On September 3 in Paris there took place a session of the Committee for legal affairs and human rights of the CoE Parliamentary Assembly during which they discussed the situation in our country. The meeting resulted in the formation of a temporary working group, due to deal with the human rights situation in Belarus and, in particular, examine the situation with missing opponents of the regime in power.

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Russian president Vladimir Putin forwarded a message to Lukashenko, in which he proposes three concrete variants of integration: complete integration into one state, the EU type of integration with super-state bodies, as well as the unification within the Accord on “union state’s” formation.

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Leader of the Union of right-wing forces of Russia Boris Nemtsov intends to address the prosecutor general Vladimir Ustinov in connection with the records of his phone conversation with the leader of the United Civil Party of Belarus Anatoly Lebedko, published on Tuesday in the newspaper “Zavtra”. An article is also laid out at the political news portal “Sovietskaya Rossiya”.

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On September 3 the judge of the Minsk Central court Tatiana Pavluchuk sentenced to ten-day arrests three members of the Hindu group “Light of Kailasa”. Pavluchuk found the head of the group Tatiana Akadanova, her husband Sergei Akadanov and the member of their group Sergei Olisevich guilty of unsanctioned picketing at the Oktyabsrskaya square of Minsk on August 17, 2002. The convicted people protested against violation of their religious rights. All three went on a hunger-strike, reports BelaPAN.

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The department of financial research of the Committee for state control of the Brest region charged the director of the foreign private trade company “Yalina” Igor Naimushin with the violation of the existing legislation – failure to return from abroad $150thsd, received from selling mushrooms and berries to Germany in October-December 2001.

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The decision, passed by the Belarusian authorities, on escorting the Lithuanian trucks along the country’s territory, breaches international agreements. Such an opinion was shared in an interview to “Interfax” by the Lithuanian plenipotentiary ambassador in Belarus Jonas Paslauskas.

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Minsk traders from the fairs “Dynamo”, “Zhdanovichi”, “Parking”, “Kupalovsky”, “Underground town”, “Impulse”, “Olymp” and others went for a sitting strike in central city. Over a thousand small business representatives sat for an hour at the Oktyabrskaya square of Minsk, supporting the demands, formulated during their unlimited strike, which commenced on September 1. In first turn, they demand cancellation of the already passed orders, which violate their civil rights and strangle their business. The action’s organizer was a co-chairman of the “Private initiative” Leonid Malakhov, who has just served 10 days of arrest for protesting against infringement on entrepreneurs’ rights.

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A terrible car crash occurred September 4 morning at the 485th kilometer of the Brest-Moscow highway. 16 vehicles collided there: 6 cars, 7 trailers, 2 minivans and a lorry. Currently the place is cordoned off by police, fire fighters and rescuers. BELTA was told in the Minsk regional department of the Ministry for emergency situations that 9 people fell prey to the road accident. 10 injured persons were delivered to the Krupky hospital, 4 being placed in the intensive care. The root-causes of the tragedy are being clarified.

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Yesterday at around 5p.m. one of the ZUBR movement activists Timofei Dranchuk was captured by Alexander Lukashenko’ security service men. Timofei said about that at the press-conference 1,5 hours following his liberation:

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Chief of the Zhlobin colony Yuri Kuzmich forbade Pavel Mozheiko to get employed in a school and a newspaper. One of his possible working places may become local power-saw bench.

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Trade unionist Leonid Kozik’s visit to Baghdad was no secret to the world community, for it had been carried out upon the permission of the UN Committee for sanctions, the journalists were told on Tuesday by the Foreign Ministry’s press-secretary Pavel Latushko. At the same time the official Minsk didn’t comment on the foreign media reports, according to which Kozik passed over to Hussein personal message from Alexander Lukashenko. The presidential Administration officials decline to give any commentaries. In particular, the press-secretary of Lukashenko Natalya Petkevich said today in Minsk that “they have to personally ask Kozik over the matter”.

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