Forms of Belarusian democracy are of interest to Latin American countries

The House of Representatives held a round table on the topic Democratic Features of the Belarusian People’s Congress: Historical Perspectives. Comments from Latin America, in the format of a videoconference with the participation of representatives of higher educational institutions of Colombia, the media, and the diplomatic corps.

Belarus is currently moving closer to a number of Latin American countries in understanding the need to establish a just world order, taking into account national characteristics and interests, and achieving sustainable development goals. An important link in the contacts between the parties is the exchange of views on the political and social processes taking place in Belarus and Latin American countries.

“During the round table, we talked about the historical evolution of the forms of Belarusian democracy, starting from the earliest and ending with such an important one as the Belarusian People’s Congress. We shared our experience of how the Belarusian People’s Congress arose, what is characteristic of it, what is the uniqueness of this body of people's power for Belarus, and why we decided that the People’s Congress should have the full power outlined both by the Law On the Belarusian People’s Congress and those provisions contained in our Constitution, updated at the referendum,” the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Education, Culture and Science of the House of Representatives of the seventh convocation of the National Assembly, Igor Marzalyuk, stated.

Speaking on the topic Belarusian People’s Congress: Origins and Prospects, the parliamentarian drew attention to the fact that if we are talking about Latin America as a whole as a civilisational region, then it has certain characteristics according to which it typologically coincides with Belarus. This is largely due to the appeal to social justice characteristic of Latin American ideological doctrines.

“The experience of Belarus is interesting for Latin America. Moreover, according to a number of development paradigms, including a social perspective, Latin Americans expressively contrast themselves with the United States of America with its apologia of individualism. Latin America is more characterised by solidarity, an appeal to the collective principle, and to such basic values as social justice. This is why socialist and communist movements, what we call left-wing political movements, are so popular, including in the Latin American region,” Igor Marzalyuk underlined.