Prosecutor General of the Republic of Belarus Andrei Shved took part in the 21st Meeting of Prosecutors General of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Member States

The 21st Meeting of Prosecutors General of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Member States took place in Xi’an, People’s Republic of China. The meeting focused on the role of prosecutor’s offices in state modernization.

The event was attended by delegations from the Prosecutor Generals’ Offices of China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, as well as observer States and dialogue partners Belarus and Mongolia.

The main goals of the SCO include:

strengthening mutual confidence and good-neighbourly relations among the member countries;

promoting their effective cooperation in politics, trade and economy, science and technology and culture, as well as education, energy, transportation, tourism, environmental protection and other fields;

making joint efforts to maintain and ensure peace, security and stability in the region;

moving towards the establishment of a new democratic, just and rational political and economic international order.

In his speech on the role of the prosecutor’s office in countering extremism, Andrei Shved noted that Belarus aims to join the SCO at the earliest time possible, “as the organization makes a significant contribution to the stable and progressive development of the Eurasian region”.

The head of the supervisory agency stressed that Belarus is an export-oriented State with developed industry, service sector and agriculture, adhering to the model of a socially oriented market economy, which has proved its soundness and effectiveness.

Speaking about the situation in the country in 2020, the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Belarus drew his colleagues’ attention to the goals of the mass riots, which were organized using the technologies of colour revolutions: to overthrow the legitimate authorities and deprive the country of its real sovereignty.

“Thanks to the timely measures taken, this goal was not achieved. In this difficult period for our country, the efforts of the prosecutor’s office were focused on countering extremism, preventing destabilization of the socio-political and socio-economic situation in the Republic. Under our supervision, a set of measures was implemented to immediately investigate extremist crimes, to ensure effective and coordinated activities of law enforcement agencies, to identify and put an end to sources of financing of extremist activities, to establish the causes and conditions that contributed to commission of the crimes, - said Andrei Shved. - During prosecution in court on behalf of the State, the implementation of the principle of inevitability of responsibility was ensured, which also played an important preventive role in restoring order”.

The head of the supervisory agency pointed out that more than 70 per cent of extremist offences in the country have been committed using information technologies, and therefore special attention is paid to the information space today: “On the decisions of prosecutors, access to Internet resources and online publications through which extremist content is distributed is promptly restricted”.

At the same time, it was noted that the timely reaction of law enforcers allowed to restore order, the number of extremist crimes in the country has significantly decreased and continues to decline, while the socio-political situation has stabilized.

Andrei Shved informed his colleagues about the course of investigation of the criminal case on genocide of the Belarusian people during the Great Patriotic War, attempts of the countries of the collective West to glorify Nazi criminals, as well as crimes against the security of humanity committed by officials of a number of Western neighbouring countries against foreign migrants who are trying to enter EU countries, including from the territory of Belarus.

“The events of 2020 showed that our society, especially the youth, is not sufficiently aware of the crimes of Nazi Germany. Not everyone realized that the West continues to pursue a hypocritical neo-colonial policy, dividing peoples into “right” and “wrong”. To prevent the glorification of Nazism we have returned to the study of genocide of the Belarusian people during the Great Patriotic War. Today we are taking all possible measures to restore historical justice and preserve the memory about the victims. First of all, this work is carried out for the benefit of the younger generations. We want our young people to know about the tragedy of the war and be able to resist attempts to revive Nazism,” said the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Belarus.

Andrei Shved called international cooperation and well-coordinated work of the law enforcement agencies of States the most important aspect of countering extremism. He assured of the readiness of the Prosecutor’s Office of Belarus for constructive co-operation in this area to ensure universal and indivisible security.

Summing up, Andrei Shved stressed that “the development of society should be based on the historical experience, spiritual values and traditions of the people and should not be reduced to blind copying of other peoples’ models.

Within the framework of the meeting, Prosecutor General of the Republic of Belarus Andrei Shved held a bilateral meeting with Prosecutor General of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate of the People’s Republic of China Ying Yong, the purpose of which was to strengthen professional ties and reach a higher level of international cooperation.

Department for Interaction
with Mass Media and Editorial Work
of the Prosecutor General’s Office