The international public association “Union of Belarusians of the World Batskaushchyna” (“Fatherland”) faces liquidation. As BelaPAN news agency was informed by the chairman of the Union of Belarusians of the World “Batskaushchyna” Alena Makouskaya, the association has received a ruling of the Minsk economic court containing a statement of reasons of the court ruling of December 12. The court denied the enterprise “Minskaya Spadchyna” a suit to cancel a rental agreement because the agreement had been found invalid.
A 1980 Olympic silver medallist has been denied ballot access in January`s local elections over what he describes as a minor lapse. Igor Kanygin, who holds two world and four European Greek-Roman style wrestling titles, planned to run for a seat on the Vitebsk Regional Soviet but was denied the status of candidate by a district election commission, which pointed to an error in his Belarusian-language biography form.
The forthcoming local elections are receiving little coverage in the country`s media, according to a report unveiled by the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) in Minsk on Thursday. The BAJ monitored the press and the broadcast media in the period between December 4 and 16 when the district election commissions were registering nominees as candidates in January` local elections.
The editor-in-chief of the magazine “Rodnaje Slova” Mikhail Shavyrkin was dismissed by the Minister of Education on December 14. One of the reasons for it was the fact that the magazine’s circulation was decreasing. “But how can the circulation increase when the role of the Belarusian language is getting less and less important?”, – wondered Mikhail Shavyrkin in his interview with the BAJ Press Service.
Vitsebsk regional court tried to study the complaint of a human rights activist Pavel Levinau against actions of a regional election commission in the department of cardiology of Vitsebsk emergency hospital where Levinau was placed after a hypertensive crisis. The Charter’97 press center has been informed about that by a human rights activist Valery Shchukin.
Belarusian Voters’ Club carried out independent observation of the election. Right before the local election this year the Minsitry of Justice suspended the activity of the NGO. Uladzimir Hudzeyeu, chairperson of the Voters’ Club, says the Supreme Court considered the suit of the Ministry of Justice on December 11. This year the Ministry of Justice issued 2 warnings to the NGO. That became the ground for a 6-month suspension of the NGO’s activity. The Supreme Court decided that the fact that the office of the NGO was not located at its legal address was enough to suspend the activity of the Voters’ Club. The decisions of the Supreme Court may not be appealed. If the NGO fixes the problem in 6 months, its activity might be renewed.
Yury Bachyshcha, assistant professor at Belarusian State Teacher’s University was fired on March 23, 2006. the official reason for his dismissal was for “immoral actions, which does not correspond to the position of a teacher”. The university administration accused the assistant professor of distributing CDs with materials that insult the honor and dignity of the president of the Republic of Belarus.
The United States will acknowledge no results of the referendum on uniting Russia and Belarus, the U.S. Ambassador to Belarus Karen B. Stewart made clear. This statement of ambassador signals Washington suspects Moscow of staging Anschluss for Belarus and is ready to fight for this state with the Kremlin.
Lukashenka has offered his profound condolence to the chairman of Turkmen parliament Ovezgeldy Atayev, family of the late, to all citizens of Turkmenistan on the occasion of Saparmurat Niyazov’s death, BELTA was informed by Lukashenka’s press-service.
Answering the question of Radio Svaboda what was the best news in Belarus in 2006, a well-known Belarusian writer Volha Ipatava said: "This news was a participation of young people in events on the Square. Such a great number of young faces who love Belarus, who want to live in completely different conditions, do not want to live in obedience and servitude to which most our citizens still agree unfortunately. Our large objectives haven’t been achieved unfortunately, but the example of the young people should inspire those who believe in changes. And I believe in changes, I believe they are inevitable. A great quantity of people who do not have such an awful fear has emerged…
On December 20 in Pinsk policemen and people in mufti burst into an apartment of a candidate for deputy of the city council, a member of the Belarusian Popular Front party Yury Bakhtserau.
A Czech conference of rectors, an official association uniting rectors of all Czech universities, has adopted a special statement condemning repressions against a former candidate for presidency in Belarus, a former rector of the Belarusian State University, a political prisoner Alyaksandr Kazulin, and to release him.
Reporters Without Borders today condemned the arrest of Aleksei Salei, one of the editors of the magazine Magazyn Polski na Uchodzistwie (Polish Magazine in Exile), who was released on 19 December after serving a seven-day sentence for «hooliganism» and «protesting at the time of arrest» Salei said his arrest was linked to an article about a dispute between the Catholic church and the government over the expulsion of several priests and nuns from Belarus.
The EU on Wednesday (20 December) decided to impose ˆ400 million a year worth of trade sanctions on Belarus from mid-2007, in a decision unwelcome by pro-democracy workers in Belarus and its EU neighbour states.
Iran said Wednesday the country`s Economic Council approved drilling by Brazil`s Petrobras in the Caspian.We will continue our negotiations with that company until a deal is finalized. It should be noted that the first agreement in that respect was signed between Petrobras and Caspian Oil Co. about 10 months ago, Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh told the Iranian Students News Agency in an interview. Excavation work by Petrobras in two Caspian blocks will begin only when the semi-floating Alborz platform is operational, ISNA reported.
The US Administration is to follow the freedom of access to Internet and monitor work of internet-providers in authoritarian countries – Belarus, China, Cuba, Iran, Ethiopia, Laos, North Korea, Tunisia and Vietnam. The corresponding mission has been set on Wednesday by Bush Administration to Global Internet Freedom Task Force created by the US Department of State. The Task Force is to coordinate its activities in the framework of the strategy approved on Wednesday with other structures of American administration, including the National Security Council by US President. “This new strategy is a warning for regimes that use repressions against internet,” told a chairman of the subcommittee of the Chamber of Representatives of the US Congress, a Congressman Christopher Smith.
On December 20 the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on human rights in Belarus, the UN press-service informs. As we have informed, this resolution proposed by the US and the EU was approved by the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly earlier.
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