As the press center of the Charter’97 has just learned, today the US President George Bush is to sign the “Belarus Democracy Act”. On October 4 and 6 this document was passed by the two Houses of the Congress. “The Belarus Democracy Act” foresees sanctions against Belarus in case the Belarusian authorities would not stop persecution of opposition and independent mass media, to investigate politically motivated disappearances. After this document’s approval a number of Belarusian top officials are to be banned entry to the US territory, strategically export to Belarus and state investment would be banned, and the steps taken in order to cut international financial aid to Belarus. “The Belarus Democracy Act” also foresees revealing of Belarus’ arms export to countries sponsoring terrorism, and publication of information on personal assets and wealth of Lukashenka and other senior Belarusian government officials. The Act is also to authorize support to Belarusian democratic forces and independent press.
Minsk riot police today evening brutally disbanded a protest of Belarusian opposition. People came to express their indignation at the obvious rigging of the results of the Sunday parliamentary elections and referendum. According to official information, about 80% of the Belarusians supported Lukashenka in his desire to lift terms limit for president from Constitution. However, opinion polls, carried out by the Gallup Institute in Belarus, showed that this figure is 48.3%. Here is the list of detained during the rally. The observers and human rights activists, who are standing in front of the police department of Lenin district of Minsk, have just informed that two more detained activists were taken away by ambulance. One of them, a girl, was carried out in the arms unconscious, and literally thrown into the ambulance. We should underline that the Internal Affairs Ministry informs that 48 demonstrators wereó detained:
“Minks riot policemen haveó beaten me up to a mummy. I was dragged into the kitchen of the restaurant “Patio Pizza” from the street, handcuffed. They started to beat me, dragging me on the floor by hair. Then I fainted,” told the leader of the United Civil Party Anatol Lyabedzka in the interview to our press center. He was arrested and beaten up today in the evening at a spontaneous rally in the center of Minsk.
According to preliminary information, detained demonstrators were taken to the Interior Affairs department of Lenin district of Minsk. All detainees are beaten up cruelly. Activists of the youth movement Zubr, and chairman of the UCP A.Lyabedzka are among them.
According to specified data, Anatol Lyabedzka, leader of the United Civil Party, was detained in the restaurant “Patio Pizza” . Mikola Statkevich, leader of the Narodnaya Hramada, coordinator of the European coalition “Free Belarus”, was detained by the Lenin Street. Men in mufti attacked him and packed into a microbus GAZ with tinted glasses. Associated Press photographer Sergey Grits has been released.
Patio Pizza restaurant is unblocked, the beaten-up politicians are carried though a back door away to the yard, put into a car and driven in unknown direction. Staff of the restaurant observed the SWAT clash with horror. The restaurant belongs to the Russian company Rosinter. Demonstrators do not disband and remain standing by the restaurant by the metro station “Kastrychnitskaya”.
The leaders of the UCP Anatol Lyabedzka and “Narodnaya Hramada” Mikola Statkevich were blocked by a riot policemen in the room of the restaurant Patio Pizza. They are beaten up by policemen. Demonstrators are trying to get into the restaurant, but the door is blocked by the SWAT. Policemen, who are behaving outrageously, have attacked the NTV cameraman Konstantin Morozov and beaten him. Journalist is bleeding, camera is broken. Besides, reporters of the Russian TV channel RENTV are thrashed as well.
The protest rally continues. Demonstrators, mainly young people, Zubr and Young Front activists, are shouting “Shame!” They are holding a banner “No to Dictatorship!” In the vicinity of the October Square a column of 10 trucks with internal security troops and riot police is noticed.
During the protest rally in the center of Minsk riot police and special services have detained more than 50 demonstrators. The activists wanted to express their disagreement to the official results of the referendum and elections, announced by the authorities. Among the detainees are Associated Press photographer Sergej Grits, the leader of the Young Front Paval Sevyarynets, Zubr activists Yukhnevich, Maldavanava, Yalavaya, Mikulovich.
In Homel region, like everywhere in Belarus, none of oppositional candidates, according to the official data, has won a seat, Radio Svaboda informs. According to the official information in all 17 electoral districts of Homel region the deputies were elected, and no one of this list belongs to democratic forces.
On October 18 at a press conference in Minsk Russian journalist, reporter of the PRIMA-NEWS agency Azgar Ishkildin presented facts of voting count rigging at the polling station number 495 of Uskhodni electoral district 107. In this electoral district the Belarusian Popular Front chairman Vintsuk Vyachorka’s rivals were incumbent deputy of the house of representatives, Uladzimir Kruk and Yawheny Daronin, an independent candidate.
Criminal case against one of coordinators of “Zubr” movement Yauhien Afnagel. Chief of KGB Leanid Yerin said it during protest action that was carried out in Minsk yesterday.
An appellate board of the Grodno Regional Court on Tuesday rejected the appeal against the sentences awarded to two leaders of market vendors’ strike committee in Grodno.
Student Alyaksaey Lyavkovich was arrested for pasting leaflets with the appeal to come to the October Sqaure on October 18, to sum up the results of the voting.
Yesterday the chairman of the KGB (State Security Committee) Leonid Erin (Leanid Eryn) answered the questions of journalists and the Young Front leader Paval Sevyarynets about the political prisoners, disappeared Belarusian oppositionists, the arrest of the US citizen, surveillance over Russian politicians. On Monday evening he came out to the protesters in front of the KGB building and invited six persons to his office, to answer their questions.
The active participant of the protest on October 18, Paval Sevyarynets, leader of the Young Front, comments on the action: “Yesterdays’ rally is a reaction of the Belarusian society to the enormous fraud, which was the referendum. We heard lots of lies in these10 years, but the lie on October 17 was the greatest one. That is why the young people came to the streets yesterday, burst through the police cordons by the Presidential residency and came to the KGB building to say what they think about the regime. I think that the Belarusians should get up steam, become organized and change everything before 2006.
The chairman of the Council of External and Defense Policy Sergey Karaganov commented the events in the following way: “Referendum is a substantial step to reinforce Lukashenka’s personal power, but he is still to win elections. And it would be more and more difficult for him with every year, and Russia would not support him. If he would only lead Belarus towards the market economy, to the effective society - but he acts in a opposite way. Belarus cannot stay an island of Authoritarianism In the Center Of Europe for a long time”.
“Yesterday we saw a protest of the Belarusian youth. People who were coerced to participate in early voting, threatened by expelling from the university, went to the streets of Minsk. It is strange that candidates of the parties who were de-registered or not allowed to win, have not been there. They told to the young people that they are to lodge complaints. It is another proof that the future of this country is to be determined by the young people, and not by parties’ functionaries,” told Uladzimir Kobets, coordinator of the Zubr movement commenting on the yesterday’s rally in Minsk.
Coordinator of the European coalition “Free Belarus”, coordinator of the civil initiative Charter’97 Dzmitry Bandarenka comments on yesterday protest action in Minsk: “People all over the world always react to the results of the elections and go to the streets. Somebody expresses joy, somebody protests. In Belarus everybody saw the protest, but despite of the “superb” figures for Lukashenka, no spontaneous meetings occurred, where people would rejoice over the “victory” of the dictator. By the way, there where no demonstration or meeting in support of the Belarusian ruler organized by the authorities. Maybe, they remember the Romanian variant, when people who were herded to the meeting in support of Nicolae Ceaucescu people suddenly became a core of people’s revolution.
The United States on Monday criticized the Belarus elections for so-called "electoral misconduct", saying "It does not look like the voters of Belarus were given a fair choice or a fair chance to express their choice." "The election was seriously flawed, didn`t meet standards," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told a regular news briefing.
European Union (EU) foreign policy chief Javier Solana on Monday expressed his concern over the parliamentary elections and referendum in Belarus. "I see with great concern the way in which the parliamentary elections have taken place, and the referendum itself," Solana said in a statement.
In speaking to journalists October 17, Ambassador George Krol said that in observing the voting during the day, which did not include the counting, what he saw on the surface was “a rather normal affair”, not “normal and fair” as has been mistakenly reported by several web-sites. Ambassador Krol stressed in his comments that the main problem with the voting that took place October 17 was not so much the form of voting which could appear on the surface as normal, but the substance and the fact that both the parliamentary campaign and the referendum were conducted under seriously unfree and unfair conditions that did not grant Belarusian voters the opportunity to make a free and fair choice among a range of views and candidates.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said yesterday that he won a mandate from voters to stay in power in a weekend referendum that scrapped presidential term limits, but foreign observers said the vote process was marred by violations, and thousands of people protested the outcome.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko says voters have shown overwhelming support for his plan to stay in power but hundreds took to the streets to protest against what they call a rigged referendum. Western monitors said Sunday`s vote, held in conjunction with parliamentary elections which shut out the liberal opposition, fell badly short of international standards.
The Lithuanian prime minister noted that the European Union (EU) should examine whether the October 17 referendum that allowed Aleksandr Lukashenko to stand for reelection was held in compliance with laws.
The lawyer for journalist Pavel Sheremet, battered severely on Sunday night, said that she intends to complain to the Sovetsky District Prosecutor`s Office about failure of the district police department to launch an inquiry into the accident.
A U.S. citizen has been detained in Belarus on fraud charges and placed in the State Security Committee`s pre-trial detention facility, State Security Committee chief Leonid Yerin said. Yerin made this announcement at a meeting with Pavel Severintsev, a Belarussian opposition leader, on Monday evening.
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