegate.6 Despite ByNGO’s consolidation of real, experienced, and active CSOs, it represents a paradoxical situation where an anonymous delegate represents civil society at such a high level.

"I'll go build My own CSO, with charities and Belyakov!"

The authorities are aware of the fact that the surge in Belarusian societal activity in 2020 was not an accident, but an outcome of inevitable processes of social development, including a growing demand for civic participation in various forms. Despite the regime’s efforts to push this demand down, it cannot be completely destroyed or reversed. Hence, the authorities not only struggle with independent formats of public self-organization but also endeavor to establish their own.

For example, the fight against unregulated Telegram channels (e.g., labeling them extremist, taking the relatives of channel administrators hostage, hijacking a passenger flight to arrest the channel administrators) is not combined with attempts to return to the past (e.g., forcing society to read government-controlled newspapers). Instead, the government creates alternatives in a new space. Examples include official Telegram channels of government agencies offering exclusive information, like the flagship "Pool of the First" channel, coupled with old promotion methods, such as forced subscription of security forces and state employees.

Similarly, the fight against real CSOs coincides with the fostering of new and promotion of existing loyal players on the field. The authorities aspire not only to eradicate existing CSOs and hinder any unmonitored activities but also to construct themselves a loyal and faithful civil society.

This intention was officially documented in February 2023, when Lukashenko signed the law "On the Foundations of Civil Society." However, efforts in this direction were already underway in 2022. In particular, in the summer of that year, Lukashenko emphasized the importance of building a loyal pro-governmental CSO system at a time of the subsiding political crisis: "While we have opportunities (these lunatics seem to have left us alone), we need to write the law on civil society as we need it ... Our pillars are young people - BRSM, trade unions, our parties ... The subjects of this civil society - these are the ones who are on the [our] list. Not the way we’ve been stuffed or the way it’s built in the post-Soviet republics, so that now they don’t know how to get out of it ... We know, he who pays the piper calls the tune."7

Thus, Lukashenko wants to be the one “calls the tune”, and he does not attempt to hide this intention. The structure of a loyal CSO is not declared anywhere and is likely not comprehensively understood even within the ruling circles, but a discernible hierarchy can be identified.

At the top level are old and large GONGOs, clear to and fully controlled by authorities. These entities gained access to the All-Belarusian People's Assembly as representatives of NGOs with Belaya Rus, BRSM, and the Federation of the Trade Unions being prime examples.

The middle level comprises public GONGOs and loyal CSOs primarily engaged in propaganda functions. This includes both explicit GONGOs created by and/or with the authority, such as the society "Knowledge", and loyalist CSOs established ad hoc for specific individuals or events. For example, "Actual Concept" exists so that Aleksandr Shpakovsky can present himself as the director of the analytical center, thereby enhancing the propaganda effect by falsely presenting himself as an authority in science. "Systemic Legal Protection" by Dmitry Belyakov was created in the context of the migration crisis, and in 2022 continued to exploit the situation for propaganda purposes. Belyakov also registered "Emil Chechko International Charity Fund",8 the name of the Polish deserter even after he was found hanged in Minsk.

The lower level includes loyal CSOs that actively praise the Lukashenko regime but otherwise possess all or nearly all characteristics of conventional CSOs. A case in point is the charity fund of the Paralympian Alexey Talay, which in 2022 honored with the “For Spiritual Renewal” award for its charitable projects, including forcibly displacing Ukrainian children from the Donbas for “recovery”.9

Such a hierarchical model corresponds to the cautious approach of the Lukashenko regime, unaccustomed to relying on even its supporters’ initiative. The regime is unwilling to give space to overly ambitious and therefore dangerous individuals, and not without cause suspects many of them are even more loyal to Moscow than they are to Minsk.

Conclusion

The cooperation of emigrant CSOs will play a significant role in fulfilling the civil society functions for Belarus that are achievable from abroad. Existing connections with the “resistance” CSOs will help compensate for the separation from the Belarusian context.

Niche CSOs loyal to the authorities will inadvertently allow the growth of a more pro-Russian activist base than a pro-Lukashenko one, potentially leading to conflicts with institutionalized elites.

In 2023, the scouring of CSOs operating in Belarus will continue, albeit at a decelerated pace- a consequence of the near-total elimination of such organizations, with the few remaining ones steering clear of the public eye. Despite this, the authorities will continue their dual approach towards Catholic organizations, employing both incentives and deterrents. due to the Vatican's cautious stance and historical precedence of revitalizing the Western foreign policy vector through state visits to the Pope in 2009 and 2016.