Foreign minister of Estonia Urmas Paet condemned the arrests of members of the youth oppositional movement “Young Front”, including its leaders Pavel Sevyarinets and Alyaksei Shein, in Belarus, the DELFI reports.

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As of today, Navapolatsk has become the only town in the country where the authorities gave the permission for holding the pickets in support of the former presidential candidate and present political prisoner Alyaksandr Kazulin.

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The panel of judges of the Minsk regional court remained valid the decision of the Myadzel regional court on expulsion of John the Baptist Pentecostal Church pastor Yaraslau Lukasik from the country.

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Alyaksandr Lukashenka is reshuffling senior officials, at the same time as his energy minister is in Moscow for talks over an unpaid US$500m gas debt. The two issues are related, for cheap energy and a strong “power vertical” have been the bedrock of Mr Lukashenka’s rule. With the era of cheap Russian energy coming to a close this year, it is all the more important for Mr Lukashenka to be sure he has a firm political grip on the country.

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Today at the regular selector meeting dedicated to the harvesting campaign in Belarus A. Lukashenka predicted the crises of the world grain market, the Interfax reports.

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Yesterday the representatives of Russia and Belarus held another round of talks on the prospects of cooperation in the sphere of power-engineering. This time the accumulated since the beginning of the year Belarusian debt for Russian gas appeared in the center of attention. The topic of energy resources delivery to Belarus was indivisible from the union relationship of both countries. In the mid nineties Minsk managed to make Moscow write off its debts for the amount exceeding USD 1 billion. How it was going on and if that scenario is likely to be repeated was dwelt upon by Mikhail Chigir in his interview to the Vremya Novostey.

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Russia must strengthen its military and step up spying on the west in response to US plans to site parts of a missile defence shield in eastern Europe, President Vladimir Putin warned on Wednesday.

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Yesterday in Warsaw representatives of the Belarusian ”Free Theatre” met with the legendary musician, leader of the Rolling Stones Mick Jagger. The musician declared that he cared about the situation in Belarus and, according to him; Belarus must become a free European country.

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