INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

BELARUS UPDATE
Edited by Victor Cole

Vol. 3, No. 4
January 2000

IN THIS ISSUE:

-- HUMAN RIGHTS AND OPPOSITION NEWS --

OPPOSITION WILL HOLD PROTEST MARCHES IN SPRING
On January 18, the Coordinating Council of the Congress of Democratic Forces announced plans to stage mass rallies to press for a dialogue with the Lukashenko regime and to denounce its moves to merge with Russia. The Coordination Council said that the first protest, "Freedom March-2," would take place on March 15, Constitution Day, regardless of whether or not its organizers obtain permission from the authorities. A second gathering on March 25 will mark the founding in 1918 of the Belarusian People's Republic, which was crushed within months by the Bolsheviks. The protest campaign will reach its apogee on April 26, the 14th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in adjacent Ukraine, which contaminated much of Belarus. Opposition leaders said that they would invite observers from the OSCE to the protests, along with members of parliament from Russia, Ukraine, and Poland. (Belapan, January 18)

FOUR CIS COUNTRIES VOTE AGAINST OSCE RESOLUTION ON BELARUS
During the January 13-14 session of the Standing Committee of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly in Vienna, representatives of Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia voted against a resolution in support of opposition-government talks in Belarus aimed at the organization of free and fair parliamentary elections this year. Belgium and Cyprus abstained. Accordingly, the resolution did not pass because decisions of OSCE commitments are made on the consensus minus one principle as designated in the OSCE by-laws. Speaking at the session, Adrian Severin, head of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly ad hoc Working Group on Belarus, called on the Belarusian authorities and opposition to enter into a dialogue aimed at the organization of free and fair parliamentary elections. He said that the opposition's immediate access to the electronic media should be one of the conditions for the election to be recognized by the OSCE. He suggested that Belarus should adopt a new electoral law, which should not prevent candidates convicted of minor offenses related to their participation in street protests from running for parliamentary seats. Speaking about other issues that should be settled within the framework of the 2000 election campaign, Severin pointed out that all political parties should be represented in the central electoral commission and electoral commissions of all levels, and that the required voter turnout should be lowered to 25 percent for the first round and abolished for the runoff round. (Belapan, January 18)

OPPOSITION REAFFIRMS READINESS FOR CONSTRUCTIVE DIALOGUE
The OSCE AMG in Belarus plans to hold a round-table discussion with the participation of the representatives of the Belarusian Association of Journalists and the State Press Committee, said Amb. Hans-Georg Wieck, head of the OSCE AMG, during the January 20 meeting of the Coordinating Council of the Congress of Democratic Forces. Amb. Wieck also said that his group had already sent the relevant proposals to Ural Latypov, Belarusian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister. Amb. Wieck admitted that there is no indication that the government is ready to continue OSCE-mediated consultations on the opposition's access to the state-owed media. During the meeting, the members of the Coordinating Council shared the assessment of the situation in Belarus that Adrian Severin, head of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Working Group on Belarus, made at a recent meeting of the Assembly's Standing Committee. The opposition leaders believe that the vote on the resolution in Vienna proved that the international community will continue making an effort to normalize the situation in Belarus in line with the declaration and final documents of the Istanbul OSCE Summit. In its statement, the Coordinating Council expressed regret that the Belarusian authorities have ignored the OSCE recommendations by trying to rush electoral legislation through the National Assembly. "The electoral legislation should be adopted as a result of opposition-government negotiations," reads the statement. The opposition leaders confirmed their readiness to work toward a constructive dialogue with the authorities as recommended by the OSCE. (Belapan, January 20)

OFFICIAL SAYS LUKASHENKO WILL NOT TAKE PART IN TALKS
Ivan Pashkevich, Lukashenko's deputy chief of staff, told Reuters that the Belarusian leader has no intention of opening a discussion with his opponents and added they should abide by the existing or pending electoral laws. "The president will not take part in talks. He should be above that process," Pashkevich said. "I am ready to conduct such talks round the clock. But for what purpose? Real politics can proceed only through elections to parliament and not on street corners," he added. (Reuters, January 18)

TRIAL OF DEPUTY RESUMES
On January 17, the trial of Andrei Klimov, a deputy of the 13th Supreme Soviet, resumed in the Leninski District Court in Minsk. Klimov is accused of embezzling the city government's funds while his company constructed an apartment building in Minsk. His lawyer Olga Birula and public defender Garry Pogonyailo petitioned the Court to release Klimov on agreement not to leave the country. Judge Vera Tupik rejected the petition. The defense's request for the hospital papers documenting the defendant's health condition after his beating by prison guards on December 13, 1999 was satisfied. However, Judge Tupik has rejected the defense's petition to summon Vladimir Yermoshin, chairman of the Minsk City Council, to court. Yermoshin was deputy chairman of the Minsk City Council who signed all the contracts with Klimov's construction company. The judge also rejected the petition for the re-valuation of the project costs. In particular, Klimov and his business partners are accused of overstating the cost of brickwork. Klimov believes that the prosecutor produced forged invoices. He said that investigators compiled his company's financial documents with a bias for the prosecution. "After watching the court's and detention center guards' actions, I concluded that they had been ordered to concoct a conviction as soon as possible. The panel does not show the required fairness," Klimov said in the courtroom. (Belapan, January 18)

FORMER PRIME MINISTER GOES ON TRIAL
On January 19, the Minsk City Court began the trial of ex-Prime Minister Mikhail Chigir, who faces charges of abuse of power and criminal negligence. "This is a political trial. All the charges are falsified," Chigir told journalists before the proceedings opened in court. "I am not guilty. But there is no fair, independent court system in Belarus and I am prepared for a political sentence." Chigir added that the Procurator General's Office had warned him before the trial that he would be jailed if he made strong-worded political statements during the trial. Less than an hour after the beginning of the court session, Judge Alexander Vasilevich announced a break, saying that it was impossible to examine the case in the overcrowded courtroom. Chigir's lawyer, his wife Julia, said that it was the court's duty to ensure proper conditions for the trial, including designating a more spacious room. Among those who attended the first session were foreign ambassadors, the leaders of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party and the United Civic Party, and deputies of the 13th Supreme Soviet. The courtroom was packed and many people were standing in the hall chanting, "Open Trial!" The judge ignored the defense's motion for the removal of Prosecutor Viktor Zhingel from the case. The defense lawyers insisted that the prosecutor had made mistakes in pre-trial procedures and failed to correct them after the Minsk City Court had been ordered to do so by the Supreme Court.

On January 20, Judge Vasilevich allowed Boris Gyunter, activist of the Vyasna 96 Human Rights Center, to join the defense team as a public defender and gave the defense ten days to study new materials added to the case. The judge rejected the defense's request that Professor Stanislav Bogdankevich, chairman of the United Civic Party and former head of the National Bank, take part in the trial as a financial expert. The defense's request that additional inquiries be made with regard to some firms involved in the case, was also rejected. Dozens of policemen blocked the entrance to the courthouse because the room was full. The police did not take measures to prevent the unauthorized demonstration outside the courthouse demanding freedom to Chigir. The trial will resume on January 31.

"Chigir is the only political heavyweight capable of being the sole opposition candidate in the forthcoming presidential election in 2001, unlike earlier experiences in which the democratic opposition competed against itself," stressed Anatoly Lebedko, chairman of the Commission for International Affairs of the 13th Supreme Soviet and a member of the Coordination Council of the Congress of Democratic Forces. (Belapan, January 19-21; Reuters, January 20)

OPPOSITION ACTIVISTS IN BORISOV TO STAND TRIAL
On January 16, opposition activists in Borisov, Minsk region, staged an unauthorized demonstration near the Borisov City Council to display support for Mikhail Chigir. The demonstrators were holding photos of Chigir, white-red-white flags and placards that read "Hands Off Chigir!," "Zakharenko, Gonchar.... Who's Next?," and "Dictatorship Won't Pass!." They were passing out the Zgoda (Consent) local opposition newspaper and other opposition literature. After about a half an hour, the police arrived and arrested the organizers of the action. Gennady Gavrusev, Ales Abramovich, Alesia Yasyuk, and Anatoly Askerka were taken to a local police station but released shortly thereafter. Abramovich and Yasyuk, members of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party, refused to answer police's questions, saying their party had launched a campaign of civil disobedience. The opposition activists are expected to be tried on charges of violating street demonstration regulations. (Belapan, January 17)

LUKASHENKO, HANDS OFF SHARETSKY!
On January 20, Anatoly Lebedko addressed the Lukashenko regime with an open letter asking that it guaranty the safety of Semyon Sharetski, the opposition-appointed Acting Belarusian President in exile, in the event that he returns to Belarus. Since last summer, the Speaker has been living in neighboring Lithuania fearing for his life. "It is not normal when a person, who's recognized by the whole world as a legitimate speaker of the Belarusian Parliament, cannot come to his mothers' funeral (Sharetski's mother died last fall). The atmosphere of fear, arbitrariness and terror, embedded in the country, is paralyzing its normal development," reads the letter. (Belapan, January 21)

OPPOSITION ACTIVIST SENTENCED
On January 18, Evgeny Osinski, activist of the Malady Front and one of the participant of the July 27, 1999 opposition protest in Minsk, received two years of suspended sentence with 20% salary deduction to be paid to the state. Judge Valery Komisarov of the Minsk City Court found Osinski guilty of active participation in group actions violating public order and resisting the police officer. The charges of "malicious hooliganism" initially suggested by the prosecutor were dropped. (Belapan, January 18)

EXILED BANKER TO REVEAL MYSTERY OF DISAPPEARANCES IN BELARUS
On January 20, Tamara Vinnikova, the former head of the Belarusian National Bank, who mysteriously vanished while under de facto house arrest on April 8, 1999 and reappeared under cloudy circumstances on December 13, called the office of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee to inform it that she was working on an extensive interview for the media. According to the BHC, Vinnikova said that she plans to tell in detail how she had managed to escape from guards while she was kept under house arrest. She also claims that she will reveal what had happened to Viktor Gonchar and Yury Zakharenko, opposition leaders who disappeared last year. (Belapan, January 20)

EXPELLED FROM UNIVERSITIES OPPOSITION ACTIVISTS TO CONTINUE STUDIES
Belarusian students who have been expelled from universities for political reasons will have the opportunity to continue their studies in the Karlov university in Prague, Natalya Makovik, an activist of the Malady Front, told Belapan. Makovik, who coordinates the project in Belarus, said that the university has arranged 30 vacancies for young victims of political oppression majoring in economics, philosophy, history, sociology, and journalism. Among those who have already given their consent are Sergei Martselev and Nikolai Privarnikov, who were expelled from the Belarusian State University, Vadim Konopatski, who was expelled from the Belarusian Agro- Technical University, and about two dozens other students who were persecuted for their participation in the October 17 Freedom March in Minsk and other street protests. A group of Oxford University professors is reportedly ready to come to Belarus to offer courses to groups of students at home and award diplomas to those who pass exams. (Belapan, January 20)

FAMOUS BELARUSIAN WRITER RETURNS HOME AND CRITICIZES AUTHORITIES
The Belarusian regime pursues its goal of returning to the Communist past, said Vasil Bykov, a prominent Belarusian writer, in an interview given to Radio Liberty. "As a member state and founder of the United Nations, Belarus has the right to sovereign existence, but what Lukashenko and his administration are doing at present is aimed at the complete elimination of sovereignty," Bykov said. The writer believes that the Lukashenko regime has been destroying national culture, literature, and the Belarusian language under the cover of integration with Russia. He said that Belarusian culture is controlled by "Soviet colonels with a communist mentality." The writer believes that Lukashenko is popular among Belarusians because he is making a furious effort to obtain everything the country needs from Russia. Bykov has returned to Minsk after staying in Finland for two years. He gave the interview shortly after receiving Russia's Triumph prize for his literary achievements. (Belapan, January 18)

BELARUSIAN LAWYERS VISIT U.S.
A group of Belarusian attorneys specializing in trade unions and employee rights, legal aid services, human rights, and gender issues continues its two-week visit to the US, which was organized by the American Bar Association's CEELI program. The Belarusian lawyers, the majority of whom came from the provinces, represent regional Belarusian NGOs, among them the Free Trade Union Legal Advice Centers in Mogilev and Gomel, the Belarusian Organization of Working Women and the Women's Center for Legal Education in Minsk, the Soligorsk Legal Advice Center, the Viasna 96 Human Rights Center in Vitebsk, the Smorgon Legal Advice Center, and the Belarusian Women's Lawyers Association in Brest. The guests are participating in numerous training sessions, briefings and roundtables on legal rights and advocacy in Belarus. (ILHR, January 21)

INDEPENDENT TRADE UNION LEADER FINED
On January 19, Dmitry Plis, deputy chairman of the Independent Trade Union of the Minsk Automobile Plant, was fined 1.5 million BRB (about $2) by the administrative commission of the Soviet District Council in Minsk. Plis was found guilty of distributing leaflets and papers describing the deteriorating social-economic situation in the country to workers. (Charter 97, January 20)

LOCAL OPPOSITION PAPER CLOSED
On January 19, the Kutseina opposition daily in Orsha, Vitebsk region, was closed by the authorities on the pretext that the paper's founder, the Center for Support of Democratic Changes, was refused official registration. The paper wrote about the most poignant political developments in Belarus and the region, which, in turn provoked plenty of scrutiny on behalf of the local tax authorities and led to its closure. (Charter 97, January 19)

--AT HOME IN BELARUS--

BELARUS SEEKS NATO CHARTER
Belarus still wants to sign a charter with the NATO on bilateral relations and security guarantees, Sergei Martynov, Belarusian Deputy Foreign Minister, told a briefing in Vilnius on January 18. "Two years ago we proposed to work out a document --a charter on bilateral relations -- and still think that this could and should be done," Martynov said. Such a charter could regulate relations between Belarus and the NATO, provide for regular meetings of high officials, a system of confidence building measures and security guarantees, said Martynov. With its enlargement, the military alliance, also got new neighbors, including Belarus, he noted. "Two paths for future relations are possible: confrontation or good neighborly relations," said Martynov. "Belarus is by all means for friendly relations with NATO, but they should be based on equality and mutual respect." (Agence France Presse, January 18)

LUKASHENKO PROMISES TO ELIMINATE FOOD SHORTAGE
Alexander Lukashenko assured his compatriots that 2000 will not be a hungry year for Belarus. "Despite the fact that the past year was hard for agriculture, I am sure that we will live through it normally," Lukashenko said on January 20, during his trip around the Mogilev region. Lukashenko added that he personally guaranties a stable food situation in the country. (Itar-Tass, January 21)

INVESTMENT CLIMATE: ICE AGE
The U.S. Department of Commerce released an updated consular sheet on Belarus on January 7, 2000, in which it described the current economic and political situation in the country as follows:
"Economic and political reform in Belarus has stalled under the current government. Tourist facilities are not highly developed, and many of the goods and services taken for granted in other countries are not yet available. Localized street disturbances relating to political events may occur without warning, most frequently in Minsk. Bystanders face the possibility of arrest and detention. Law-enforcement personnel may at times place foreign visitors under surveillance. Hotel rooms, telephones and fax machines may be monitored, and personal possessions in hotel rooms may be searched. Taking photographs of anything that could be perceived as being of military or security interest may result in problems with authorities. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, US-Belarus trade has been stagnant for the last seven years, averaging about $100 million a year ( see http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c4622.html for exact numbers). (U.S. Department of Commerce, January 7)

-- BROTHER SLAVS--

LUKASHENKO RECONGNIZES NEW STATE SECRETARY OF UNION
On January 18, after two hours of talks behind closed doors, Alexander Lukashenko formally accepted the recent appointment of Kremlin properties chief Pavel Borodin to a high post in the Russia-Belarus Union, wrote Kommersant-Daily. The official objective of Borodin's trip to Minsk was to discuss with the Belarusian leader the agenda of the Russia-Belarus Union Supreme Council meeting to be held on January 25 in Minsk and to consider the organizational structure of the Union. In his interview after meeting with Lukashenko, Borodin pictured a bright future for the Union, stressing Belarus's auspicious geographical position at the crossroads of European transport arteries. The paper recalled that after his dismissal from the lucrative Kremlin job, Borodin was appointed Chairman of the Standing Committee and State Secretary of the Russia-Belarus Union by acting Russian President Vladimir Putin without any prior consultations with Lukashenko. The Belarusian leader swallowed the insult and pretended he knew about Borodin's appointment well in advance. But other Belarusian officials, including Sergei Posokhov, Belarus's representative at the CIS governing bodies, expressed their open dissatisfaction with the appointment of "political pensioners and discredited politicians" to high Union posts. (Kommersant-Daily, January 19)

--CALENDAR OF UPCOMING EVENTS--

February 1- Free Trade Union of Entrepreneurs to stage nationwide protest.
February 14 - Malady Front to stage action of protest "Belarus into Europe!"
March 15 - opposition to stage Freedom March-2.
March 22 - Democratic Trade Unions to stage nationwide protest.
March 25 - opposition to mark the founding in 1918 of the Belarusian People's Republic.
April 26 - opposition to commemorate the 14th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

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Belarus Update is a regular news bulletin of the Belarus Human Rights Support Project of the International League for Human Rights. The League, now in its 58th year, is New York-based human rights NGO in consultative status with the United Nations and ILO.

The Belarus project was established to support Belarusian citizens in making their cases before the U.S. government and public and international fora and intergovernmental organizations regarding Alexander Lukashenko's wholesale assault on human rights and the rule of law in Belarus.

For more information e-mail belarus@ilhr.org or call (212) 684-1221 or fax (212) 684-1696 or visit our web site at www.ilhr.org.

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