“No to capital punishment!”
Charter97 reported that human rights activists from HR Centre Viasna Ales Bialiatski, Valiantsin Stefanovich, Iryna Toustsik and an independent journalist Siarhei Sys were detained during the protest rally near the presidential administration building. The human rights activists held a picket against capital punishment in Belarus. They had special T-shirts with blood stains painted on them, and held a poster “No to capital punishment!”
HR defenders decided to take it to the streets after the recent executions of two convicts in Belarus. According to Amnesty International last week 25-year-old Andrei Zhuk and 30-year-old Vasily Yuzepchuk were shot. The first one had been found guilty of an armed assault and murder of workers. The second one had been sentenced to the capital punishment for the murder of six elderly women in the Brest region (South-Western Belarus).
After a press-conference about the recent executions human rights defenders moved to the presidential compound. They were going to express their disdain for the authorities who violated an international and domestic legislation by carrying out the death penalties. However, right after the picket had started all HR defenders were detained and transported to police. A journalist Siarhei Sys was let free.
Arrested Aleas Biliatski, a vice-president of International Federation for Human Rights, explained his position to Charter97 news service: “We oppose capital punishment resolutely. We want to declare that two more persons must not be executed, when there is a call of the world community for the moratorium, and an appeal of the UN not to carry out executions while this issue is under discussion. But the authorities have cynically broken all the previous agreements.”
HR defenders spent a night in the detention centre awaiting a court decision. They will most probably be found guilty for ‘violating rules of conducting mass gatherings.’
“Belarus ignores international agreements in emphatic manner”
Authorities’ actions against HR defenders who actively campaign against the capital punishment contradict recent positive tendencies in abolishing the death penalty. Tatsiana Raviaka (on photo), an HR Centre Viasna representatives and the Belarusian HRH president, commented on the situation.
-How would you interpret these detentions in the light of the HR situation and the death penalty discussion in Belarus?
-I believe that [detentions] demonstrated how the Belarusian authorities purposely gave up on the dialogue with the European institutions – EU and Council of Europe. It appears that Belarus would not try to renew its special guest status at PACE. Also it looks like the authorities are willing to ignore demands of the international community to improve human rights. Belarus ignores its international agreements in emphatic manner, especially those prescribed in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
–What do you think, as an HR defender and as a human, about the recent executions and about the attack on your colleagues?
-I think that the Belarusian authorities blatantly demonstrated their utter disregard to opinions of Europe, international organisations, and Belarusian citizens. They decided to keep the right to decide the most important questions exclusively to themselves. And my colleagues are very brave people. They knew very well what their protest demonstration could lead to. But nobody says that it is an easy ride to be an HR defender.
