World Association of Newspapers calls for impartial inquiry into Belarusian reporter’s murder :: Charter'97 :: News

Gavin O’Reilly, president of the World Association of Newspapers, and George Brock, president of the World Editors Forum, have petitioned several high-ranking Belarusian officials to ensure an impartial investigation into Veronika Cherkasova’s murder and stop harassment of the reporter’s family.

The letters were sent to Aleksandr Lukashenko, Interior Minister Vladimir Naumov and Prosecutor General Pyotr Miklashevich. Copies of the letters were addressed to Kofi Annan, UN secretary-general and Koichiro Matsuura, director-general of UNESCO, according to the press office of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ).

Ms. Cherkasova, a reporter with the Minsk-based private newspaper Salidarnasts, was found stabbed to death in her apartment on October 20, 2004.

Investigators regard the journalist’s son, Anton Filimonov and her stepfather Vladimir Meleshko as prime suspects.

Despite the fact that the law-enforcement agencies do not have any evidence to accuse the two, the investigators continue to treat them as suspects and they suffered persecution and tough interrogations, during which they were intimidated, the letter stressed.

As a result of the harassment, the son was admitted to hospital with a heavy depression.
The authors say that Ms. Cherkasova’s relatives fear that evidence may be falsified to implicate them in the murder.

An independent investigation found that the murder was committed professionally.
The authors asked the officials to guarantee that the facts revealed during the independent investigation will be given necessary consideration.

Messrs. O’Reilly and Brock stressed that shortly before her death, the reporter investigated Belarus’ arms deliveries to Iraq.

The murdered reporter’s son, Anton Filimonov, left for Moscow last week to stay with his father, just days after Belarusian investigators attempted to put him in a hospital for a psychiatric examination.

The psychiatric examination order, signed by Nikolai Starovoitov, first deputy prosecutor of Minsk, angered the boy`s grandparents who protested to Prosecutor General Pyotr Miklashevich.
Ms. Cherkasova`s mother does not know how the investigators reacted to the boy`s departure.