On Monday the chairman of the United Civil Party Anatol Lyabedzka, deputy chairpersons Ludmila Hryaznova and Yaraslau Ramanchuk, as well as the leader of the Belarusian Communist party Syarhei Kalyakin underwent a thorough personal search while crossing the border of Lithuania and Latvia, the internet-source pelpa.org informs. The car driven by the UCP leader was stopped and searched by the officers of the Belarusian customs.
The International Helsinki Federation (IHF) for Human Rights with headquarters in Vienna has published an annual report on situation in the sphere of human rights in 38 countries of the OSCE in Europe, Caucasus and North America. The report includes 24 former Communist countries and 13 countries with established democratic systems. 14 pages of the report are dedicated to Belarus, Radio Svaboda informs. Belarus remained one of the worst countries in Europe in terms of respect for the rule of law, democracy and human rights. The government’s record fell short in respect to a number of basic rights. It imposed excessive restrictions on the freedom of expression, association and the media, while violations of the right of peaceful assembly continued. Numerous examples of government policies aimed to suppress the use of the Belarusian language, and discrimination of Belarusian-speakers in daily life are provided in the report. In 2004 the administrative and economic pressure on independent media outlets continued, and many editions were closed.
The Supreme Administrative Court rejected the action of the publishing house of “Narodnaya Volia” against the Ministry of Information, thus preserving the notice to the newspaper. The publishing house has the right to appeal against this decision in the Presidium of the Supreme Administrative Court, and “Narodnaya Volia” will use this right, editor-in-chief of the edition Iosif Siaredzich said to the PO Belarusian Association of Journalists.
Alyaksandr Lukashenka stated that recently the country has managed to decrease the intensity of activities of foreign grant donors, who have been carrying out ideological expansion in Belarus under a mask of humanitarian aid, organized going abroad of our experts and scientists, and in fact stealing intellectual property of our country,” Lukashenka said at the meeting with talented youth of the country on Monday.
The money that the students of the Varkhousk secondary school (Garadziets district) earned themselves were withdrawn from the children in the result of the obligatory departmental subscription to “Sovetskaya Belorussia”. According to the school’s headmaster Leanid Garavy, it was ordered to subscribe to the edition using “non-budget means” - these means are the money that the students earned collecting junk paper and working in gardens.
The Union of Poles received a short letter from the Belarusian Television (BT) saying: “We inform you at your request that the video film “Who ordered Union of Poles” was not broadcast on the First National TV-channel on May 13”. The reply was signed by assistant head of the State Television and Radio Company Aliaxandar Martynenka.
On June 27 in the morning workers of the headquarters of the Belarusian Popular Front Party, saw the doors daubed with black paint. Besides, on the pavement in front of the entry the words “Travel case – railway station – Warsaw!” was written in red paint.
Today it is 45 days since former Deputy and the Deputy group “Republic” leader, active oppositionist Siargey Skrabets was detained in Minsk and transferred to Brest. Right after the detention he went on protest hunger strike. There is no definite information that the hunger strike was stopped.
Several famous people called on the former deputy Siarhei Skrabiets to stop the hunger-strike, which he has kept for the 40th day. "The political case of Siarhei Skrabiets has already occurred. The current hunger-strike does not have an impact on the political process, and the importance of preserving human life should also prevail. We understand the motivation of the politician but also want him to understand that the hunger-strike should be stopped," says the appeal.
Not long ago in Minsk two very symptomatic court proceedings against activists of the democratic opposition ended. I mean trials over the democratic movement activists Paval Sieviaryniets, Mikolai Statkievich and Andrei Klimau. All the three men are accused of staging group actions that violate the public order. The responsibility for this crime is provided in Article 342 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus.
[Presenter] The popularity of Ukrainian TV channels is growing in Belarus. Residents not only of the border areas, but of the Belarusian capital Minsk too, have been able to watch them regularly for several years. Serhiy Khomych reports.
Is it possible at the dawn of the 21st century that an entire university could be driven into exile in Europe? Seventy-two years after scholars fled Hitler`s Germany to establish the Graduate Faculty at the New School for Social Research in New York, it has happened. Last year, the European Humanities University in Belarus was forced to close by the country`s authoritarian regime. This month, European Humanities University-International dedicated its new campus in Vilnius, where it now resides in exile.
The 500-page report by the Vienna-based International Helsinki Federation (IHF) covers human rights developments in 38 member states of the OSCE in 2004. Aaron Rhodes, executive director of the IHF, told RFE/RL: "It`s difficult to make a generalization about human rights in such a group of countries, some of which are the most democratic and liberal countries in the world and some others are extremely repressive. But what you can say is that, in some areas especially, not much progress is being made in human rights."
The traditional "Russia day" at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is always a lively affair, but last Wednesday, June 22, it came close to full-blown scandal. The 144-page report on Russia`s fulfillment of its commitments to this organization contained more than 400 reservations and accusations of violating basic democratic norms (Lenta.ru, June 23). The Russian delegation, led by Konstantin Kosachev and Mikhail Margelov, gave a good fight in order to soften this criticism, at times taking a cue from Nikita Khrushchev`s behavior at the UN, but also making an emotional plea not to attack Russia that hard on June 22, a day associated with the German invasion in 1941 (Kommersant, June 23). It was all to no avail; the Assembly approved the report and even voted for several amendments requesting the end of financial support to the Lukashenka regime in Belarus and the speedy withdrawal of Russian troops from Moldova, as well as clarifying that the Baltic states were indeed "occupied" (Nezavisimaya gazeta, June 23). In the best traditions of resurrected Soviet diplomacy, Kosachev qualified these amendments as "absolutely unacceptable" (Vedomosti, June 23).
Western Europeans may have forgotten that one fundamental reason for the creation of the European Union was to keep ancient enemies from going to war, but the lesson remains fresh for Poland and Ukraine. Just as the EU helped end hatred and misunderstanding between France and Germany, Poland is hoping that the prospect of EU membership for Ukraine will play a similarly constructive role in eastern Europe - despite complications following the French and Dutch referendum rejection of an EU constitution.
Belarus is going to withdrew from the treaty on non-visa movement of CIS citizens on the territory of member states, which was signed on October 9, 1992 in Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan), told deputy Foreign minister of Belarus Alyaksandr Herasimenka on June 27 at the session of a Permanent Commission on international affairs and relations with the CIS of the so-called “chamber of representatives” of “national assembly” of Belarus.
The letter printed below in the source language that was, for known reasons, signed by an assumed name was handed over to the Human Rights Center Viasna together with another two complaints of prisoners in the Mazyr-based maximum security prison. The prisoners asked for the letters to be transferred to international human rights groups so that they could bring to attention the overall situation of the prisoners in Belarus and in Mazyr prison, in particular. We did as they asked and sent their complaints to the UN Committee against Tortures, to the head office of Amnesty International in London and to the office of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) in Paris.
The United States again leads the world in putting criminals in jail, ahead of Russia and Belarus, according to figures released on Monday by British academics.
Gazprom General Director Aleksandr Miller has announced that as of 2006 the majority-state owned Russian energy giant is planning to increase the price on natural gas supplied to Georgia and Ukraine.
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