Court ceased lawsuit against oppositional communists :: Charter'97 :: News

12 February court of the Savetski district of Minsk ceased the lawsuit of the civil claim to leader of the Party of Communists Belarusian (PCB) Syargei Kalyakin and editorial staff of the “Tovarisch” newspaper on protection of honor and dignity, as it was reported by member of the central committee board of the PCB and chief editor of the Tovarisch Syargei Vaznyak.

The claimant was a former member of the central committee board of the PCB and former first secretary of the central committee of the LCUYB Yuri Vaskrasensky. H e demanded a compensation of 150 million rubles for the moral damage from the defendant. The claim was caused by the statement from Syargei Kalyakin’s report at the X party congress on June 15, 2006. When characterizing the defendant who recently managed to get enrolled in many oppositional organizations and now is a member of the Communist Party of Belarus (CPB), the leader of PCB called him a “political par venue.” Kalyakin’s report was later published by the Tovarisch.

12 February judge Marina Fyodarava referred the characteristics given to the defendant to political polemics and ceased the corresponding lawsuit. “Kalyakin only characterized the political qualities of Yuri Vaskrasensky. The court admitted the case to be political polemics which can not make subject of a case”, S. Vaznyak said.

S. Kalyakin didn’t comment the decision of the court as, according to him, he considered any comment as incorrect until the decision came into force. There are 10 days at Yuri Vaskrasensky’s disposal for appealing the court’s decision, leader of the PCB explained.