Mikhail Chigir’s initiative group gathered the necessary 100 thousand signatures to nominate former Belarusian Premier as candidate for the presidency. In this connection Mikhail Chigir addressed with an open letter the Belarusian electorate: “Dear countrymen! Depending on the results of the presidential elections Belarus will either be a free, rich and happy state or follow the path of lawlessness, dictatorship and poverty. Lukashenko, like seven years ago, is trying to deceive the voters, promising them mounts of gold. He again puts on a sheep’s clothing, but we know the nature that’s inside it. And we won’t repeat the same mistake twice.

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Analysis of the leading group of the territorial election committees for the presidential elections, carried out by the public initiative “Independent Observance”, which details the leadership’s composition, their social and labor status, testifies to the violation of Election Code.

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Directors of some companies came to a last resort in order to pay out workers’ wages – they are selling equipment and machinery. However, this step can’t be explained by their care for the workers, but rather by personal fear to lose posts. Brest electro-mechanic factory was visited a few weeks ago by president Lukashenko, who declared: if the leadership is unable to pay workers their monies in due time and if the size of the payment is under $100, let both the company director and the Minister of industry file in their resignations. That was the major reason why they determined to sell electric devices and containers.

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“I have to publicly address you, Alexander Grigorievich, in connection with the following circumstances. As you know, the public is seriously concerned over the disappearances of famous people. Previously declared testimony of procuracy detectives D. Petrushkevich and O. Sluchek give us grounds to suspect of direct implication of some high-ranking officials from Interior Ministry and Security Council in the murder of your political opponents,” – reads the text of an open letter with which the potential candidate for the presidency Vladimir Goncharik, chair of Trade Union Federation, addressed Alexander Lukashenko.

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“In the 1st workshop of the “Belshina” manufacture of Bobruisk they took away workers’ passports and forced them to sign the ballots in support of acting president Alexander Lukashenko. They never returned them the passports, so that they couldn’t support any other candidate except him. The documents were returned only to those, who need to leave for summer vacation. In Shklov district the signatures of the hospitals’ personnel were collected during their working time by aide of the Vice-Speaker of the “house of representatives” Konoplev. In a likewise manner, director of the “Na Nemige” mall told all the shop assistants to not only sign for Lukashenko, but also bring at least 100 signatures from their neighbors, relatives or friends in his support. In case of refusal, he threatened them with problems at work,” – these are just a few facts cited in the message to the Central Electoral Committee, written by heads of initiative groups of some candidates.

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Two people in medical garments showed up at seven in the evening in the Alexandrovsky park of Minsk right in front of the presidential palace. One of these two was carrying broken skis, while another approached the walkers and explained that they are looking for one nutty guy, who engaged in a ski race on July 3 and somehow lost his skis. The people convincingly pointed them at the residence and, having wandered a bit, the medical orderlies proceeding in that direction. However, at the entrance they encountered an aggressively looking KGB officer, who obstructed their way. They failed to convince the guard to allow them to enter the residence. Instead, the man radioed to police, which shortly arrived and arrested the doctors.

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The make-up of the elective commissions in Pinsk is determined not by the district electoral commission, as the law requires it, but rather some electoral headquarters, chaired by the head of the city hall Vassily Shust, radio Svaboda was told by the chair of the Pinsk affiliate of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee Viktor Yaroshuk.

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Dozens of ZUBRs passed out “Nasha Svaboda” in Bragin. The guys came to this town, which suffered intense radioactive fall-out, from Gomel and went on distributing the paper’s special issues. There’s no independent press in Bragin as such, so the arrival of ZUBRs, telling them truth about events in the country, was a gulp of fresh air for local residents.

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Highest inflation rates among all CIS states were witnessed in January-May 2001 in Belarus – 19,9%, reads the statement of the CIS International committee for statistics, forwarded to АК&М. Russia runs up second with 10,9%, followed by Tajikistan (9,3%), which both failed to curb the inflation. The lowest price rise was recorded in Azerbaijan (0,8%), Georgia (1,3%) and Kazakhstan (3,7%).

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