A/HRC/38/51 2017 and March 2018. New amendments to media laws threaten further harsh restrictions to freedom of expression online. 106. On the occasion of his previous report to the Human Rights Council, the current Special Rapporteur deplored the lack of any meaningful progress on systemic human rights issues since the establishment of his mandate: issues which the High Commissioner for Human Rights had previously highlighted in 2011. The purposefully oppressive legal framework, the structural absence of the rule of law and the blatant lack of consideration of the recommendations of human rights mechanisms testify to the freezing of fundamental freedoms in Belarus. During his period in office, the Special Rapporteur has demonstrated that the human rights record of Belarus could easily be improved if there were to emerge, at the internal level, political will to utilize the ready-to-use toolbox provided by the recommendations of the human rights mechanisms, including the universal periodic review, over more than 20 years. 107. As no tangible progress on systemic issues has been achieved, the Special Rapporteur is of the view that there is no reason to discontinue the international scrutiny of the human rights situation in Belarus, all the more so given that no regional scrutiny is applicable owing to the exclusion of Belarus from membership of the Council of Europe because of the retention in the Criminal Code of the death penalty and its regular application. 108. While members of the international community have constantly reminded Belarus of the need to comply with its international obligations, and to implement the recommendations of the human rights mechanisms, the State party’s authorities do not even acknowledge the existence of civil and political human rights issues. While the State party’s authorities claim to have made progress on social rights, in fact, their repressive handling of civil liberties also affects social and economic rights, as the “social parasitism” policies show. The exercise of civil and political rights is described as a threat to “social stability”, and their repression has been presented to some partners as being necessary in order to avoid political instability amid geopolitical tensions in the region. 109. The human rights record of Belarus, which has gradually worsened since 1996, has shaped the lives of several generations of Belarusians. A 22-year-old in Belarus has never experienced free and fair elections, does not know what the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers mean in reality, fears to publicly express views that are critical of government policies, does not have free access to different media or to a diverse culture, finds it normal to undertake forced labour at the weekend and has grown up with patriarchal stereotypes about women and men. Amid the continuing vilification of, and prohibitive restrictions on the work of human rights defenders, political, cultural and environmental activists and independent journalists in the country, the persistence of such actors must be praised, protected and encouraged. The Special Rapporteur deems it vital for the situation of civil society activists to continue to provide international support for them through the present mandate. 110. Attempts by Belarus to present alleged progress made regarding its human rights record through, for instance, the cyclical release of political prisoners, the granting of permission to two token opposition members to be present in the National Assembly, or the adoption of an inter-agency plan on human rights without tackling any of the persistent systemic issues, are contradicted by the daily reality faced by citizens, who are obliged by the country’s laws to obtain specific official permission for every instance of exercising their rights to peaceful assembly, to freedom of association and to freedom of the media, and who are considered as criminals and can be condemned to prison sentences under the above-mentioned laws because of their decision to exercise their rights to political expression, to peacefully demonstrate, or to participate in unregistered gatherings. 111. The Special Rapporteur has described in the present report the cyclical system of oppression of human rights in Belarus. The State party’s authorities have 18