The Polish-based Freedom and Democracy Foundation has issued an appeal for support for Belarusian independent reporters whose homes and offices were raided in nationwide crackdown the previous week.
On Thursday, police and KGB officers raided offices of pro-opposition broadcasters funded by the European Union and Poland, and the apartments of journalists working with them, seizing broadcast equipment. Other independent journalists also were targeted.
The foundation urged the Polish media, non-governmental organizations, local authorities and common people "for whom freedom of expression are not hollow words" to donate PCs and cameras to the Belarusian reporters, suggesting giving them two pieces of cameras or computers for one gone.
The foundation supports projects aimed at promoting democracy in Belarus. It monitors human rights abuses committed in the country and issues lists of Belarusian officials who it believes should be barred from traveling to Poland over rights violations. Its annual report for 2007 featured 427 names, and it was delivered to the Polish authorities.
The Belarusian foreign ministry defended the crackdown on the broadcasters, saying that the media outlets had not been accredited with the country's authorities.
The US Department of State condemned the raids. "The regime of Alyaksandr Lukashenka has again shown itself as a brutal, authoritarian dictatorship that blatantly ignores human rights and fundamental freedoms," it said.
The Polish embassy in Minsk has received the first applications for the Polish Charter granted to people of Polish descent living in post-Soviet states.
"The first packages of documents have been accepted today from those who wish to get the Polish Charter," Monika Sadkowska, spokeswoman for the embassy, told BelaPAN on Monday. "The consul will handle the documents and make a decision. He has 14 days for this, but the deadline may be extended if need be."
The charter means extensive privileges for the holder such as a free multi-entry visa and the rights to work, set up a company and study in Poland similar to those exercised by Polish nationals.
It is granted under the Polish Charter (Karta Polaka) Law that passed the Polish parliament this past September.
The law unexpectedly came under fire from the Belarusian state media and foreign ministry in February, with the latter alleging that its enforcement may "seriously destabilize interethnic relations in our country, spark tensions in Belarusian society, disrupt its stability and give rise to mistrust between Belarusian nationals of different descent."
Under the Polish Charter Law, the charter will be issued to former Polish citizens and those who have relatives of Polish descent, even in the fourth generation.
It will be given for a period of 10 years and extended for further 10 years upon application.
The charter also will entitle the holder to a 37-percent discount on rail travel in Poland.
According to Polish official statisticians, 900,000 people of Polish descent live in Belarus.
The Czech authorities have denied political asylum to Belarusian opposition youth Alyaksey Shydlowski and expelled him back to Lithuania.
The opposition activist, who has a vast record of what is widely believed politically motivated convictions, fled to Lithuania after the Belarusian police brought a criminal charge of hooliganism against him in late 2007 in connection with his scuffle with a store assistant over Alyaksandr Lukashenka's image, which Mr. Shydlowski claims was orchestrated.
The activist told BelaPAN that he held a long-term Lithuanian visa and had traveled to the Czech Republic with a visa valid for three days. When declining to consider his application for political asylum, the Czech authorities cited an international accord under which the activist should have applied for the asylum to the Lithuanian authorities that had issued him the long-term visa.
Mr. Shydlowski had spent a month and a half at a Czech camp for asylum seekers.
He said that the Lithuanian authorities had first wanted to expel him to Belarus, "unaware of details of his case," but then agreed to send him to Ukraine.
He said that he would not return to Belarus.
"I would be arrested right on the border," Mr. Shydlowski said. "I am on the list. My lawyer has learned that I am wanted by the Belarusian police and the investigation of the case against me is 'frozen.' My Lithuanian visa is about to expire and I will apply for a new Czech visa so that they have no formal reasons for declining to handle my application."
The criminal charge over the scuffle may land the activist in prison for up to 10 years.
In the late 1990s, Mr. Shydlowski served 18 months in prison for spray-painting anti-Lukashenka slogans in the city of Stowbtsy, Minsk region. In 2001, he was sentenced to a two-year community service term for spray-painting "Zubr" on residential buildings in central Minsk.
The opposition activist served three jail terms on petty hooliganism charges last year. He was jailed ahead of key opposition street protests on all of the occasion.
Prominent artist Alyaksey Marachkin expressed outrage over his last week’s arrest and jailing.
The painter was apprehended in his studio in Minsk on March 24 and sentenced to five days in jail the following day on a charge of using obscene language.
“The most abhorrent thing in my jailing is that police officers accused me of speaking profanities and putting up resistance,” Mr. Marachkin said in an interview with BelaPAN following his release from jail on March 29.
The 68-year-old artist, who speaks Belarusian as the first language, said that the tongue has no profane words and the police accusations could not be true.
The police seized The Dolls, a famous painting by Mr. Marachkin that depicts Belarusian top government officials in a satirical manner, as well as Belarusian Popular Front flags, banners and posters from the artist’s studio.
Mr. Marachkin, who linked his jailing to a March 25 demonstration in Minsk, announced plans to push for the return of the items.
The secretariat of Dmitry Medvedev said that it had received an appeal urging the Russian president-elect to demand the release of Belarusian former presidential candidate Alyaksandr Kazulin.
The appeal was sent earlier this month by prominent opposition politician Syarhey Skrabets and his brother, Alyaksandr.
Syarhey Skrabets told BelaPAN that they had received the reply on March 28.
"It is encouraging," he said. "The positive thing is that the letter reached Dmitry Medvedev's secretariat and he was notified of it. We have not received such notifications earlier, and our appeals sometimes never reached Russian government officials."
On March 10, the two brothers went on indefinite hunger strike in protest against the imprisonment of Dr. Kazulin.
Mr. Skrabets expressed the opinion that democratic changes in Belarus “depend on Russia to a great extent.” “We would like the new Russian leadership to devote attention to this. We hope that Medvedev will influence the Belarusian authorities and Kazulin will be released,” he said.
Students at Francisak Skaryna Homyel State University who had signed a petition for the recall of locally elected House of Representatives member Alyaksandr Shawko were ordered to give an account.
Local opposition activists initiated a drive for the recall of the lawmaker after he had voted to abolish benefits and privileges for the students, retirees, disabled people and other social groups, thereby failing to meet his pre-election promises.
Some 60 students of the Homyel university signed the petition.
On March 28, after the Homyel City Executive Committee had sent a list of them to the administration of the university, such students were summoned to the dean’s office and ordered to write accounts as to why they had taken part in the campaign for the recall of the lawmaker, local opposition activist Pyotr Kuznyatsow told BelaPAN.
He noted that that might have been done by order of the city ideology department for the purpose of intimidating the students. “It’s still unclear if any punitive measures would be used against them,” he said.
Students at Francisak Skaryna Homyel State University who had signed a petition for the recall of locally elected House of Representatives member Alyaksandr Shawko were ordered to give an account.
Local opposition activists initiated a drive for the recall of the lawmaker after he had voted to abolish benefits and privileges for the students, retirees, disabled people and other social groups, thereby failing to meet his pre-election promises.
Some 60 students of the Homyel university signed the petition.
On March 28, after the Homyel City Executive Committee had sent a list of them to the administration of the university, such students were summoned to the dean’s office and ordered to write accounts as to why they had taken part in the campaign for the recall of the lawmaker, local opposition activist Pyotr Kuznyatsow told BelaPAN.
He noted that that might have been done by order of the city ideology department for the purpose of intimidating the students. “It’s still unclear if any punitive measures would be used against them,” he said.
Police officers on March 29 raided the Hrodna office of a Warsaw-backed association of Belarusian Poles in an attempt to find what they called illegal printed material.
At about 9 a.m. policemen tried to discover illegal printed material in a car that they stopped near the office. The passengers in the car, which included the association’s leaders Anzelika Borys and Jozef Porzecki, and Ihar Bantser, editor in chief of the Polish-registered Magazyn Polski na uchodzstwie who is a member of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), refused to open the trunk, reported the BAJ press office.
After the three managed to jump in another car and escape from the scene, the police moved their search into the office, but did not find anything of interest to them in the rooms that were unlocked, Hrodna journalist Andrzej Poczobut, who happened to be in attendance, told BelaPAN.
“There was one locked room, but the police needed a prosecutor’s sanction to break the door,” Mr. Poczobut said. “To all appearances, they failed to obtain the sanction. In addition, some 100 members of our association were in the office and the policemen didn’t dare to act on their own authority.”
Police officers on March 29 raided the Hrodna office of a Warsaw-backed association of Belarusian Poles in an attempt to find what they called illegal printed material.
At about 9 a.m. policemen tried to discover illegal printed material in a car that they stopped near the office. The passengers in the car, which included the association’s leaders Anzelika Borys and Jozef Porzecki, and Ihar Bantser, editor in chief of the Polish-registered Magazyn Polski na uchodzstwie who is a member of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), refused to open the trunk, reported the BAJ press office.
After the three managed to jump in another car and escape from the scene, the police moved their search into the office, but did not find anything of interest to them in the rooms that were unlocked, Hrodna journalist Andrzej Poczobut, who happened to be in attendance, told BelaPAN.
“There was one locked room, but the police needed a prosecutor’s sanction to break the door,” Mr. Poczobut said. “To all appearances, they failed to obtain the sanction. In addition, some 100 members of our association were in the office and the policemen didn’t dare to act on their own authority.”
The organizers of a march to be held in Minsk on April 2 on the occasion of Belarusian-Russian Unity Day have invited rock musicians to play in the “Rock for Freedom” concert that will be staged in culmination of the march.
As one of the organizers, former lawmaker Syarhey Skrabets, told BelaPAN, the concert will take place in Nations’ Freedom Park that adjoins Bangalore Square from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
“We invite all rock musicians who value the ideals of freedom and democracy to take part in this show,” Mr. Skrabets said. “Electric power and quality concert equipment will be available. Since the city government has given its permission for the march and the concert, we don’t expect any obstacles on the part of authorities.”
The Minsk City Executive Committee has allowed the march to run from the square in front of the National Academy of Sciences to Bangalore Square along Surhanava Street.
About 10 people took part in a similar demonstration last year. The organizers predict that up to 250 people will take part in the march this time.
31 March 2008