The statement, signed by twenty worldwide famous artists, amongst them dissident, playwright and president Václav Havel, reminds that one year ago, on Presidential election day, 19 December 2011, thousands of peaceful protesters in Minsk were arrested, often with brutality.
Regime’s brutality
“Seven of the nine opposition candidates were among them. Persecution to the point of kidnap and murder had long been directed at open dissent, activism and artistic independence,” says the statement.
One of the opposition candidates was Andrei Sannikov. His sister, Irina Bogdanova, the director of Free Belarus Now, says that her brother’s real crime was to dare to stand against Europe’s last dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, during Belarus’s rigged presidential election.
“Now Andrei is being tortured and humiliated in jail by the psychopaths of the KGB. He is one of the few remaining political prisoners on our continent. He stands beyond 1989; he is still waiting for the final call on the Iron Curtain,” said Irina Bogdanova.
She tells that many of her closest friends have ‘disappeared’ or committed suicide in mysterious circumstances in Belarus.
“My sister-in-law Irina Khalip, an investigative journalist was arrested at the same time as Andrei. The regime used this as an excuse to get to my 4 year old nephew Danil – at his grandmother’s flat the police attempted to snatch him and force him into care. Andrei is a strong man, but the thought of this perverted state taking care of his beloved son nearly broke him,” she adds.
According to her, Andrei Sannikov is being tortured in the prison which interrogation rooms unchanged since their use under Communism.
“These bloodied rooms stain the conscience of Europe. […] Only tough economic sanctions on the regime will force it to change. This view is held by Andrei and Belarusian civil society. Yet nothing has been done. Lukashenko is still free to fly his private jet over European airspace and trade with the Netherlands and Germany is rising. […] British banks have actively purchased Belarusian government bonds that help fund this police state. […] Europe’s leaders who know only the language of condemnation but have forgotten that confronting evil means taking action,” said Irina.
Every citizen – potential enemy
Twenty artists in their statement second Irina’s thoughts and say that a year ago, literally overnight, Belarus further regressed into a paranoid police state which sees a potential enemy in every citizen.
“Meanwhile, outside Belarus, the official world is about to go into sea
sonal hibernation. The Christmas decorations are up in the marble halls of democracy and no more is expected to be heard from there until next year. The levers of political, diplomatic and economic pressure are set at rest.”
The statement was signed by Ai Weiwei, Alan Rickman, April Gornik, Bob Holman, David Lan, Eric Fischl, Gillian Slovo, Hamish Jenkinson, Joanna Lumley, Jude Law, Kevin Spacey, Michael Sheen, Michael Attenborough, Natasha Kaliada, Nicolai Khalezin, Ron Rifkin, Sam West, Tom Stoppard, Vaclav Havel, Vladimir Shcherban.
Street actions across Europe
International non-governmental organisations organized street actions across Europe in London, Zurich, Prague, Berlin, Stockholm and Amsterdam to stand up for human rights in Belarus on 19 December 2011.
In their joint statement 19 organisations warn that one year after the 2010 presidential elections Belarus finds itself in the most alarming human rights crisis since the country became an independent state 20 years ago.
“The situation with human rights in the country has never been worse and continues to deteriorate,” they say.
The organizations also remain so called “silent protests“, which took place across Belarus from April to July 2011. Most of these demonstrations were dispersed by the police and altogether over 1,700 participants were detained and either fined or subject to up to 15 days of administrative arrest.
They state that at the moment at least 11 people are detained for political reasons in Belarus. These prisoners of conscience are Ihar Alinevich, Mikalai Autukhovich, Dzmitry Bandarenka, Ales Bialiatski, Dzmitry Dashkevich, Mikalai Dziadok, Aliaksandr Frantskevich, Eduard Lobau, Andrei Sannikau, Pavel Seviarynets and Mikalai Statkevich.
Free word under attack
One of the last sad news from Belarus in this year was last week’s attack on a 
Belarusian pro-opposition news website Charter 97.
On 27 December the site endured a devastating online raid, Editor-in-Chief Natalya Radina told Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
Anonymous individuals used a password that Radina believed they got from malware used on an editor’s personal computer. The saboteurs then logged on to the site’s administrative section, deleted archives, and created a false news story about opposition presidential candidate Andrei Sannikov, she said.
Next morning Charter 97 was forced off-line after another DOS attack, Radina told CPJ.
Sites like Charter 97 do not have the resources to devote to digital forensics. Radina, winner of CPJ’s 2011 International Press Freedom Award, works in exile in Lithuania. Like Sannikov, she faces charges of “organizing mass disorder” in her home country of Belarus.
Whatever the news from Charter 97 will be in 2012, it’s clear that some in Belarus do not want their compatriots to read about it online. Radina remains defiant: “Take it from me that we shall live through today’s attack too, no matter how serious it is. And we shall work even better.”
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