Judge of Minsk`s Kastrychnitski District Court Natallya Revutskaya has sentenced the lawyer of the Belarusian Congress of Democratic Trade Unions [BCDTU], Uladzimir Adynets, to five days of administrative arrest in accordance with Article 166 of the Code of Administrative Offences - "Contempt of Court".

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“A Local Paper “A Step””, which published some articles from “The Belarusian Business Paper” at the beginning of August, is still being prosecuted in Baranavichy. On October 16 Anatoly Waitehowsky, the publisher, was summoned to the Municipal Office of Public Prosecutor for the third time.

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The majority of Belarusians is sure that the European choice made by their neighbors is the right one and will bring a practical benefit. These are the results of the national poll carried out in September 2003 by the Independent Institute of Social, Economic and Political Research.

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Interesting things are happening in the educational establishments of the city. On the wave of the ideological politics conducted by the state schools started working actively in this direction. On September 1 a new subject was introduced, Ideology of the Belarusian State.

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On November 27-28 Saparmurat Niyazov, the president of Turkmenistan, is coming on a visit to Minsk. Illya Veldzhanaw, the ambassador of Turkmenistan in Belarus, informed about that on a press conference, as “The Observer” reports. Turkmenbashi plans to visit Minsk Automobile Plant, Minsk Tractor Plant, a research and manufacture joint “Integral” and Belarusian National Technical University.

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A Chilean army lieutenant accused of executing political prisoners during a bloody 1973 coup was ordered to pay $4 million Wednesday in the first U.S. trial stemming from the 30-year-old killings. A jury found Armando Fernandez Larios, now a Miami auto body shop manager, liable for extra-judicial killing, cruelty, torture and crimes against humanity for massacres by the Caravan of Death _ a mobile killing squad that executed 75 political prisoners in the weeks after Gen. Augusto Pinochet seized power.

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Just recently friends of mine sent me a couple of photographs of Aung San Suu Kyi. The nonviolent struggle of this woman for her fellow citizens` freedom dwells in my soul as a stark reminder of our struggles against totalitarian regimes in Central and Eastern Europe.

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