In Minsk in the Part of People’s Friendship on Bangalore Square a picket is taking place. As informed by Interfax, 10 young men are taking part in the picket. They are holding placards with slogans: “Kosovo is Slavonic land!”, “Defender of brothers Serbs from Muslims, Slobodan Milosevic meanly murdered”, “Death to Hague hangmen, murderers of the hero”, “White Might”.
A delegation of the Islamic Republic of Iran is on the visit in Belarus. As the press service of the Foreign Affairs Ministry of Belarus informs, the delegation is headed by Iranian Commerce Minister, a chairman of the Joint Commission on Economic Cooperation Masud Mir-Kazemi. Business circles of Iran are represented by a deputy Commerce Minister, a deputy Chairman of the Iranian part of the Commission Mekhdi Gazafari.
Detained participants of the action of solidarity with a student of the Higher School of Tourism of the Belarusian State Economic University Tatsyana Dzyadok are released. In the police department of Leninski district their names and places of residence were recorded, they were videotaped, one of the detainees, Mikhail Litvinau told to the Charter’97 press center.
The Embassy of the United States of America welcomes the long-awaited release on April 14 of Ambassador Mikhail Marinich, who served nearly two years in prison on clearly trumped up, political motivated charges. The United States condemned and continues to condemn the arrest, conviction and imprisonment of Ambassador Marinich as a groundless and outrageous abuse of Ambassador Marinich`s human and civil rights. The United States notes that the Belarusian Government has continued to incarcerate an alarming number of Belarusian citizens for their peaceful political activities.
According to reports, in the beginning of April the plate and the doors of Frantsysk Skaryna Society of Belarusian language building were covered with fascist leaflets with the words: “April 5 is the day of Russian nation” and the slogan “Glory to the Nation! Death to Enemies!”
On April 17 a human rights watchdog Ales Byalatski was summoned to the prosecutor’s office of Savetski district. He was issued a warning for violation of the Article 400 of the Criminal Code of Belarus (“intentionally false denunciation”). The warning was issued in line with a comment of Ales Byalatski to the internet source www.charter97.org after a forcible dispersal of a peaceful protest on March 25: “It’s an obvious provocation of the authorities. They have declared that even before the elections. Interior Minister Navumau said at a press conference that explosions and victims are expected among demonstrators. Now we have seen that. The Belarusian authorities, and namely Lukashenka and his power ministers bear the blame for all today’s events. Today the regime has used unprecedented cruelty against peaceful people,” the human rights activist said then.
According to the preliminary information, during the action of solidarity with a student of the Higher School of Tourism of the Belarusian State Economic University Tatsyana Dzyadok 11 people were detained. The names of the detained are still unknown. It is supposed that they were taken to the police department of Leninski district of Minsk.
A student of the Higher School of Tourism of the Belarusian State Economic University Tatsyana Dzyadok hasn’t ask forgiveness for participation in the protest action against rigged results of the presidential elections, and her fellow students refused to condemn her publicly, as the dean’s office demanded. The administration of the Higher School of Tourism was nervous of representatives of the press and people who have gathered by the building of the university to support Tatsyana Dzyadok. At the meeting the administration has not repeated the treats to expel the student from the university.
Today about 80 students of different universities of Minsk have gathered to support the defender of the tent camp on October Square, a student of the Higher School of Tourism of the Belarusian State Economic University Tatsyana Dzyadok. The administration of her educational institution forces her to “repent errors” publicly: to ask forgiveness for participation in the protest action on October Square.
At night of 17-18 April in Minsk Uladzimir Katsora, the chair of Homel regional electoral headquarters of A.Milinkevich, was detained. According to the deputy chair of the headquarters Iury Zakharanka, the detainee was accused of ‘organization of unauthorized meeting’. It can be possibly connected to the fact that Mr Katsora filed with Homel City Executive Committee the request to authorize the Chernobyl Way action which he intends to hold on 25 April in the center of the city. “I don’t rule out that V.Katsora will suddenly start to use four-letter words and cling to passers-by’ or will resist to the police’ on the eve of the action. The practice of arrests on such accusations is already quite well developed in Belarus”, said Mr Zakharanka.
HRC Viasna still has no information about the location and surnames of the persons who were beaten during the dispersal of the peaceful procession on 25 March in Minsk. Belarusian medics seem to have forgotten about Hippocrates’ oath. On 26 March journalists and relatives of the beaten persons applied to all hospitals of Minsk, asking for information.
In some schools of Hrodna pupils were asked to evaluate their “acceptance of the ideology of the Belarusian state” or “level of ideological and political conscience” with marks from zero to three. Then parents and teachers were to give such marks to the children, after which the average was to have been counted and introduced into the “individual charters of the level of breeding”. These charters also include such points as hygiene, health, physical exercises, but the first points are “respect to the Constitution and law-abidance” and “ability to resist negative tendencies” (this mystical point is not explained). This paper was provided to RFE/RL by the parents who consider this charter as forcing pupils to self-delation concerning their political loyalty.
Human Rights Center Viasna protests against the systematic use of criminal persecution by Aliaksandr Lukashenka’s regime as a means of struggle against political opponents and opposition-minded persons. We have to conclude that the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus has become a tool of political repressions.
Belarusian Prime Minister Sergei Sidorsky will visit Cuba Thursday at the invitation of President Fidel Castro, the government said in a statement here Tuesday.
An activist of youth pro-democracy movement Artur Finkevich is charged with a graver crime. Finkevich was detained in Minsk on the night of January 30 this year on a charge of making graffiti “We want a new one!” It has become known that he is presented accusation for violation of two articles of the Criminal Code, Article 339 Part 2 (malicious hooliganism) and Article 218 Part 3 (intentional destruction or damaging of property). Artur Finkevich faces a prison term from 7 to 12 years for violation of the latter article; moreover, this article does not envisage postponement of execution of judgment.
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