| United Civil Party of Belarus Russian:Объединенная гражданская партия Belarusian:Аб'ядна́ная грамадзя́нская па́ртыя Белару́сі |
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| Leader | Anatoly Lebedko |
| Founded | 1 October 1995 |
| Merger of | United Democratic Party, Civic Party |
| Headquarters | Minsk |
| Ideology | Conservatism, Liberal conservatism |
| Political position | Centre-right |
| National affiliation | United Democratic Forces of Belarus |
| International affiliation | International Democrat Union (Associate member) |
| European affiliation | European People's Party (Observer) |
| Official colours | Red and White |
| Website | |
| United Civil Party | |
| Politics of Belarus Political parties Elections |
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The United Civil Party of Belarus (Belarusian: Аб'ядна́ная грамадзя́нская па́ртыя Белару́сі, Abjadnanaja hramadzianskaja partyja Biełarusi) is a centre-right, liberal-conservative party in Belarus. The party opposes the government of Alexander Lukashenko, generally participates in the country's elections, but doesn't have a single member in parliament. It claims its lack of seats is due to the unfairness of the election process, a claim to which international election monitors have lent some credence.
The party's chairman (as of 2005[update]) is Anatoly Lebedko; its deputy chairman is Alexander Dabravolski and Jaroslav Romanchuk. Lebedko represents the party most visibly in both domestic and international settings, and has been involved in numerous altercations with the Belarusian authorities; see Anatoly Lebedko for details.
At the last legislative elections, 13–17 October 2004, the party was part of the People's Coalition 5 Plus, which did not secure any seats. According to the OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission [1], these elections fell significantly short of OSCE commitments. Universal principles and constitutionally guaranteed rights of expression, association and assembly were seriously challenged, calling into question the Belarusian authorities’ willingness to respect the concept of political competition on a basis of equal treatment. According to this mission principles of an inclusive democratic process, whereby citizens have the right to seek political office without discrimination, candidates to present their views without obstruction, and voters to learn about them and discuss them freely, were largely ignored.
UCP is an observer member of the European People's Party (EPP).
UCP has a Women organisation and a Youth Organisation in its structure.
In 1995-2000 youth organisation of UCP was "Civil Forum", which left UCP during Parliamentary elections of 2000, when UCP bycotted it. Culadzimer Novosiad, chairman of Civil Forum got a place in Parliament than.
In 2000-2000 youth organisation called itself "UCP Youth", but was rather an artificial structure in the party.
In 200-2009 YCSU Young Democrats was officially a youth wing of UCP, but in February 2009 at the congress of YCSU Young Democrats a decision to stop cooperating with party was taken.
Some members of YCSU Young Democrats did not support the decision to restrain cooperation with United Civil Party, left YCSU Young Democrats, and stayed as UCP Youth.