Borrell regrets that Belarus opens the possibility of prohibiting its citizens from living abroad

According to the High Representative of the EU, the decision of the Belarusian Parliament aggravates the "brutal persecution" of the opposition

MADRID, 23 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, regretted this Thursday the decision of the National Assembly of Belarus to modify the Citizenship Law, ensuring that it "will open the possibility" of depriving citizens of living in the Foreign.

"The European Union condemns this bill, which represents another step in the brutal persecution of the Belarusian regime against all independent voices," Borrell said in a statement released by the European Union Diplomatic Service.

According to Borrell, representatives of democratic forces, the media and civil society, who have fled the country to escape persecution, thus risk becoming stateless.

In this sense, the High Representative has maintained that these facts would suppose "a violation of International Law", since article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights protects the right of every person to a nationality and prohibits its arbitrary deprivation.

"The amendment to the Citizenship Law is just another example of the growing lawlessness in Belarus. There are currently more than 1,440 political prisoners in the country, often held in inhumane conditions, trials are held behind closed doors and sentences are handed down. dictate in absentia", has detailed the representative of Foreign Affairs of the Union.

Meanwhile, he recalled that earlier this year Belarus expanded the scope of application of the death penalty to include "attempted acts of terrorism", an accusation that could easily be formulated arbitrarily for political reasons and in the absence of any transparency or procedural guarantees.

"The European Union will continue to support a free, independent and democratic Belarus," Borrell reiterated in his letter.