Slander case dropped against rights defender Pogonyailo :: Charter'97 :: News

The Minsk City Prosecutor’s Office has dropped a case against Garri Pogonyailo, deputy head of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee who was accused of slandering Belarusian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko in his interview with Sweden`s TV 4 channel.

Investigator Aleksandr Pikarev informed Mr. Pogonyailo that the case has been closed because of the absence of a crime element.

“I regard the wording as recognition of me as a professional lawyer,” Mr. Pogonyailo told BelaPAN. “I did not slander the country leaders in my public statements, which were based on hard evidence concerning the high-profile disappearances.”

In the interview, he accused Mr. Lukashenko, former Prosecutor General Viktor Sheiman, Sports Minister Yury Sivakov and Interior Minister Vladimir Naumov of possible involvement in the disappearances of four prominent figures in 1999-2000.

Belarusian customs officers seized a tape with the interview when the human rights activist was returning to Belarus.

Mr. Pogonyailo said that that an independent enquiry has already solved the abductions of opposition politicians Viktor Gonchar, Yury Zakharenko, businessman Anatoly Krasovsky and journalist Dmitry Zavadsky.

“The perpetrators have been identified and the victims’ burial place is known. I think we will follow Ukraine’s example. President Viktor Yushchenko said that the lack of political will was the only thing that prevented that country’s previous leadership from solving the murder of [journalist Georgy] Gongadze. I believe it is the same in Belarus - the country leadership lacks political will to solve these crimes. The crimes will be solved as fast as the Gongadze case once there is the will.”