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Human Rights Centre “Viasna” protests against the “black list” of people of art, forbidden to be mentioned in Belarusian state media. According to the information from independent sources, people on the list – both national and foreign artists, such as Pet Shop Boys, Jude Law, Lyapis Trubetskoy, right, happened to be out of favour with the Belarusian authorities.

The presentation will be hosted at the Belarusian Human Rights House in Vilnius by the book compilers, Siarhei Lacinski and Anton Kalinousky. The book is containing real stories of real people who served administrative punishment in isolation of lawbreakers at Akrestsin Street in Minsk in 2006-2008.

Today representatives of many international human rights organisations, including members of the Human Rights House Network, addressed president of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite to take leadership in advocating for the release of political prisoners in Belarus. Human Rights Watch in its new report tells about a post-election crackdown in Belarus, mistreatments, pressures on relatives and lawyers.

A statement by 45 UN member-states on the situation in Belarus was presented during the session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on 14 March. The authors voiced concerns regarding repressions against the political opposition, reports about intimidation of lawyers and torture of prisoners. The Belarusian side responded to the statement with accusations and denial of dialogue.

While chairing the International Human Rights Observation Mission in Belarus, the Russian human rights defender Andrei Yurov, right, was detained in Minsk on 16 March. After spending the night at police department of the Savietski district, Yurov had to leave Belarus. That situation outraged the human rights defender and astonished the international community.

Following a one-year-long human rights education course, lawyers from four post-Soviet countries received certificates of “Electronic Human Rights Education for Lawyers” programme. “The project idea is to turn professional lawyers to the essence of human rights again” – said Liudmila Ulyashyna from Human Rights House Foundation during a conference at the Belarusian HRH in Vilnius.

In a letter to the Minister of Justice of Belarus Viktar Halavanau, the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) expressed deep concern in relation to cases of prosecution and pressure on Belarusian lawyers, and asked to reinstate the licences of Pavel Sapelka, Uladzimir Toustsik, Tamara Harayeva, Tatsyana Aheyeva and Aleh Aheyeu. See the full text of the letter below.

The series of criminal trials for the December 19 “mass riots” have opened in Belarus. The brutality of the first sentences was shocking. However, no-one was surprised that despite having no real proof of guilt, the authorities tried to silence the lawyers by all possible means. Long-standing defender of Belarusian political prisoners Pavel Sapelka was disbarred, following his colleagues.

Following a statement of an ex-candidate for presidency about torture that he had undergone while detained by the KGB, Belarusian human rights defenders referred to the UN Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, calling for action. The Belarusian Helsinki Committee also filed an appeal to the Prosecutor-General.