At the meeting with the workers of the central office of the ministry new Minister of Sports and Tourism Alyaksandr Hryhorau (Grigorov) said that he is going to carry out orders of Lukashenka and the government “whatever it takes”. “We do not have a moral right to let down the head of the state. There are not so many countries in the world where the National Olympic Committee is headed by a person of such level,” the minister noted.

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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus said that it lets the presidents of Latvia and Poland have on their conscience the statements of about our country made on July 6 in Riga. “We know these positions very well. We have not heard anything new, and that is why we let these words weigh upon the conscience of the politicians, who accept such statements about a sovereign state in their public rhetoric,” said deputy head of the information office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus Ruslan Esin, answering the questions of journalists on July 7, BELTA informs.

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Pursuant to Rule 103 of the Rules of Procedure, by Bogdan Adam Klich, Barbara Kudrycka, Laima Andrikiene, Charles Tannock, Karl von Wogau, Alfred Gomolka, Aldis Ku??is on behalf of the EPP-ED Group;

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Russian President Vladimir Putin told that the industrialized countries are not obliged to provide assistance to African dictators, for instance like Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe. Today in Kazakhstan before going to G8 summit in Scotland the Russian president underlined aid would be useless if African leaders were corrupt adding that "we should not be afraid to stop aid to dictators, like Zimbabwe’s Mugabe, AP informs.

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Alyaksandr Lukashenka has signed a number of decrees on conferring the order “For Service to Motherland” of the third degree. The Interfax was informed about it on Wednesday by the press service of the head of state. In particular, it has been stated that the chairman of the charity foundation of Afghan war veterans support “Pamyat Afgana” (Memory of Afghanistan) Alyaksandr Myatla (Alexander Metla) was awarded for “great personal contribution to patriotic education of the youth, for active work for assistance to Afghan war veterans, and meritorious service during construction of the historical and cultural complex “Stalin Line”. The deputy head of the division of engineer troops of the General Staff of the Belarusian military forces Anatoly Gritsiuk recieved the same order “for model fulfilment of military duty, high professionalism, meritorious service during construction of the historical and cultural complex “Stalin Line”.

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July 7 is a “Belarusian day” at the session of the European parliament in Strasbourg (France), told the head of the delegation of the European parliament on relations with Belarus Bogdan Klich in his interview to BelaPAN. As said by him, in the morning of July 7 Iryna Krasouskaya, leader of the civil initiative “We Remember”, member of the “Free Belarus”, whose husband was abducted in 1999 together with the former vice prime-minister of Belarus Viktar Hanchar, is to make a report on the situation in Belarus in the European Parliament. At 1 p.m. voting on the joint resolution on political situation and independent mass media in Belarus is planned. The document has been elaborate by the delegation on relations with Belarus and different political factions – European People’s Party, Socialists, Liberals, Greens and Communists.

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In the court of Lenin district of Hrodna started the consideration of administrative cases of the five journalists who gathered in the center of the city for a protest rally on July 6. The acting editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Glos znad Niemna” Andrzej Pisalnik, editor of the “Magazyn Polski” Andrei Pachobut, and Inesa Gordyk, Igor Bantsar and Ivan Roman. They gathered at Lenin Square in the center of the city by the building of the city executive committee, where they put up a tent and unfurled a slogan in Polish: “Give “Glos znad Niemna” back to Poles!” and “The Protest of the Union of Poles in Belarus”.

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Hundreds of leaflets with Dzmitry Zavadski portrait and the date of his disappearance distributed by the activists of movement “Zubr” in Miensk districts Kurasoushchyna, Sierabranka and Kuncaushchyna and also in the centre of the capital of Bielarus on the eve of the July 6, 2005.

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New leaflets with slogan to release the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary ambassador of Belarus Mikhail Marynich, former minister of foreign economic relations appeared in Vicebsk on last weekend. It distributed by Zubr’s activists on the Suvorov, Davatara and Lenin streets, near the KGB building, near the school number 10 and the Medical University buildings. The graffiti “Freedom to Marynich!” and “ZUBR” were made in another busy places.

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The new editions of the laws “About public associations” and “About political parties” witness the will of the authorities to limit and strictly control the activity of structures of civil society. The purposeful campaign aimed at liquidation of the daily non-state newspaper Narodnaia Volia has begun. Regional independent mass media are pressurized as well. Human rights organizations of Belarus have registered numerous cases when students of different educational establishments were persecuted for political reasons. The main reason for persecution became public and political position of students and pupils. In many cases provosts and deans openly collaborate with KGB, provide to it information about active students and arrange “prophylactic talks” together.

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In the evening of 29 June in the town of Kalinkavichy the police detained Uladzimir Tsieliapun, chair of Mazyr town branch of Human Rights Center Viasna. Mr. Tsieliapun took the system block of his computer back from his Homiel friend Uladzimir Katsora, who had repaired it. After their meeting Uladzimir Tsieliapun was detained on the way to a bus stop by three policemen – one of them was in the uniform and the other two – in plain clothes. They took Mr. Tsieliapun to Kalinkavichy Town Board of Internal Affairs.

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On July 3, 2005 Blearusian people started a national campaign on re-naming at least one street in every oblast city after Vasil Bykhov. The campaign was iniciated by Young Democrats – UCP youth wing. First action was hold in Grodno.

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A district court in Minsk has handed down judgments against the opposition daily Narodnaya Volya (The People`s Will) in three separate civil defamation trials and ordered the daily to pay a total of 115 million Belarusian rubles (US$53,500) in damages, according to local and international reports.

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The European Commission on Wednesday (6 July) kick-started a process that could see Belarus expelled from the EU`s General System of Preferences (GSP), effectively cutting off trade links with the eastern European country.

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Belarusian journalist Zmitser Zavadski disappeared on July 7, 2000 in the airport “Minsk-2”, where he arrived to meet his colleague – journalist Pavel Sheremet. Since than time there is no information about Zavadski’s fate. Though the investigation of the journalist’s case was resumed recently, there is no hope that the real persons responsible for his abduction could be found while Lukashenka’s regime is in power. The international community constantly states the necessity to clarify the fate of the Belarusian journalist, and other Belarusian oppositionists. The demand to find the truth about the abductions is contained in the resolution of the UN Commission on Human Rights, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and of the OSCE. A number of high Belarusian officials, in particular Interior Minister Uladzimir Navumau, the head of the Presidential Administration Viktar Shejman, former head of the Interior Ministry Yury Sivakou and the commander of the quick response unit Dzmitry Paulichenka, are banned entry to the counties of the EU and the USA since they are suspected of involvement in abduction of the journalist.

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