INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

BELARUS UPDATE
Edited by Victor Cole

Vol. 4, No. 50
December 2001

IN THIS ISSUE:

- Human Rights Day Detentions
- Former Prosecutor General Refuses To Speak Up In Court
- Freedom of Press Restricted
- Regime Threatens To Review Accord With OSCE AMG, Bugs Its Office
- TV Producer Beaten By Police
- Lebedko Wins Libel Case
- Lukashenko Refuses To Pardon Imprisoned Professor
- Belarus Adopts New Military Doctrine
- Russia, Belarus, Ukraine Mark 10th Anniversary Of SU Collapse
- Chinese Defense Minister Meets Belarusian Guests

--HUMAN RIGHTS AND OPPOSITION NEWS-

DETENTIONS OF OPPOSITION ACTIVISTS ON HUMAN RIGHTS DAY

Fifty-three years ago, the world's leaders assembled at the United Nations to affirm in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the inherent dignity and equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family. The Lukashenko regime marked the 53rd anniversary of the Declaration by heading deeper into authoritarianism and further restricting its citizens right to their freedom of opinion, assembly, and expression.

Twenty seven opposition activists were arrested nationwide for marking the 52nd anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. On December 9, about four hundred activists, holding portraits of well-known Belarusian public figures who went missing over the recent years, held an unauthorized picket "We Want to Know the Truth" on Skaryna Avenue near KGB headquarters in downtown Minsk marking International Human Rights Defenders Day and demanding impartial investigation into the disappearances of prominent opposition leaders and journalist Dmitry Zavadsky.

The demonstrators distributed the texts of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and independent newspapers. As usual with mass opposition rallies, the Minsk City Council had only granted permission for demonstrators to gather in the Bangalore Park on the city outskirts and deployed several hundred policemen and soldiers in the courtyards of apartment houses in downtown Minsk to prevent them from marching in the center of town. Due to the heavy presence of journalists, no arrests were reported.

Fifteen people staged an unauthorized picket in Borisov, Minsk Region. After about thirty minutes, the picket was dispersed by the heavy armed law-enforcers. Leonid Novitsky, Ludmila Scherbakova and Alesia Yasyuk, all Zubr activists, as well as Dmitry Borodko, chair of the local branch of Viasna Human Rights Center, were detained, but released shortly. [On December 5, Sheryl Johnson from the U.S. State Department met Vasily Dolgolev, chair of the Brest Regional Executive Council, to discuss the situation with the freedom of speech and assembly in the Region. During the meeting, Dolgolev insisted that the Belarusian citizens enjoy these rights and there is nothing to talk about. When Johnson mentioned that Dolgolev is infamous in the U.S. for his efforts to close Brestsky Kuryer (Brest Courier), an independent daily, the Lukashenko official cynically responded that the Roman Pope also knows him because he had extradited Catholic Priest Zbigniew Korolyak, a Polish citizen.-Ed.].

About fifty activists of the United Civic Party, the Belarusian Freedom Party, and the Malady (Youth) Front held an unauthorized picket in Grodno demanding democratic changes. The picketers were holding posters: Students are against dictatorship, We have a right to a decent life, and We have a right to freedom. The police arrested Svetlana Nekh, deputy chair of the local branch of Maladaya Hramada, an organization of the Young Social-Democrats, and Dmitry Karpenko, member of the United Civic Party. The activists were released in an about two hours. No protocols were filed on them.

Nine Zubr members were arrested in Baranovichi, Brest Region, for holding an unauthorized picket and rally. The protesters marched along the central street and
left portraits of the disappeared people near the local police station. When the marchers was about to disperse, about a dozen of policemen ran out of the building and started arrests. The law-enforcers reportedly cursed at the detainees and deliberately smoked in their presence. When Julia Plotnikova asked the policemen to stop smoking because she suffers from severe allergic reactions to smoke, the policemen told her that "it is her problem" and exhaled smoke in her face. As a result, the girl fainted. The activists were accused of participation in mass actions which violated public order under Art. 167, para 1, of the Administrative Offences Code and to stand trial.

On December 10, Vladimir Malarshuk, chair of the Vileika, Minsk Region, branch of the United Civic Party, Aleksey Sudak and Andrei Volynets, were summoned to the police office and charged with staging an unauthorized picket for taking part in an opposition action "Chain of People Who Cares." The activists refused to sign already prepared police reports and will stand trial soon.

The pickets were also staged in Gomel; Molodechno, Soligorsk, Minsk Region; Polotsk, Novopolotsk, Vitebsk Region; Gorky, Bykhov, Krichev, Mogilev Region, and other Belarusian towns. No incidents with the police were reported. (Viasna Human Rights Center/ Radio Racyja/ Charter 97, December 9-13)

HUMAN RIGHTS DAY CELEBRATED IN BREST
Twelve activists of Zubr, a nation-wide youth opposition movement, were arrested during an unauthorized opposition action "Chain of People Who Cares" on December 9 in Brest. The event was held on Sovetskaya Street and lasted for about an hour. Holding the pictures of the disappeared, the participant distributed a Pocket Reference Book on Human Rights held. Shortly after the action had started, three police cars and a few cars with civil license plates arrived in haste. Maj. Kregel, deputy head of Leninski district police department, came up to the chain of people and ordered them to disperse. After the participants had refused, Kregel gave an order to start detentions. Law-enforcers detained as many people as they could put in the police cars. Some of the people refused to walk, sitting down on the ground, and were dragged to the cars. A lot of passers-by surrounded the scene, shouting: "Shame!", "What have they done?", "Why don't you go after criminals instead?". One of the protesters wistfully able to joke: "What? They are afraid of criminals. Criminals can fire back!" At 4 p.m. the following people were brought to Leninski district police station: Maria Klimovich, Mikhail Mikalyuk, Sergei Kozlov, Mikalai Kazimirchik, Vasil Barbolin, Raisa Antaniuk, Uladzimir Malei, Uladzimir Vialichkin, Henadzi Samoilenko, Paulina Panasyuk, Sergei Aleksievich. After being detained for 3 hours and charged violating Art. 166 (disobedience to the police) and 167, par. 1, (participation in mass actions violating public order) of the Belarusian Administrative Code, the activists were released. (Vyasna Human Rights Center, December 11)

FORMER PROSECUTOR GENERAL REFUSES TO SPEAK UP IN COURT

On December 7, Judge Alexander Simonov of the Minsk Region Court cross-examined Oleg Bozhelko, former Prosecutor General. Bozhelko is a witness in a closed-door hearing in the case of Valery Ignatovich and Maksim Malik, both former officers of the Almaz Special-Assignment Police Force, Aleksey Guz, former student of the Police Academy, and Sergei Savushkin, a former convict, who are accused of committing seven premeditated murders, five armed assaults, two abductions, including kidnapping of journalist Dmitry Zavadsky, ORT cameraman in Belarus. Bozhelko vigorously denied having any conversations with Pavel Sheremet, who testified earlier.

According to Sheremet, while hiding in one of the Russian monasteries, Bozhelko revealed to him some details of the interrogation of Lt.-Col. Dmitry Pavlichenko, commander of the military unit # 3214 of the Interior Forces, who on November 20, 2000, was placed in the KGB's jail and personally interrogated by Bozhelko, then Prosecutor General. According to Sheremet, after the interrogation, Bozhelko concluded that Zavadsky had been murdered and his body, along with the bodies of Viktor Gonchar, a 13th Supreme Soviet deputy chair, his business associate Anatoly Krasovsky, and Yuri Zakharenko, former Interior Minister, were buried in the Northern Cemetery in Minsk. Bozhelko planned to issue a warrant to arrest Viktor Sheiman, then the secretary of the Belarusian State Security Council (KGB). On the next day, however, Pavluchenko was set free upon Sheiman's order. A couple of days later, Lukashenko replaced Bozhelko with Sheiman and fired Vladimir Matskevich, then chief of the State Security Council.

Bozhelko also denied that he had personally interrogated Maksim Malik, one of the accused, and refused to answer the majority of the questions, referring to the Art. 60 of the Belarusian Penal Code, which stipulates that no member of the investigation team can be interrogated in court as a witness.

Pavel Sheremet believes that Bozhelko has been intimidated by the authorities and is too afraid to speak. After returning to Minsk from Russia, Bozhelko even refused to talk to his former colleagues and friends. When asked to comment on Bozhelko's testimony, Sheremet reaffirmed his willingness to stand behind his. "Moreover, my meetings with Bozhelko took place in the presence of several witnesses, who not only saw us but heard every word of our conversations and can recall them in detail," said Sheremet. "Although I don't know what exactly Bozhelko said in court, it is sad that he tries to deny even the fact of our conversations."

Separately, Radio Svaboda reported that it interviewed a few lawyers involved in the case, who preferred to remain anonymous. According to them, after three weeks of hearing, the prosecution had failed to present "any compelling evidence to prove the guilt of either Ignatovich or Malik." (Nasha Svaboda, Radio Svaboda, December 10)

LOCAL AUTHORITIES PROHIBIT PUBLISHING OF NON-STATE PERIODICALS

The Belarusian government continues its suppression of freedom of speech, as well as the freedom to receive, retain, and disseminate information. The Grodno Region Economic Court upheld a decision of the Smorgon City Executive Committee to prohibit Romuald Ulan, founder of Novaya Gazeta Smorgoni (The Smorgon New Newspaper), an independent newspaper, from publishing another independent periodical. The authorities motivated their refusal by saying that the population receives "sufficient amount of information from existing publications." In May 2001, the Executive Committee banned the local state agencies and organizations from subscribing to Novaya Gazeta Smorgoni.

The League notes that both the 1994 and the operational Constitution of the Republic of Belarus adopted in 1996 guarantee freedom of media (Art. 33). The existing law "On Press and other Media," which came into the force in January 1995, was amended in June 1996, and in January 1998, and under revision right now, guarantees in Art. 3 "freedom of press and other media to citizens of the Republic of Belarus." The same article entitles Belarusians to "found media, own, use, and control them." Citizens are further "entitled to freely seek, obtain, use and circulate information with the help of press and other media, to freely express through them their ideas, views and convictions." Also, Belarus is a signatory of the Human Rights Charter and of the Convention of the CIS on "Human Rights and Basic Freedoms," adapted in May, 1995, which states in Art. 11: " Everyone has the right to freedom of expressing his/her opinion. This right includes freedom to stick to one's opinions, to receive and impart information and ideas through any legal media without interference." (Radio Racyja, December 12)

PAHONYA'S EDITOR APPEALS NEWSPAPER CLOSURE; FINED
Nikolai Markevich, editor-in-chief of Pahonya, a Grodno-based Belarusian-language weekly, filed an appeal with the Belarusian Supreme Economic Court, which on November 12 ruled to shut down the newspaper for alleged breaking of the Law On Press and Other Media by insulting the Belarusian president and printing information about unregistered political group.

On August 27, 2001, on behalf of the Ministry of Information (former the State Committee for the Press), the Grodno Region Prosecutor Office filed a petition with the Belarusian Supreme Economic Court requesting the initiation of the closing procedures against the newspaper. In accordance with Art. 5 of the Law On Press and Other Media, a newspaper can be closed after receiving two warnings during one year. By that time Pahonya had been warned only once. The warning was issued on November 17, 2000, for publishing an appeal to Belarusians by the Grodno Initiative, an unregistered organization chaired by Semyon Domash, deputy of the 13th Supreme Soviet.

On September 12, the Prosecutor Office seized 8,132 copies of the issue #36 of the newspaper published on September 4, 2001, which contained a number of anti-Lukashenko articles, including an essay on whether a person who stands behind political killings has a right to run for the Belarusian presidency and a poem titled "I promised, I promise, I will promise!" about Lukashenko's numerous promises to his compatriots that were never fulfilled. The next issue of the newspaper was also confiscated. The Prosecutor Office filed a lawsuit against Pahonya on charges of "slandering the Belarusian president" under Art. 367, part 1 of the Belarusian Penal Code and on September 21, 2001, gave a ground for legal proceedings by issuing a second warning to Pahonya for slandering Lukashenko, the very charges it had brought against the newspaper in the suit earlier. The newspaper appealed the warning in the Grodno Region Economic Court.

This action followed a period of harassment of employees of the paper by the KGB in the run-up to the presidential elections. During an alleged attempt to recruit a Pahonya journalist in August, a KGB agent apparently said that "although the closure of a newspaper does not lie within the competence of the KGB, there are other relevant bodies which can do that.'" Afterward, Nikolai Markevich, Pahonya's editor, was summoned to the regional Deputy Prosecutor's office and informed that the newspaper was to be closed.

On September 27, 2001, the Information Ministry dropped the lawsuit, seeing no legal basis for action, and asked the court to void the second warning. Although all copies of the #36 and #37 issues of the newspaper were confiscated and never reached the reader, Evgeny Prutko, Grodno Region Deputy Prosecutor, insisted that the information allegedly defaming the Belarusian President could be still found at Pahonya's website and demanded the newspaper's closure. The experts of the Ministry responded that the Internet version of the newspaper can not be considered an independent media outlet and, therefore, there is no legal ground to shut down Pahonya.

Ignoring the fact that the newspaper's appeal of the second warning was filed with the Grodno Region Economic Court, the Belarusian Supreme Economic Court took the case and combined it with the petition filed by the Grodno Region Prosecutor Office to close the newspaper. On November 12, Judge Valery Zhandarov upheld the second warning, fined Pahonya 150,000 BYR (about $100), and ruled to shut the newspaper down despite the still open criminal investigation of the matter and the absence of a court decision.

In an interview to Nasha Svaboda Markevich said that he is not deluded into thinking that he can win the appeal, but as "an old Russian proverb tells us 'hope dies last.'"

As if all those troubles were not enough, just a month after the authorities had shut down Pahonya, Judge Dmitry Demchenko of the Leninski District Court in Grodno fined Nikolai Markevich, BYB500,000 (about $350) for "staging an unsanctioned picket in Grodno on November 19. (Nasha Svaboda, December 12-14)

REGIME THREATENS TO REVIEW ACCORD WITH OSCE AMG

On December 11, Mikhail Khvostov, Belarusian Foreign Minister, told press conference in Minsk that the Belarusian authorities will approve the appointment of a new head of the OSCE AMG in Belarus only after some "amendments" to the mission's mandate.
The activities of the monitoring group and its chief should remain within the scope of the agreements signed between Belarus and the OSCE and Minsk reserved the right to review these accords, the Lukashenko official said.

Khvostov admitted that the head of the mission is appointed by the OSCE's leadership without regard whether the hosting country's government approves or disapproves the candidate. At the same time, he warned that Amb. Wieck's successor "will have hard time" working in the country, if the Belarusian authorities and OSCE fail to agree on his candidature. The Minister was quick to emphasize that it does not mean that the new head of the OSCE AMG will not be issued entry visa to Belarus. "But, I think, he will not be willing to come to Belarus if we do not reach an agreement," Khvostov added.

The League notes that the Lukashenko government used numerous occasions to accuse the mission of violating international guidelines by "siding with anti-government dissidents" and turning itself "into an independent political player in the field of Belarus politics." Lukashenko has repeatedly accused the mission of recruiting anti-government spies under the cover of legitimate diplomacy, while verbal attacks on foreign diplomats for allegedly funding the Belarus opposition have become a staple of his speeches. The accusations, which were made to discredit the mission, always raised serious doubts about the regime's intentions to cooperate with the European organizations and its readiness to meet its OSCE commitments.

The OSCE AMG's work follows the 1997 Memorandum of Understanding between the OSCE and the Belarusian government. Heads of State and Government of 54 OSCE Participating States issued a joint declaration at the Istanbul Summit in 1999, in which they expressed strong support for the work of the OSCE AMG. Alexander Lukashenko participated in the OSCE Istanbul Summit, thereby endorsing the active role of the OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group in support of the development of democratic institutions.
(Belarusskaya Delovaya Gazeta, December 13)

BELARUSIAN KGB BUGGED OSCE OFFICE

On December 13, Amb. Hans-Georg Wieck, Head of the OSCE AMG in Belarus, mentioned in an interview given to Interfax on the eve of his departure from Minsk that Belarusian special services had planted bugs on the mission's premises and recorded all meetings held there. Visibly mystified by such an activity, Amb. Wieck pointed out that all the meetings and consultations were unconditionally open to the Belarusian authorities. At the same time, the ambassador explained that, according to the agreements between OSCE and official Minsk, the OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group is obligated to consult with the Belarusian authorities on projects it intends to carry out in that country, but does not have to seek their approval. Asked about whether the AMG policy may change under the new head, Amb. Wieck expressed doubts that the mission's mandate would be change in the "next year or two." Still, he believed that his successor will have to "response to certain requests and demands of the Belarusian government."(Interfax, December 14)

TV PRODUCER BEATEN BY POLICE

Ruslan Zgolich, producer of the Belarusian State Television and Radio Company (BTR), was severely beaten by police in Minsk suffering numerous bruises and head injury. Zgolich was arrested on December 5 for allegedly stealing tapes with his unfinished movie titled "Guests." According to his lawyer Vera Stremkovskaya, Zgolich was handcuffed and denied medical treatment. (Radio Racyja, December 7)

LEBEDKO WINS LIBEL CASE

Pervomaisky District Court in Minsk found the State Belarusian TV and Yuri Azaryonok, its notorious host, guilty of slandering Anatoly Lebedko in a serial titled "Secret Strings of Politics." The court awarded Lebedko BYB1,000,000 (about $700) in damages and ordered the TV station to publish a retraction. (Charter 97, December 14)

CHARTER 97 NOMINATES CANDIDATES FOR ANNUAL AWARD

On December 10, the organizing committee of Charter 97, nation-wide civic movement, nominated Kurapaty defenders for the national human rights award established by the organization in 1998 for their month-and-a-half-long efforts to defend a place where thousands of political prisoners were executed and buried during Stalin's repressions in the 1930s, from the expanding Minsk Beltway. Zinaida Bondarenko, a famous TV anchor, who despite the continues harassment by the authorities, endorsed the candidature of the opposition presidential candidate, and Marina Koktysh, a journalist of Narodnaya Volya, an independent newspaper, were also selected as recipients of the award. (Charter 97, December 11)

LUKASHENKO REFUSES TO PARDON IMPRISONED PROFESSOR

Sovetskaya Belarusiya reported on December 13 that Alexander Lukashenko refused to pardon Professor Yuri Bandazhevsky, former rector of the Gomel State Medical Institute, who in June 2001 was sentenced by the Belarusian Supreme Court to eight years in a hard-labor colony with confiscation of property under Art. 430, par. 2 of the Belarusian Penal Code for taking bribes from medical school applicants. Prof. Bandazhevsky, who serves his term in of the Minsk colonies, also petitioned the Belarusian Supreme Court with a request to review his sentence. The court turned down the petition, following Lukashenko's negative response. In the meantime, Bandazhevsky's attorneys insist that he is innocent and that the trial was full with numerous procedural violations. Local human rights activists say that the case against Bandazhevsky and Vladimir Revkov, Bandazhevsky's deputy, is connected to their frequent public criticism of the government's policy in the contaminated areas. (Sovetskaya Belarusiya, December 13)

- AT HOME IN BELARUS -

BELARUS ADOPTS NEW MILITARY DOCTRINE

On December 12, the Lukashenko parliament adopted a new military doctrine, designed to protect its authoritarian leadership's policies from an outside attack. The new doctrine is designed to reverse "the lack of effective mechanisms to protect the interests of all European states," and counter the use of "double standards and information technologies for psychological pressure." It "has a defensive character," aiming to safeguard Belarus against extremist groups and those states that would meddle in the country's internal affairs, officials said. The official Minsk was apparently referring to the United States and its other critics in the West, who often charged Alexander Lukashenko with violating human rights and suppressing all opposition to stay in power.

Belarus is actively overhauling its armed forces, and a massive overhaul is due to be completed by 2005. Minsk had been particularly alarmed as its neighbor Poland joined the NATO military alliance and as nearby Latvia and Lithuania were stepping up their armed forces in hopes of joining NATO.

The opposition and human rights groups criticised the doctrine, saying that its principles were too ambiguous and politically-charged to be a sound military policy. Ivan Pashkevich, head of the parliamentary Commission for Human Rights and Mass Media, slammed the doctrine's principles as "odious," saying that Belarus's powerful neighbor Russia was more guilty of double standards and misinformation than Lukashenko's western opponents. "Some of the doctrine's points are mere political games to suit Lukashenko," commented Valery Shchukin, a deputy of the 13th Supreme Soviet and a reporter for Narodnaya Volya, an opposition newspaper, adding that if anyone is meddling in Belarus's internal affairs, it is Russia. Shchukin also voiced fears that the doctrine's pledge to protect Belarus from "extremism" could well be used for a new clampdown against the opposition. "By that logic, I am an extremist, as I do not agree with the current leadership's policies," he added. (Belapan/ Associated Press, December 12)

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT KILLS FOUR IN BELARUS

According to Alexander Ivanovsky, deputy Prosecutor General, last year, four people received capital punishment in Belarus. In 2001, four more convicts were sentenced to death and eighteen got life sentence. (Nasha Svaboda, December 10)

- BROTHER SLAVS -

RUSSIA, BELARUS, UKRAINE MARK 10th ANNIVERSARY OF SU COLLAPSE

On December 8, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine marked the 10th anniversary of the secret talks that sealed the collapse of the Soviet Union, wrenching apart the communist empire. From a hunting lodge in a Belarusian forest, former presidents Boris Yeltsin of Russia, Leonid Kravchuk of Ukraine and Stanislav Shushkevich of Belarus announced to the world on Dec. 8, 1991 that the USSR "as a subject of international and geopolitical reality no longer exists." Their new alliance effectively left former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev without a job - he resigned Dec. 25 - and ended Vladimir Lenin's political creation. The accord changed life not only for the former Soviet Union's 290 million people, but for the world beyond.

Shushkevich recalled that the agreement was signed by 2 p.m. Then phone calls were made - to President Bush, Sr. and Gorbachev. Yeltsin reached Bush first, something that still rankles many in Russia. The pact, which created the Commonwealth of Independent States as a much looser replacement for the Soviet Union, topped television broadcasts and grabbed newspaper headlines around the world.

"I have no regrets," said Shushkevich, the former Belarus leader, in an interview to Associated Press. "We did everything right. There is not a single letter or line that I would change even now. It is impossible to cross the USSR out of history. The agreement we worked out and signed can't be crossed out either. It is a history, it is real history," added Shushkevich. "I regret only one thing: we failed to fully implement what we signed together," Kravchuk told to a journalist of Kiev's Fakty daily.

Alexander Lukashenko, who turned Belarus into something of a pariah state in Western eyes, is openly nostalgic for the days of the Soviet Union, and he is hardly alone. Some 72 percent of Russian citizens deplore the breakup of the Soviet Union, according to a poll published by ROMIR, an independent research center. (Associated Press/ Facty/ Interfax, December 9)

- INTERNATIONAL NEWS -

CHINESE DEFENSE MINISTER MEETS BELARUSIAN GUESTS

On December 12, Chi Haotian, Chinese Defense Minister, hosted a meeting with Sergei Buligin, Commander of the Belarusian Air Force [upon his return to Belarus, Buligin was fired by Lukashenko along with some other high-ranking officials of the Defense Ministry-Ed.]. Chi, also vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission and a state councilor, said that China and Belarus have enjoyed traditional friendship, and although the two countries are far apart, and bilateral relations have developed smoothly since diplomatic ties were forged in 1992. Chi said China takes a positive attitude toward furthering relations between the Chinese and Belarusian armies, and is ready to maintain friendly military cooperation with Belarus in all areas. (Interfax/ Belapan, November 12)

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The 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 60th year, is New York-based human rights NGO in consultative status with the United Nations.

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.

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