Mikola Statkevich Not Allowed Minsk :: Charter'97 :: News

Wife of the political prisoner Mikola Statkevich, Valyantsina Statkevich, lodged an appeal to the prosecutor’s office of Pershamajski district of Minsk, which prohibited her husband to visit Minsk. Her husband, the leader of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party (Narodnaya Hramada) Mikola Statkevich, serves the sentence of corrective labour in Baranavichy for organizing street protest after the referendum last year.

Mikola Statkevich started to serve the sentence since July 29. According to the law, if the prisoner had no violations of the internal order, he is allowed to visit his family once a month. However, the leadership of police of Pershamajski district of Minsk, where M.Statkevich is registered, sent a letter to the special commandant`s office, and referring to a hard operational situation in the city, asked not to allow the oppositional politician to go to Minsk. Mikola Statkevich’s wife Valyantsina considers the actions of the police illegal.

“I want to receive explanations why they are afraid to let my husband visit Minsk for three days. Is the operational situation so difficult indeed? A police chief in city department that he is afraid that Statkevich would make a demonstration or something like this in three days. Mikola wants to visit his family and spend some time at home. I have an impression that the authorities are afraid of any person already,” Valyantsina Statkevich said to Radio Svaboda.