Belarusian ruler Aleksandr Lukashenko made some new government appointments on October 31.
New rector was appointed to Brest State University. Brest receives an appointee from Minsk -- Dr. Mecheslav Chesnovsky. Chesnovsky's last position was the Deputy Dean of the Belarusian State University Faculty of International Relations.
The resigning rector Dr Vladimir Pletyukhov is quiting due to the health conditions. He has been undergoing profilactic medical treatment for the past month. He is currently on vocation untill November 11th.
The Brest Customs House chiefs have rejected accusations of abuse of office that were brought against several customs officers by the State Control Committee's Department of Financial Investigations (DFI).
The FDI charged the officers with failing to collect $144,000 in duties from passengers of the Warsaw-Moscow train, which inspectors stopped and checked for 13 hours on October 18 after it passed customs controls.
The Brest Customs House has released a statement to the media saying that no discrepancies were documented between the stated and actual amount of duties. The FDI charged nine officers, some of whom had nothing to do with checks and the collection of duties from passengers of the Brest-Warsaw train, Konstantin Rutsky, deputy chief
of the Brest Customs House, told BelaPAN. "It is difficult to imagine customs officers, who work together with border guards, train service and veterinary inspectors, letting 12 passenger cars stuffed with goods
pass through the border without paying customs duties," he said, noting that the accusations were aimed to discredit the Customs House.
Herzl Makov, director of the Israeli-based Center for the Study of Menachem Begin's Legacy, and the center's deputy director, Ehiel Fishzon, arrived in Brest on October 23 to propose to the local
government that a memorial plaque be unveiled in the city on the occasion of the Brest-born Israeli political leader's 90th birthday, which will be observed next year. The Menachem Begin Center originally wanted the plaque to be unveiled on the tenth anniversary of the politician's death, but this did not occur although the Brest authorities seemed favorable to the project at last year's talks.
Menachem Begin, Israel's prime minister between 1977 and 1983, was born in Brest in 1913 into the family of the chairman of the local Jewish community, Volf Begin. He died in Tel Aviv in 1992.
On Wednesday, the Israeli guests planned to see the place where Brest ghetto prisoners were shot in 1942, and visit the Regional Record Office and the Brest Fortress Memorial. On the following day they are scheduled to visit Brest State University and hold meetings with the staff of the area history museum and representatives of the local Jewish
community. Also on October 24, they are to meet with the leaders of the Brest Regional Executive Committee to sign a protocol of intentions. The Israeli delegation hopes that the protocol will provide for unveiling a plaque and organizing other commemorative events in Brest on Begin's
90th birthday.
Criminal charges were brought against several top-ranking officers of the Brest Customs House as a result of an inspection conducted recently by the State Control Committee's Department of Financial Investigations
(DFI).
On the night of October 18, an inspection group, which consisted of officers of the State Control Committee and the Brest Border Control Unit's internal security department, and was led personally by DFI Director Anatoly Gromovich, stopped a Warsaw-Moscow train, which had just passed the Brest customs, and ordered all the baggage
unloaded and re-weighed. The inspection, which lasted for some 13 hours, established that the Belarusian Customs had been paid $144.000 less than it should have been, a DFS official told BelaPAN.
Mr. Gromovich, formerly deputy chief of the KGB office for the Brest region, met with State Control Committee Chairman Anatoly Tozik on Monday to discuss the results of the inspection. They decided to submit a report to the head of state.
The issue will be under discussion at a conference that Prime Minister Gennady Novitsky plans to hold on October 25 during his trip to the Brest region. Participating in the conference will be State Customs Committee Chairman Aleksandr Shpilevsky and Aleksandr Pavlovsky, chairman of the State Border Troops Committee. The premier is expected to visit the customs checkpoints Kozlovichi, Varshavsky
Most, Domachevo and Peschatka at Belarus' Polish border.
The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church has dismissed Sofrony, the Bishop of Brest and Kobrin, and transferred him to the vacant chair of the Mogilyov and Mstislavl Eparchy.
His successor in Brest and Kobrin will be Ioann, the Bishop of Borisov and vicar with the Minsk Eparchy. He is expected to conduct his first service at the Saint Simon Cathedral in Brest in early November.
Representatives of the Brest and Kobrin Eparchy decline to comment on the Synod's decision. Circles close to the Church have been saddened at the news, linking Sofrony's dismissal to his involvement in the situation at the Saint Peter and Paul Church in Ruzhany, which has not seen service for five months. The parish ousted the local dean
whom they suspect of stealing church property and who enjoyed Sofrony's support. Despite his effort, Sofrony has failed to bring peace to
the community. Churchgoers have taken possession of the key and stood guard over the church for several months now. Many of their complaints addressed to the church authorities blame the conflict on Sofrony.
The construction of a new bridge across the River Bug is to be launched at the Kozlovichi-Kukuryki border crossing north of Brest before the end of the year, Gennady Cheptsov, first deputy head of the Belarusian
transport ministry's Road Construction and Maintenance Department (Belavtodor), told reporters in Minsk on October 17.
Under an agreement with the Polish side, Belavtodor will be the customer and the two parties will go halves in the expense, which is estimated at $7.5 million, Mr. Cheptsov said.
According to him, the bridge plan has already been approved by both the Belarusian and Polish governments. The contractor is to be selected from among Polish and Belarusian construction organizations within the next few days, Belavtodor's press office told BelaPAN. The bridge is
to be completed in late 2003.
The most promising areas of cooperation between Bulgaria and the Brest region are tourism, woodworking, and economic and cultural ties among sister cities, said Blagovest Sendov, deputy chairman of the
Bulgarian National Assembly, on October 18. Mr. Sendov arrived in Belarus on October 15 at the head of a parliamentary delegation.
"Bulgaria and Belarus took a little different roads," Mr. Sendov told regional officials in Brest. "But our countries move in the same direction -- toward prosperity. Therefore, we must find points of contact."
Mr. Sendov said that he has learned new things about Belarus during his visit, noting that information about the country in the foreign media "differs from the truth." The Bulgarian delegation visited the Free Economic Zone "Brest" later the same day. On October 19, the delegation will go to the National Park Belovezhskaya Pushcha.
The Brest city government has banned the local branches of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party "Narodnaya Hramada" and the Belarusian Helsinki Committee from demonstrating against the defense ministry's decision to close down the region's only hospital for military
servicemen and army veterans.
The two organizations planned to stage a protest in front of the hospital, but the city authorities have replied that Brest's only legitimate venue of demonstrations is the Stroitel stadium.
Igor Maslovsky, chairman of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee's Brest regional branch, told BelaPAN on Wednesday that he had expected the application to be turned down, but the authorities had breached the deadline for reply.
Mr. Maslovsky expressed the intention to file another request, this time signed by individual residents. "If the demonstration is banned this time too, we will go to court," he said. "In our practice, there have been cases of a court declaring the city government's decision illegal,"
he added.
Meanwhile, the two organizations are collecting signatures to a petition titled, "Do not Let Veterans Be Mistreated." To justify its decision to close the hospital in Brest, the defense ministry says that it does not have enough funds to serve 4,000 inpatients and some 30,000 outpatients annually.
The hospital in Belarus' south-eastern regional capital has 17,000 registered patients who are retired servicemen and around 1,600 World War II veterans.
Santa Bremor, a private seafood manufacturer based in Brest's "free economic zone," has become the first company in Belarus to receive an HACCP international certificate.
HACCP, the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point, is a quality control certification system recognized by insurers in arbitration proceedings. It is a guarantee of product safety during storage, and it significantly boosts the manufacturer's chances to find customers internationally. Belarus' standardization chief, Valery Koreshkov, who
handed the certificate to Santa Bremor Director General Aleksandr Moshensky, noted that the standard was a must for every West European company, and that all leading food manufacturers in Poland would have to obtain such certification, as the country is expected to join the European Union in 2004.
Valery Murokh, director of the National Center for Food Quality and Safety Assessment pointed out that Santa Bremor was the first enterprise to embark on the path of rigorous quality control, "which should put an end to food poisonings, and help increase the competitive capacity of goods."
Mr. Moshensky said that his company had worked for eight months to get the certificate. He added that the next step in the fight for quality and markets would be to become registered to ISO 9000.
A new non-governmental organization (NGO), the Regional Development Foundation "Nasha Vezha", has been established in Brest as a successor to the Brest Regional Civic Initiative Support Center "Vezha" closed down by the regional court in April.
Vezha was the Brest region's largest and most influential NGO, which supported most of other local organizations. In 2001, burglars emptied Vezha's office of all equipment and computer files. Angered by Vezha's support for the domestic observer network, the regional Justice Department issued two warnings to Vezha shortly after the September 2001 Presidential Election. The department accused Vezha of acting outside its charter by conducting a public opinion poll on the eve of the
election. The second warning was issued for allegedly incorrect use
of words and titles in Vezha's documents and stamps. The Brest Regional Court and the Supreme Court upheld both warnings and ordered the organization closed. After the closure, Vezha activists registered the Regional Development Foundation "Nasha Vezha."
The organization will support projects in the area of education, culture, science, healthcare, law, market-oriented economy, media and international exchanges, the foundation's head, Inna Kulei, told BelaPAN.
31 October 2002