Volodymyr Campaign

Russia apologized Monday to two U.S. senators who were held in an airport in the Urals for several hours after local officials refused to allow their U.S. military aircraft to depart without an inspection.

The delegation, led by Indiana Republican Sen. Richard Lugar, was held up at the Perm airport Sunday as it tried to leave Russia after visiting nuclear weapons-related facilities.

Russia's foreign ministry Monday formally apologized for the Perm incident.

"We regret that a misunderstanding has taken place and the discomfort experienced by senators," it said in a statement.

The ministry denied that the lawmakers were detained, saying the departure was instead "delayed as local border guard authorities had questions concerning some formalities and the status of the flight. After the diplomatic status of the flight was confirmed, the senators left Russia."

A slightly different interpretation came from the deputy head of the border checkpoint at the airport, Captain Maksim Zhaleyev, who told Interfax the senators were "detained" because they had refused to obey border guards' instructions.

Moscow sought to downplay the incident, which Mikhail Margelov, head of the international affairs committee of the Federation Council, said would hopefully not affect Russian-American relations.

"We know Lugar well, and he is also our colleague," Margelov added.

Some media outlets pointed out, however, that Lugar has been critical of the pace of democratization in Russia.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:59 0 comments links to this post

Security officials had said Friday that they would deport two Georgian activists accused of teaching their local counterparts to stage anti-government protests similar to the demonstrations that brought down Georgia's longtime leader two years ago.

But a district court in Minsk said it had sentenced Georgy Kandelaki and Luka Tsuladze to 15 days in custody after finding them guilty of "minor hooliganism." The court refused to say what the Georgians, detained Wednesday, were accused of doing.

A Belarussian opposition activist, Dmitry Bondarenko, claimed that the Georgians were beaten and that the sentences were imposed to keep them in custody until their wounds heal. He said authorities often take similar measures against Belarussian opposition protesters.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:48 0 comments links to this post

While the court process and discussion of a founder and presenter of 202 TV Shalva Ramishvili was the headline news Monday, some Tbilisi residents questioned what would happen to channel's programs and to the channel itself.

Founded in 2002, the station took a low-budget approach to producing analytical and often satirical news shows. According to the monthly television rankings by AGB Georgia, as of June the station was the sixth most popular station in Tbilisi, ranking between two musical channels Evrika-Maestro and First Stereo.

"Maybe they did not have some modern technology and live reporting, but the Debates [the weekly political talk show] themselves were interesting," said Nino Mumladze who works in an NGO and has a background in journalism.

"I think the society has the right to have a free and independent media and of course, it would be sad if I am deprived of the opportunity to watch the programs like the investigative pieces on 202," Mumladze told The Messenger.

The station's Debates show broadcast this Sunday though with another presenter who analyzed the arrest of Ramishvili. A self-described "frequent" viewer of Debates, Nino Veshapidze said Monday she fears that the program will soon be terminated and there will be no chance for the opposition to discuss the latest events on television.

The channel was founded in 2002 by a group of Georgian humorists who worked
at the Georgian radio station Radio 101 and on an animated series Dardubala criticizing the ex-president of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze.

At a pre-trial hearing Shalva Ramishvili, who claimed innocence, made the first statement after he was arrested on August 27.

“Firstly, I have never blackmailed or extorted money from Koba Bekauri. On the contrary, for past three months Bekauri had been mounting pressure on me and on my friends through blackmail and threats, saying that this film [which included compromising materials against Bekauri] should not be broadcasted. There are many persons, who know about it and have witnessed this fact. This will be proved by an impartial investigation,” Shalva Ramishvili said.

Tina Khidasheli, a legal expert and the member of opposition Republican Party has already stated that she has witnessed “for several times” who MP Bekauri was calling Ramishvili and asking him not to air investigative reporting about his activities. “Shalva [Ramishvili] was very angry and was telling him [Bekauri] not to call him anymore,” Khidasheli said.

In his statement during the pre-trial hearing Ramishvili also revealed a new detail in the case.

“At the same time, my and Bekauri’s common friend contacted me and offered to take money in exchange for blocking the film. I have no doubt about the honesty of this person, who is very important for my future fate. This person is the owner of the apartment where the money was arrested,” Ramishvili said, though he did not specify the name of the person.

“Now about why I agreed to take money and what the society has watched [on a footage shot by the police hidden camera]: when Bekauri’s actions went beyond the limit, I, in agreement with [Vakhtang] Komakhidze [journalist from the organization “Reporter” producing investigative reporting about Bekauri], decided to shoot footage by hidden camera showing how much Koba Bekauri would pay to prevent the airing of a compromising material,” Shalva Ramishvili said.

Ramishvili said that he has become a victim of his “badly planned investigation.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:45 0 comments links to this post

Uzbek authorities arrested a member of an outlawed opposition party for allegedly distributing anti-government leaflets, her party said Monday.

Human rights activist Elena Urlayeva, a member of the banned Free Peasants party, was detained Saturday in the capital, Tashkent. A police official said Urlayeva had been trying to spread anti-government drawings and organize a protest.

Urlayeva - a harsh critic of President Islam Karimov's authoritarian regime - has been subjected in the past to repeated beatings and detentions, and was twice hospitalized by authorities for psychiatric treatment.

Her detention comes amid a fresh wave of arrests among rights activists and independent journalists, following an anti-government uprising in May in the eastern city of Andijan that was brutally suppressed by government troops, with hundreds of civilians killed.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:42 0 comments links to this post

Until now the fate and location of the citizens of Georgia detained several days ago, Luka Tsuladze and Georgi Kandelaki, is unknown. Ombudsman of Georgia, Sozar Subaru, told to the Charter’97 press-center, that activists of Georgian movement “Kmara” did not arrive on Saturday to Tbilisi, as expected. This information was confirmed in the Tbilisi Institute of Freedom. Meanwhile, Belarusian official personalities do not give any information about the fate of the detained Georgian citizens.

Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili at a press-conference in Kazan on Saturday expressed his concern over the detention of Georgian citizens in Belarus. As said by the Georgian leader, for several days neither Georgian nor Ukrainian consul, who had been asked for help by Georgian officials, has been allowed to visit the detainees.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:19 0 comments links to this post

ON MAY 13th, the authorities in Uzbekistan opened fire on a peaceful demonstration of close to 10,000 people in the eastern city of Andijan, probably killing several hundred of them and possibly as many as 1,000. According to survivors, tanks rolled through the main square, firing indiscriminately, snipers picked off their victims from convenient buildings, and, later on, soldiers shot some of the wounded dead. That was three months ago. Since then, the European Union and America have expressed their horror at the worst massacre of demonstrators since Tiananmen Square by imposing the following sanctions on Uzbekistan:

1.

2.

3.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:14 0 comments links to this post

A group of ten skinheads attacked two yeshiva students in Kiev, Ukraine on Sunday, critically wounding one of them, Haaretz newspaper reported Monday quoting Israel Radio.

Rabbi Yaakov Zilberman, head of Kiev’s Jewish community, said the skinheads approached the two in an underground tunnel in the city center and attacked them with bottles, rods and knives.

The critically wounded student, 28, underwent surgery late Sunday.

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The majority of Russians are afraid of the police according to a survey cited by a respected daily on Monday.
Izvestia wrote that the survey, which was conducted by the Levada Center, showed that 75% of the respondents feared the police. Moreover, the number of people who said they were afraid of falling victim to arbitrary treatment at the hands of the police had increased 5% in recent months.
The police, in return, cited a poll from the Public Opinion Foundation (FOM). "Only" 41% of respondents said they feared violence committed by law enforcement bodies. FOM experts, who are often referred to as Kremlin-backed, made a reservation that "more than half of residents of Moscow and other large cities, with a population of more than a million people, fear police." Nearly 60% of respondents said violence was a common practice in the police ranks.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:01 0 comments links to this post

The head and co-founder of the independent TV channel 202 was arrested on Saturday under accusations he extorted money from a member of parliament in order to quash a compromising report.

Shalva Ramishvili helped create the off-beat private channel and was best known for his program 'Debates on 202.' He was arrested on Abashidze Street in Vake as he came out from the building where MP Koba Bekauri had just handed him USD 30,000 in cash allegedly to halt an investigation into why the MP's wealth had dramatically increased over the past year.

The MP had been wired with a hidden camera that recorded the transaction. Ramishvili was immediately detained in a car with a companion Davit Kokhreidze. Police officials stated they recovered the money in the car.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs released a statement after the arrest saying MP Bekauri approached the ministry with the claim that Ramishvili had demanded USD 100,000 in order not to air the compromising program. The ministry's security department then arranged for the sting operation and the hidden camera.

While being moved from the building to a police vehicle, Ramishvili, whose birthday was the same day, appeared defiant, at times smiling and holding up a victory sign with his fingers. "It's a provocation," he said as police put him in a car.

Co-founder of 202, MP Vazha Kiladze, appeared at the scene of the arrest almost immediately and stated that he knew nothing about the deal but confirmed that journalists were preparing material critical of Bekauri.

The station 202 is the only Georgian channel broadcasting regular political debates. It does not have a regular news program but broadcasts investigative stories produced by the studio 'Reporter.' Earlier this year, it broadcast one such report that claimed to have evidence that Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania was murdered and not as officials claimed accidentally poisoned by a gas heater.

On Saturday journalists from the studio responded to the arrests saying that Ramishvili did not have the power to block the program. They stated Reporter had an agreement to air its programs on TV 202, and that Ramishvili had no editorial control.

On Sunday, officials from the Ministry of Internal Affairs failed in an attempt to conduct a supposed 'technical inspection' of the offices of Ramishvili's station 202.

Staff demanded that the investigators present a warrant or personal identifications. The officers refused and left the scene without further comment.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:54 0 comments links to this post

A U.S. Senate delegation led by Senator Richard Lugar was detained for three hours at the Perm airport on Sunday as it tried to leave the country after visiting nuclear weapons-related facilities, the U.S. Embassy said.

A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said the delay was "for customs reasons."

The Chicago Tribune, which had a reporter traveling with the delegation, reported that Perm border guards had demanded to inspect the group's military DC-9 jet and that U.S. officials refused, citing a joint U.S.-Russian agreement exempted military planes from inspection.

"We don't search Russian airplanes in the U.S. You will not search U.S. planes in Russia," said Ken Myers, a senior Senate staff member in the delegation, the Tribune reported.

Lugar, a Republican from Indiana and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Senator Barack Obama, a Democrat from Illinois; and 10 staff members were initially locked in an airport lounge, the newspaper said. They were allowed to leave the lounge only after they surrendered their passports.

Newly appointed U.S. Ambassador William Burns helped arrange the flight's departure.

The delegation was on its way to Kiev for a meeting Monday with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko when it was delayed. The delegation was also scheduled to meet with Azeri President Ilham Aliyev and opposition groups in Baku on Wednesday.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:42 0 comments links to this post

The Central Election Committee will study the issue of posters on the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), reformists, Ali Kerimli on the background of the Armenian flag, spread in Baku, the Azerbaijan’s CEC chairman Mazahir Panahov told Trend.

"We will study the issue. Certainly, it is not the time now to hold campaign and propaganda. The relevant stage will start only after 7 September”, the CEC head said. The information of the posters in the city is, of course, a serious matter, and we are to investigate it. If a candidate is really conducting campaign he must be seriously punished. But now the issue must be seriously studied," Panahov added.

Panahov said any candidate, officially set to campaigning may be seriously punished. "Ali Kerimli has not been even registered as the candidate," he said.

PFPA (reformists) has earlier reported that posters of Ali Kerimli on the background of the Armenian flag spread in the city is another "black PR" campaigning and counter-propaganda against Ali Kerimli.

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After a hesitation, Beslan mothers have accepted President Putin’s invitation to come to the Kremlin for a meeting on September 2, exactly one year after the tragedy in the North Ossetia school, Russian news agencies reported Sunday.

The mothers of children who died in the school siege in North Ossetia a year ago have been trying to meet Vladimir Putin for a long time, but they only received an invitation from Kremlin after they stated they would not have any of the Moscow official, including Putin, visit the mournful ceremonies a year after the tragedy, planned for September 1-3. The long-awaited invitation then arrived for September 2 and was considered with much doubt and hesitation.

“We did not expect the president to make such a dirty political step, but if we decide we have to overcome our feelings for the sake of what we do, we shall go to tell him who is guilty in the tragedy, and especially to say that President Putin is the one who’s guilty,” Dudaeva said after she received the invitation Friday.

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Poland will not recognise newly elected leaders of a Polish ethnic organisation in Belarus because they were installed after pressure from President Alexander Lukashenko's regime, a senior diplomat said on Sunday.

Poland objected to the new leaders of the Union of Poles in Belarus on the grounds that they were hand-picked on Saturday by Lukashenko to replace the ousted pro-Warsaw leadership.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:34 0 comments links to this post

Jailed oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky has ended his hunger strike after almost a week, his lawyer Anton Drel said Friday, as a Moscow court set his appeal for Sept. 14.

The former Yukos chief ended his hunger strike Thursday evening, after hearing on a news broadcast that his former business partner Platon Lebedev had been taken out of solitary confinement, Drel said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:28 0 comments links to this post

A crackdown on ethnic Poles continues in Belarus. An informal spokesman of the Polish Union Andrzej Pisalnik told Polish Radio that four independent Polish activists are in jail. One of them began a hunger strike. A journalist from the Polish Solidarnosc paper and a Belarussian reporter were arrested as well on charges of misdemeanou r. The two were heading for a congress of the Polish community meeting in the western city of Volkovysk today. It is expected to elect new leaders who would be loyal to Belarus’ authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko. Meanwhile, the union’s independent and democratically elected leader Angelica Borys was interrogated again today in connection with allegedly misappropriating the organization’s funds.
The Belarusian authorities have been persecuting ethnic Poles accusing them of attempts to destabilize the state.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:24 0 comments links to this post

Some five thousand Azerbaijani opposition supporters, dressed in the orange of the Ukrainian revolution, called for upcoming elections to be "free and honest" in a demonstration here Saturday.

The protestors from the opposition group Azadlyg (Freedom) representing the three right-wing opposition parties, carried placards saying, "We need free elections" and "Bush offer us democracy".

They also demanded equal representation on the country's electoral commission and the government bring to justice the killers of Elmar Hussseinov, editor of the opposition newspaper, who was shot dead on March 2.

Police said 5,000 people attended the demonstration in Baku while organisers estimated there was 15,000.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:22 0 comments links to this post

Dear Friends of the Third Way,

Obviously, someone got afraid of us… ?

Right after the website got international support, someone hacked our website and erased some of the files. One indication that people who made the damage are strange hackers is that they did not leave any ‘deface’, which is placing a substitute homepage on the site.)

The damage to the files will not stop us! We have full copies of all files of www.3dway.org in many locations and available for quick recovery. Whatever anyone would try doing, he or she will not succeed because the website is indestructible. It is for the benefit of all people our dear Belarus!

The Cartoon Club (MultClub) website is already up and running at http://mult.3dway.org !

Judi and the international support team of the Third Way.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:24 0 comments links to this post

Dear Friends,

The 3dWay.org’s team asks for your help because this is because of you that we exist!

We have no grants, nor wealthy sponsors. At the same time, we need to pay bills for growing website traffic, Internet access, cell phone communication with journalists and participants… Please review our initial budget at http://www.3dway.org/about_eng.php?artid=10 . This is only a portion of what is needed.

The Third Way urgently needs funds for:
— lawyers for those persecuted by KGB: Victor, Andrey, and Pavel,
— hosting 3dWay.org that became the number one political site in Belarus, as well as for mounting website traffic that grows every day,
— computers, because personal computers of some activists had been seized by KGB,
— Internet access for activists,
— cell phone communication for activists.

We understand that no one has «extra» money. But if even a half of tens of thousands of participants and readers of this website would dedicate $1, $2, $5, $10 from their monthly budgets, this site will go on! Value the services that are available on the website and that are useful for YOU — yourselves!

You may donate by credit of bank card with logo of VISA, MasterCard, AmEx, or Discover, by clicking on the "DONATE" button.


To make a contribution by a check, please send it to "Maidan Int" at the address:

104-G University Vlg,
Ames, IA 50010,
USA.

If you might have further questions about how you could support the Third Way now, please call us at +1 (312) 239-06-12, or email us at office@3-way.info.

The Third Way website is a real people’s initiative! Now your help is needed more than ever!

Sincerely,

The group of popular financial support of 3dWay.org.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:58 0 comments links to this post

On 26 August, the Namangan civic court sentenced Nosir Zakirov, the correspondent of Liberty Radio for Namangan region, for six months in jail on the charges of offending the special services personnel on the phone.

"My father is jailed for his professional activity," journalist`s son Zohid Zakirov told Arena.

Nosir Zakirov aired the opinion of Haydarali Komilov, region`s resident, on Andizhan events, where the latter addressed a criticism in poetim form against the policy of the authorities.

Right after the sentence was heard, the journalist was taken to jail in Djidakapas district of Namangan region.

On 6 August, Nasirov called the National Security Service staff Dilmurod Isamuhamedov and cursed him in a harsh form for provoking his respondent Komilov to refuse from broadcasting as well as stating in print, that it was done by pressure.

Nosir Zakirov has been working for Liberty Radio since 1996. He is one of the first reporters, who was present in Andizhan at 3 am on 13 May and reported on the seizure of the Andizhan jail by phone.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:57 0 comments links to this post

Nikolai Goshko, the deputy editor of the weekly Odintsovskaïa Nedela, who was sentenced to five years of hard labour on 5 June for libel, was released by judge Andrei Lantsov on 19 August in Smolensk. Gochko said he thought the judge had bowed to pressure from international organisations.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:51 0 comments links to this post

A KGB official said on Belarusian Television on 25 August that two detained activists of Georgia's Kmara youth organization, Giorgi Kandelaki and Luka Tsuladze, will be deported from Belarus in connection with their "interference in internal affairs" of the country (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 25 August 2005). "During their stay in the country, they made contacts with representatives of radical, politicized unregistered structures, such as Zubr, Youth Front, and Limon, and held a number of training seminars on the organization of civil-disobedience actions accompanied by mass unrest, similar to those during the colored revolution in Georgia," the KGB official explained. "They participated in a number of unsanctioned actions to disseminate illegal publications in the city of Minsk and intended to travel to a number of regions of the country with analogous purposes."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:49 0 comments links to this post

In a ruling on 25 August, the civil-suits section of Kazakhstan's Supreme Court left in force an earlier decision by an Astana city court on the banning of the independent online daily set.kz, "Kazakhstan Today" reported. In the initial decision, the Astana city court refused an appeal by the publishers of set.kz, who had hoped to overturn a resolution by the Ministry of Culture, Information, and Sports to close the publication. Newspaper representative Sergei Utkin described the latest ruling as predictable and vowed to appeal. Set.kz was conceived as a continuation of the independent newspaper "Respublika," which was shut down by the authorities earlier this year

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:48 0 comments links to this post

Alexander Klokov, the chain-smoking chief prosecutor in this quiet Russian backwater, says he cannot explain why, but Kovrov city council is a hornet's nest of criminals.

Over the past two years, 8 of the 21 council members have been in prison, awaiting trial or fresh from jail. It has made Kovrov, a city of 150,000 half a day's drive east of Moscow, something of a phenomenon.

The councillors themselves say there is a simple explanation: they dared to criticise Kovrov's mayor and now he is punishing them by fabricating criminal cases with the help of corrupt police, prosecutors and judges.

Kovrov may be an extreme example but critics of Russian President Vladimir Putin say officials everywhere are abusing the justice system to sideline political threats.

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Uzbek authorities have jailed hundreds of people and forced them to confess to links to radical Islamists to justify the army crackdown on peaceful demonstrators last May that left 500 people dead, The Independent has learnt.

Human Rights Watch reports that witnesses of the massacre in the eastern city of Andizhan and relatives of the victims, have been rounded up and jailed for between 10 to 15 days on fabricated charges. "They are severely beaten and tortured until they sign statements confessing to being members of radical Islamic groups," a researcher for the group who has just visited the central Asian region said.

Despite eyewitness accounts contradicting the government version, the Uzbek authorities continue to insist that the army was forced to act on 13 May to put down an attempt by radical extremist Muslims to overthrow it. Human Rights Watch fears that the jailing and coercion of "hundreds, or even thousands" of people is a deliberate tactic aimed at bolstering the government's case. It appears that some have been so intimidated that they have readily confessed to having been manipulated by the radicals.

The issue of the Uzbekistan massacre is not on the agenda of the next foreign ministers' meeting on 1 September. A Foreign Office spokesman denied that this was letting President Karimov off the hook. "We are working through the United Nations and other regional organisations to establish an independent inquiry," the spokesman said.

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Leading Russian rights activists have accused the authorities of indifference to abuses and torture they said were rampant in Russian jails. They called for legislation allowing public oversight of detention facilities.

Lev Ponomaryov, the head of the All-Russian Public Movement for Human Rights, likened Russia's prison system to the Soviet Gulag. "Without doubt, the policy of [prison officials] is aimed at making punishment more severe, crushing each convict ... and morally and often physically destroying them," he told a news conference.

In an annual report based on monitoring prisons in 40 out of Russia's 89 regions, his organisation said prison officials routinely beat and tortured inmates. The report said the convicts also were subjected to cruel punishment for no reason and systematically humiliated.

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Georgian authorities say an opposition lawmaker and beer brewery official was beaten and left in a forest in Georgia, local media reported on Thursday. Attackers seized Tamaz Kacheishvili near his home in the capital Tbilisi late on Wednesday and tied him to a tree in the woods outside the capital. He was found by a shepherd and hospitalized with a concussion, cuts, and bruises. Kacheishvili is a Right Opposition deputy in the national parliament, which is dominated by supporters of President Mikhail Saakashvili. Valeri Gelashvili, a member of the opposition Republican Party, was severely beaten last month by attackers. He claimed he had been beaten by members of a department of the Interior Ministry.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:24 0 comments links to this post

In recent years many things have irked Turkmenbashi the Great, as Turkmenistan's erratic president-for-life Sap-armurat Niyazov is officially known.

Opera and ballet have been outlawed as "unnecessary" while gold fillings and long hair are similarly prohibited.

Though relieved that the sun no longer glints off the teeth of the singers who perform in his honour, the president was reportedly furious to find that they were not singing at all, but merely mouthing the words. This week he took action, banning the playing of recorded music in all public places in an effort to stamp out the scourge.

Mr Niyazov's latest whim comes days after he issued a proclamation forbidding female news presenters and reporters from wearing make-up and dying their hair.

In power for 13 years, Mr Niyazov has turned his country into one of the most autocratic in the world, creating a powerful personality cult and forbidding all opposition. Even those closest to him live in fear. In the past month he has sacked a third of his cabinet.

Last week he docked three month's pay off his education minister, blaming him for falling standards in schools.

Calls from human rights groups for the isolation of Turkmenistan have only been heeded half-heartedly, critics say, because it holds the world's fifth-largest oil reserves.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:23 0 comments links to this post

Alisher Saipov is an independent journalist from the southern Kyrgyz city of Osh.

In July, he interviewed Qobiljon Parpiev, the alleged ringleader of the Andijon protests and a wanted man in Uzbekistan, where authorities have accused him of terrorist activities.

Soon afterward, Saipov says, he received a curious proposal.

“A local human rights activist, the head of the Law and Order human rights group, told me that an Uzbek security service officer wanted to talk to me about a very special offer," Saipov relates. "I said: ‘OK, tell him I can meet with him.' The man came. I was there with my friend. We talked. He said: ‘You know where Qobiljon Parpiev is. You’ve contacted him. If we catch him with your help, you’ll receive the 10,000-[dollar] reward promised for his capture.'"

Saipov says the man introduced himself by name and said he was an officer of the economic department of the Andijon regional branch of the Uzbek National Security Service (SNB).

Saipov says the SNB has intensified its activity in southern Kyrgyzstan since hundreds of Uzbeks flowed into the country seeking refuge following the Andijon violence.

Most of the Uzbek refugees were relocated to Romania in late July. But dozens more Uzbeks are believed to still be in hiding in the south of Kyrgyzstan. Some Kyrgyz citizens say Uzbek SNB officers have contacted them and asked for help in tracking down the refugees.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:19 0 comments links to this post

A judge in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, convicted the editor of a shuttered opposition newspaper on theft charges today, sentencing him to two years of "corrective" labor, fining him, and garnishing part of his wages. The Committee to Protect Journalists denounced the verdict, calling the charges politically motivated.

Mukhtor Bokizoda told CPJ he would appeal today's verdict, which comes several weeks after the government shut down the weekly Nerui Sukhan (Power of the Word). Bokizoda is also chairman of the Foundation for the Memory and Protection of Journalists, a press freedom group.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:08 0 comments links to this post

Police briefly detained a U.S. diplomat in Belarus, and activists said Wednesday the authorities wanted to prevent him from meeting them.

American diplomats expressed concern over the detention and were discussing the incident with Belarusian officials, U.S. Embassy spokesman Alexei Solomakh said. Officials in Belarus' Foreign and Interior Ministries declined comment.

U.S. Embassy political officer Lyle McMillan was held for about 40 minutes on Tuesday, said Galina Skorokhod, an activist in the city of Gomel, where the diplomat was detained.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:01 0 comments links to this post

Journalist Georgiy Gongadze, whose murder in 2000 jolted the administration of Ukraine's former President Leonid Kuchma, was posthumously awarded the country's highest honour on Wednesday.

The headless corpse of Gongadze, 31, was found in a wood a month and a half after he disappeared in central Kiev. Three senior policemen have been arrested in connection with an investigation still under way.

"I have signed a decree presenting the Hero of Ukraine award (posthumous) to Georgiy Gongadze," said President Viktor Yushchenko, who won last December's election on a wave of protests against Kuchma.

"He gave his young life for our freedom and independence," he told an awards ceremony.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:58 0 comments links to this post

The opposition leader in Azerbaijan, Eldar Namazov, has two namesakes running for the parliament against him.

None of the two other Eldar Namazovs has previously been heard of on the Azeri political scene. One of them is a prison guard, the other a businessman, Reuters reported.

The opposition’s Namazov, a former presidential adviser, said the authorities were putting the two rivals on the ballot to split his vote as part of a dirty tricks campaign to rig the election in favor of the party of President Ilham Aliyev.

Namazov is now one of the leaders of the New Politics bloc. He said there were only 20 people with his name in the whole of Azerbaijan, so there was no coincidence in the namesakes’ appearance in the election slate. “I view the fact these two ’clones’ are running in my district as a compliment from the authorities. Such methods are used against candidates with a good chance of victory,” he said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:56 0 comments links to this post

"Pora" movement (Ukraine), "Mi" (Russia), "Birge!" (Khirghizia) and "Kahar" (Kazakhstan) have made a decision of uniting into the international democratic network and from now will permanently coordinate their moves, support each other's initiatives and hold common actions. The common fundaments of these movements are liberal values and the fight against all the signs of dictatorship and authorities' arbitrariness.

One of the main tasks is – forming of international space for the development of the civil society, which is completely independent from the government rule.

THE PARTICIPANTS' OF INTERNATIONAL DEMOCRATIC NETWORK MANIFEST.

We, free people of different countries, united by the fight for the rights of our citizens and the opportunity to live in prospering, democratic society, are uniting our efforts and will support each others initiatives by all means. Each of us is strong, but together we are invincible.
Democracy – is not what we get after elite changes. The fundament of democratic power – is civil society, which's building we consider one of our primary aims. In modern conditions state borders don't play their previous role – and nothing prevents us from creating common international space of civil cooperation.

We are opened for everyone, who shares our values and is eager to confront all the dictatorship signs and authorities' arbitrariness. Each new organization in our network – is another step to the developed democracy.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:53 0 comments links to this post

Pinsk city executive committee has not allowed the independent newspaper “Miastsovy Chas” to hold a concert to celebrate the 100 issue of the newspaper. The concert with participation of Pinsk bards was planned for August 21 in a city park of culture and recreation. The previous verbal arrangement was made with the head of Pinsk city executive council Alyaksandr Hordzich, who assured the editor-in-chief of the “Miastsovy Chas” Viktar Yarashuk that the concert is to take place without any problems. However, the official letter signed by the head of the city executive committee Alyaksandr Kaneuski informed that the city executive committee does not allow holding an “advertising action” of the newspaper.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:35 0 comments links to this post

On August 24 the Economical court of Minsk region sustained a claim of Minsk regional executive committee to liquidate “Press-service” supplementary liability society, the founder of the newspaper “Kurjer iz Borisova”. The society is to be liquidated before January 1 next year.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:33 0 comments links to this post

Two activists of the Georgian youth movement Kmara – Giorgi Kandelaki and Luka Tsuladze have been arrested in Belarus, the Georgian media sources reported on August 24.

The two Georgian citizens were reportedly arrested in Minsk together with coordinator of the Belarus youth resistance movement Zubr, Vladimir Kobets. Kobets was released shortly after the arrest.

Belarus police officials explained that the two Georgian citizens were “taken to the police station to check their documents,” according to the RIA Novosti news agency.

In two hours, after taking fingerprints, Uladzimir Kobets was released. As said by Kobets, one of the high officers of the police department, police officer, offered his apologies, saying that the detention was a “mistake during the identity check operation aimed against persons from the Caucasus”.

Kmara activists are still in the criminal investigation department. Their mobile phones are switched off, no information could be received from them.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:32 0 comments links to this post

The leader of the Erkindik Party, Topchubek Turgunaliev, is collecting signatures for the dissolution of Parliament.

He has to collect 300,000 signatures and then a referendum can be held. Turgunaliev has submitted a copy of the form for collecting signatures to the CEC for its legitimacy to be established. The CEC did not give a negative or positive answer, but returned Turgunaliev’s letter with a comment that our legislation is not sufficiently well developed to solve this issue.

In the meantime, parties in all regions of the country have started collecting signatures and Turgunaliev thinks it will not be difficult to get the necessary number and it can be done quickly.

The reformer does not care about the opinion of Deputies, because he is sure that the current lawmakers are out of place in the JK and he doesn't care about possible riots connected with his initiative. “Any attempt to resist our action will be suppressed. Deputies say they will lead people out onto the streets. They will not be able to do this, because the people will not follow them”.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:19 0 comments links to this post

On 24 August, NDP activists tried to hold a picket in front of the Ministry of Justice. The picket started at 11 a.m. In 10-15 minutes law-enforcement bodies drove the participants back from the building and detained 4 activists. Despite the dispersal, participants delivered a resolution to the Ministry, which demanded to register the NDP. Note that the city authorities did not sanction the picket. The NDP intends to continue actions of protest in September.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:10 0 comments links to this post

Members of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Homel have accused police of disrupting their meeting with a U.S. diplomat on 23 August, Belapan reported. The diplomat -- identified as "Lyle MacMillan" -- was reportedly expected to meet with NGO activists in a building belonging to local opposition figure Viktar Karneyenka that also houses the city's chapter of the United Civic Party and several other organizations. But two hours before the meeting, police officers reportedly ordered the building vacated, saying they had found an unidentified metal object nearby that could be an explosive device. As the activists and the diplomat gathered in a private apartment later in the day, two police officers entered and ordered all those present to produce their passports, citing a special operation aimed at tracking down illegal aliens. The U.S. diplomat and his aide were kept in the apartment for some 40 minutes and allowed to go only after their documents were checked.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:03 0 comments links to this post

Mothers who lost children in the Beslan school siege have made an angry attack on Russia's President Vladimir Putin, at the trial of the sole siege suspect.

About 15 women who lost children in the Beslan siege continued to occupy the courtroom on Wednesday, after refusing to leave at the end of Tuesday's session.

The mothers, who spent the night in the court, are demanding to meet the top prosecutor in the case, deputy Russian prosecutor general Nikolai Shepel.

On Tuesday, one mother read a list of officials she alleged had not been brought to account, among them Mr Putin and the head of Russia's FSB security service, Nikolai Patrushev.

"We believe that witness testimony before the court is being ignored and that the real guilty parties are not at the defence table," said Ella Petrozova, speaking by phone from the courtroom to AFP news agency.

Correspondents say many of the relatives have been enraged by revelations of police corruption, and by details of why the Beslan rescue operation was so flawed.

The protest rapidly turned into a trial of strength between Shepel and the Beslan mothers. And after 28 hours in the courthouse, the women, looking worn and tired, gave up and returned to their homes empty-handed.

But Suzanna Dudiyeva, who heads the Beslan Mothers Committee, says the protest is not over and will continue in some other form.

Speaking to RFE/RL’s Russian Service after leaving the courthouse, she said the Beslan Mothers have no longer any desire to meet with Shepel.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:01 0 comments links to this post

Protestant communities wanting to build a place of worship face increasing obstruction from state authorities, they have told Forum 18 News Service. Other religious confessions also encounter such problems. For example, a protracted series of discussions and protests have still not enabled Moscow's Emmanuel Pentecostal Church to either obtain a new construction site or official rights to the land beneath a building it owns. Similar problems have been encountered by Protestant churches elsewhere in Russia. Protestants have often told Forum 18 of their suspicions that local Orthodox clergy are instrumental in blocking Protestant construction plans, through private discussions between state officials and local Orthodox clergy. Unusually, in a letter seen by Forum 18, the Volga city of Saratov refused Word of Life Pentecostal Church permission to put an advertisement on its own outside wall, "on the basis of letter No. 490 dated 19 April 2005 from the Saratov diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church." Protestant communities also often speak of lengthy and energy-consuming battles to retain worship premises they acquire.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:58 0 comments links to this post

The most recent backing for the idea came from Leonid Markelov, the president of the obscure semi-autonomous republic of Mari El. The fact that senior regional officials are now chosen by Mr Putin, rather than elected, may or may not have influenced Mr Markelov's position.

The main factor deterring Mr Putin from changing the constitution is the fear of the likely cool response from the West. The strategy could easily be compared with that of Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, described by President George W Bush as "the last dictatorship in Europe".

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:41 0 comments links to this post

A court in Russia's republic of Tatarstan today sentenced a former State Duma deputy to 7 1/2 years in jail on charges of fraud and embezzlement.


The court also sentenced Sergei Shashurin to pay Tatarstan's Tatneft oil company $31,500 and awarded another five unidentified individual plaintiffs a total of $10,000 in damages.

Earlier this year, a Moscow court sentenced Shashurin to 20 months in jail for libel.

Shashurin won fame five years ago when he publicly accused Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov of being involved in financial misdeeds in Tatarstan.

Shashurin served in the State Duma, the lower house of Russia's parliament, from 2000 through 2003. He was a member of the Duma's anticorruption committee.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:06 0 comments links to this post

The Constitutional Council of RK has recognised the laws "On activities of branches and country offices of international and foreign non-lucrative organisations on the territory of RK" and "On changes and amendments in several legislative acts of RK on non-lucrative organisations" passed by the parliament and forwarded to the head of state for signing, as non-complying with the Constitution, KZ-today correspondent reports from Astana.

Earlier Nursultan Nazarbayev, president of Kazakhstan, addressed an appeal to the Constitutional Council requiring to check these laws on the subject of their compliance with the Constitution. These documents intended to strengthen the state control over activities of foreign and international non-lucrative organisations on the territory of Kazakhstan have provoked complaints from the NGO.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:02 0 comments links to this post

The president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Rene Van Der Linden being on a visit in our country met with law defenders.

The law defenders brought to the attention of the guest the tense situation, the political struggle conducted by means of “black PR”, the problem of the Election Code on changing the composition of the commissions and restoring the right of NGOs to observe the elections was not solved, and the existed problem in distribution of identity cards.

They also informed that imprisonment of some former political prisoners is kept, and many persons are in migration. The law defenders also said that rights of hundreds of citizens were violated as a result of unfair judgments delivered by the courts.

Then the PACE president met with the heads of some press organs acting in the country. The sides discussed the pre-election situation, existing situation of the press, violation of the rights of the journalists, attacks to some press organs in Azerbaijan and etc.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:58 0 comments links to this post

On 21 August in Ielsk the local police blocked the house in Kalinina Street, where a congress to nominate delegates to the Congress of Democratic Forces should have taken place, reported Radio Liberty. They stopped anyone coming near the house. Telephone communications were cut off.
For three hours the police detained the driver of the privately-owned minibus Uladzimier Shytsikau who had driven Uladzimier Katsora and Andrei Tochyn, the gathering coordinators, from Homel to the district capital. They were closely watched. Police Major Aliaxei Shauchuk attempted to detain Mr. Katsora and Mr. Tolchyn at the market in a café where they had stopped to drink some mineral water. The guard explained that all new people coming to Ielsk arouse the suspicion of the police. But because the activists had passports with them, they had no other reason to continue detention.
The gathering in Ielsk that was to have nominated delegates for the Congress of Democratic Forces did not occur.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:42 0 comments links to this post

A member of the civil initiative “Tretsi Shliakh” (“The Third Way”) Aleh Minich was summoned to Hrodna branch of the KGB for interrogation. On August 16 the Prosecutor’s Office of Minsk brought up a criminal action for slandering Alyaksandr Lukashenka. The reason for that were animated cartoons of political content placed at the site of the initiative, 3dway.org. KGB officers have made search in the apartments of several members of “The Third Way” and confiscated more than 10 computers. As Radio Svaboda informs, on August 22 passports of Aleh Minich and his wife were confiscated.

Investigator Aleh Varanetski summoned Aleh Minich, the member of the Third Way, for interrogation for the second time. The first interrogation took place on August 16 in Hrodna. Besides, on that day Pavel Marozau and Andrei Abozau were interrogated in Minsk by KGB officers. They were left without all documents. Even Andrei Abozau’s birth certificate has been confiscated.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:37 0 comments links to this post

Belarusian frontier guards seized the passport of the reporter of the «Gazeta Wyborcza» Waclaw Radziwinowicz, this influential Polish daily informed today. This occurrence has taken place in a train from Kuznica Bialostocka, to Hrodna. “Belarusian frontier guards said that the passport would be returned in Hrodna, after some formalities,” Mr.Radziwinowicz told to PAHONIA. “It is very strange, as that had not been done before. I do not know the reason,” commented the Polish reporter.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:34 0 comments links to this post

Mikhail Khodorkovsky has gone on a hunger strike to demonstrate support for his partner Platon Lebedev who was locked in a punishment cell on August 19 for refusing to take his daily walk. Khodorkovsky’s lawyer Anton Drel told Ekho Moskvy radio his client is consuming neither food nor water to express solidarity with his friend. “He knows he isn't alone,” Khodorkovsky said in a written statement handed to Drel. Lebedev was moved to the punitive cell despite suffering from cirrhosis and the possibility of facing liver cancer in the near future, his lawyers say. They added Khodorkovsky is positive the Kremlin is punishing him and Lebedev for the recent bold article Khodorkovsky published in the press, “A Turn to the Left.” Last week, Khodorkovsky’s lawyers confirmed he was ready to agree to run for parliamentary election to State Duma from behind bars. “I am ready for great obstacles and more stringent jail conditions,” he was quoted by his lawyer Yuri Schmidt as saying.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:29 0 comments links to this post

Last week, the European Commission started a procedure of suspending benefits for Belarus under the EU's Generalized System of Preferences (GSP), Belapan reported on 22 August. The commission has given the Belarusian government six months to bring the country's regulations into line with its international commitments and eight months more to carry out 12 recommendations of the International Labor Organization regarding the treatment of trade unions in the country. If the European Commission sees no progress on the recommendations in 14 months, it will request the EU Council of Ministers to temporarily abolish the GSP benefits for Minsk. According to the commission, the move would mean an annual loss of 100 million euros ($122 million) for Belarus.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:19 0 comments links to this post

Murat Telibekov, head of the non-state controlled Union of Muslims of Kazakhstan (UMK), is facing a further court case, Forum 18 News Service has learnt, as part of what Telibekov believes are attempts to close down non-state controlled Muslim organisations. Telibekov has made accusations of corruption at the Nur-Mubarak Islamic Cultural University, which is controlled by the Egyptian and Kazakh governments, and the university has launched a legal case against both Telibekov and a Kazakh TV station which interviewed him about his claims. Shamsudin Kerim, vice-rector of the Nur Mubarak University, told Forum 18 that "the UMK is an illegal organisation. It's just a bogus outfit. The only organisation that can represent the interests of Muslims is the [state-controlled] Spiritual Administration of Muslims in Kazakhstan."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:15 0 comments links to this post

Turkmen president Saparmurat Niyazov has signed a decree banning the use of “phonograms at all cultural events, song-musical performances organized in honor of state holidays, in the programs of TV channels of the General directorate of the Turkmen television, as well as at all cultural events organized in the state and public organizations, in places of mass gatherings of people, during wedding parties and festivities.”

As the Ashgabat correspondent of Turkmenistan.ru reports, the decree by the head of state names “negative effect of the use of phonograms on the development of the song-musical art in the period of independence” one of the main reasons of the ban on the use of phonograms.

The Ministry of Culture and TV and Radio broadcast of Turkmenistan, administrations of the country’s regions and Ashgabat city were placed in charge of the implementation of this decree.

A decree signed by Niyazov and published in newspapers "bans the use in Turkmenistan of sound recordings... at musical performances on state holidays, in broadcasts by Turkmen television channels, at all cultural events organised by state and social institutions, in places of mass assembly and at weddings and celebrations organised by the public."

In comments carried by the official daily newspaper Neitralny Turkmenistan, Niyazov said there was a need "to protect true culture, including the musical and singing traditions of the Turkmen people, from the negative influences of factors that to them are foreign."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:14 0 comments links to this post

It was clear Monday that Turkmenistan is rewriting rules for election of president and members of the parliament.

During a meeting of the cabinet of ministers, President Niyazov asked Ovezgeldy Atayev, chairmen of Turkmen parliament, to chalk out new rules for the presidential and parliamentary elections.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:03 0 comments links to this post

Azerbaijan's opposition Popular Front Party (AHCP) today accused the country's security forces of plotting to overthrow the party's leadership.


Ramiz Tagiyev, who is an adviser to AHCP Chairman Ali Kerimli, told reporters in Baku that a few weeks ago he let himself be recruited by officers of Azerbaijan's National Security Ministry with a view to foil their suspected plans ahead of the 6 November legislative polls.

Tagiyev said the arrest of opposition youth leader Ruslan Basirli was part of a plot to overthrow the AHCP leadership. Basirli was detained earlier this month on charges of receiving foreign money to overthrow the government.

His arrest sparked a wave of antiopposition protests throughout the country. Tagiyev today alleged that the security forces' plan envisaged the seizure of the AHCP Baku headquarters by pro-government protesters and the replacement of Kerimli by himself.

There was no immediate comment from the Azerbaijani authorities.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:01 0 comments links to this post

Russia extradited to Tajikistan an active participant in anti-government protests in western Tajikistan the mid 1990s, an official confirmed on Monday.

The operation to detain Sobirdzhon Mamadzhonov was carried out by Russian and Tajik law-enforcement bodies in a Russian town within the framework of the bilateral accord on extradition, head of the antiterrorist department of the Tajik Interior Ministry Maruf Shakarov told Itar-Tass.

Mamadzhonov is accused of a number of serious crimes, including active participation in the armed group of the rebel Tajik Colonel Makhmud Kudoiberdyyev who attempted to stage a coup d'etat in 1995-1997.

After the authorities suppressed the mutiny, Mamadzhonov fled the country and lived in Russia under forged papers.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:58 0 comments links to this post

Prominent chess-player and opposition Committee 2008: Free Choice member Garry Kasparov was held up at Moscow's Domodedovo Airport for about half an hour late on Sunday due to technical malfunctioning at passport control, the public relations center of the Federal Security Service told Interfax.

"A failure in the technical control system caused a delay in passing through passport control by Mr. Garry Kasparov at Domodedovo International Airport," the center said.

"Confiscating his passport or creating any other obstacles for his entry into the Russian Federation were not our intention. Passport control officers checked [Kasparov's] documents within the longest possible timeframe designated for the procedure," it said.

Kasparov told the Ekho Moskvy radio station: “When I came to the window and produced my passport, a female lieutenant recognized me and asked me to wait. After that a male lieutenant came, took my passport and left. He came back and went away several times, made phone calls and asked me questions. Being asked what it was all about, he said that the matter was classified,” Kasparov said.

Kasparov said that the only phrase that he could hear as the man was talking on the phone was: “How can I stop a Russian citizen from entering Russia?

”This phrase led me to a conclusion that my name had been put on some sort of black list requiring some measures. After consulting my lawyers, I will try to find out what is wrong with my name and what provoked such a reaction from the border guards, who were confused and did not know what to do with me.“

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:53 0 comments links to this post

The OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Miklos Haraszti, has voiced his concern over a new criminal investigation involving alleged libel of the President of Belarus in animated Internet cartoons.

The cartoons depicting President Alexander Lukashenko and top government officials in a satirical way were posted on the website of the Belarusian Third Way youth association.

On 17 August the Minsk Prosecutor's Office started an investigation under Article 367 of the Belarusian Criminal Code Libelling the President, which carries prison sentences of up to five years.

The state security service (KGB) raided the apartments in Minsk and Grodno of members of the association who posted the cartoons and confiscated 12 computers. Website administrator Andrei Obuzov and project co-ordinator Pavel Morozov were interrogated as witnesses on 16 August.

"Satires are common and popular methods of expression in all media in democratic societies," Miklos Haraszti said.

"Treating cartoons as acts of criminal libel or insult is completely against the concept of free political debate. Moreover, for the sake of uninhibited scrutiny of governments, senior officials must tolerate harsher forms of criticism than average citizens. This was stated in numerous judgements of the European Court of Human Rights."

Haraszti noted that Belarus is the only OSCE participating State which imprisons people under special provisions on defamation to protect the President. Only last year two people were convicted on similar grounds, one of whom is still in custody.

"The news about this libel case is especially worrying in the light of this month's reports of harassment of journalists related to the elections of new leadership of the Union of the Poles of Belarus," the OSCE Representative added.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:36 0 comments links to this post

Belarus, a country of more than 10 million inhabitants has been for more than 11 years ruled by President Alexander Lukashenka, for whom governance means extensive abuse of basic human and citizens' rights on a daily basis, removal and imprisonment of his opponents and journalists, and deception of the populace by the mass media under his control.

Last autumn, a bogus referendum that Lukashenka held removed a two-consecutive-terms limit on the presidency and thus he took the first step to prolong his rule beyond next year, when his current term expires.

Since then, for a number of months -- largely unnoticed by most media and politicians of the democratic world -- the last remains of non-governmental organizations, an independent press and political parties that could thwart the plans of the Belarus autocrat on prolonging his rule ad infinitum have systematically been liquidated.

The information blockade of the country is growing, opportunities for young people to study abroad are being limited, and the last independent daily Narodnaja Volja is about to be closed down.

Lukashenka can get away with all of this not only due to the unsavory legacy of totally decimated post-soviet social and societal structures, but also due to lack of interest in the fate of Belarus on the part of democratic countries worldwide.

We are, therefore, convinced that it is necessary to make use of every opportunity to break through this wall of lack of interest and inability on the part of the global democratic community in order to take a stand against this post-soviet autocrat and his efforts to totally suppress the remains of independent initiatives in Belarus.

At the same time it is necessary to continue developing contacts and cooperation with Belarus' independent initiatives.

The EU that so far has not been able to support efforts aiming at building Belarus based on democratic values should speedily seek instruments that would enable this process. At the same time the EU should fully open its exchange and educational programs for democratically oriented young people of Belarus.

The EU should, together with Ukraine, quickly react to the proposal by EU parliamentarians Janusz Onyszkiewicz and Bogdan Klich to enable the people of Belarus an access to non-censored, non-manipulated information through radio and TV broadcasts from neighboring countries.

We call for creating a common strategy for the EU, US and all other democratic countries that ought to be interested in the democratization of Belarus.


This open letter is signed by Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic; Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland; French philosopher Andre Glucksmann; Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa; former German president Richard von Weizsecker, H.R.H. El Hassan bin Talal of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan; former New Zealand prime minister and former WTO director general Mike Moore; Vartan Gregorian, president of the Carnegie Corp of New York, Nippon Foundation chairman Yohei Sasakawa, former South African president F.W. de Klerk; US theologian Michael Novak and Senator Karel Schwarzenberg of the Czech Republic.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:42 0 comments links to this post

The site of UCP has devoted today's information review to the "3-d way" initiative. With that action we show solidarity with the creators of the remarkable cartoons, which have become the mirror of Belarusian reality.

Each peace of our news on the site is illustrated with the pictures from the cartoons, which can be accessed in the Internet from the site www.mult.3dway.org.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:00 0 comments links to this post

The Minsk city court has ruled to liquidate Christian religious congregation “Belarusian Evangelical Reformed Union”. The Minks executive committee summoned the church representatives to the court as they had not re-registered. Pastor Leanid Lipen stated in the court that the case of the church’s liquidation is a purely political one.

Main reason for liquidation of religious communities, according to many priests, is lack of money for renting suitable premises, while the state does not allocate funds for that. However, Calvinist Leanid Lipen said in the court that he boycotts the new law and demands to return Calvinist churches that had belonged to that denomination historically.

“We cannot recognize this discrimination law. It violates freedom of conscience. We need freedom to be returned to us, and historical buildings returned to us (at least one of them), and the persecution to be stopped. All our buildings have been confiscated. They have been confiscated, and now they demand some legal address. I think they understand everything. They know about the history of Reformation. It is done purposely,” the pastor said to Radio Svaboda.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:57 0 comments links to this post

The leader of the Union of Poles in Belarus Andzelika Borys was summoned for interrogation, in order to be asked only one question: where she was on January 6/7 overnight, when a car of former chairman of the UPB Tadeusz Kruczkowski was burnt. “It is evidently an attempt to intimidate me, to summon me to police department again and again,” Andzelika Borys said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:55 0 comments links to this post

Minsk executive committee has liquidated the “Denpress” Limited liability company, a publisher of an independent newspaper “Den”. Mikola Markevich, a director of the “Denpress” LLC, found out about that on August 19 in the evening from the tax inspection of the Central district of Minsk. The decision about liquidation was signed by the head of Minsk executive committee Mikhail Paulau and charge d’affaires Mikhail Savanovich on July 4.

“It is a political order, like the closure of the “Pahonya” newspaper,” M.Markevich maintains. “This decision is based neither on facts nor on law,” he believes. “It is enough to say that “Denpress”, a publisher of the newspaper “Den”, issued a newspaper on May 26, and that issue was later detained in 40 km by Belarusian-Russian border. These are entrepreneurial activities, aren’t they?”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:53 0 comments links to this post

Recently, head of the terrorism combating department of the Jizzakh regional interior department visited independent journalist Jamshid Karimov, who lives in Jizzakh, and told him to leave the region until 24 August, otherwise “strictest measures will be taken”.

According to Karimov, who immediately reported on the incident to his colleagues, the official hinted that his professional activity and contacts with foreign media and local opposition figures and human rights activists are disliked by the Jizzakh regional governor Ubaidulla Yamankulov. This is why Yamankulov ordered to get rid of the journalist, at least during the 14th independence anniversary celebrations, to prevent him from “spoiling the holiday”.

The journalist was promised that “if he is obedient and stops quarreling with the authorities”, he might be allowed to return to Jizzakh after the celebrations, but not earlier than 7-10 September.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:47 0 comments links to this post

Two public protests broke out this weekend in the Uzbek city of Samarkand. On 20 August, demonstrators from the city outskirts blocked roads to protest the scheduled destruction of their houses. And yesterday, hundreds of merchants angrily protested a sudden decision to relocate the city's main market. As RFE/RL reports, the Samarkand protests are the first in Uzbekistan since those that ended in a violent government crackdown in Andijon in May.

The owners of some 100 homes from the village of Bogimaydon, on the outskirts of Samarkand, said authorities gave them only a week's notice to leave their homes before they were destroyed in order to make room for a highway-extension project. They said the compensation they had been offered was far less than the market value of their homes.

In response, the residents blocked the village's main road for several hours on 20 August, holding placards reading: "Don't demolish an old house before building a new one." It is a phrase familiar to the country's authoritarian leader, Islam Karimov. He uses the expression often during speeches, and has also used it as the title of one of his numerous books.

Local human rights activists like Jamol Mirsaidov were said to be among the protesters. Protesters claimed Mirsaidov and other demonstrators were hurt when police used force to disperse the crowd. Uzbek officials have not commented on the protest.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:35 0 comments links to this post

Russian law does not prevent religious communities from renting premises for worship, but Protestants have told Forum 18 News Service that in recent months they are increasingly barred from doing so. Most Protestant communities in Russia do not have their own church buildings and so have to rent buildings for worship, the majority of which are state-owned. Examples of this problem known to Forum 18 come from many parts of the Russian Federation. Anatoli Pchelintsev and Sergei Sychev, two Moscow-based lawyers specialising in religious believers' rights, have suggested to Forum 18 that possible reasons include state administrators not informing the federal authorities of official leases, so avoiding the need to give reasons for refusing to lease, and stepped-up pressure by the Moscow Patriarchate on local authorities and cultural institutions not to lease buildings to Protestants.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:32 0 comments links to this post

The plight of ethnic minorities in Turkmenistan remains bleak, despite claims to the contrary by the Turkmen government during this month's session of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

"Each of Turkmenistan's ethnic and racial minorities bears a heavy burden of discrimination and exclusion in the environment where preferential treatment is openly afforded only to ethnic Turkmen," Robert Arsenault, president of the International League for Human Rights (ILHR), asserted from New York. He went on to describe the human rights situation in the largely desert but energy rich state, as alarming.

"The president for life, Saparmurat Niyazov, has defined the newly created country of Turkmenistan as the glorified home of ethnic Turkmen," Erika Dailey, director of the Open Society Institute's Turkmenistan Project, added from New York. "In that conceptualisation, there is no room for non-ethnic Turkmen in Turkmenistan. So the state has attempted to "turkmenify" its non-Turkmen population," added Dailey.

According to activists, racial and ethnic minority populations were excluded from employment in the public sector, denied access to education in their native language, restricted in their practice of religion and continuously intimidated by police.

"Such important religious confessions as the Armenian Apostolic Church and Shia Islam, remain unregistered and thus illegal," the ILHR official added. He noted that Uzbeks, traditionally a rural population in the northern and eastern parts of the country, represent a special case as they are viewed with particular suspicion by the authorities as people not loyal to the regime.

Meanwhile, Dailey accused the government in the capital, Ashgabat, of fabricating population data that significantly underestimated the actual numbers of ethnic minorities in the country.

In a further discriminatory move, the government reportedly coerced other Turkic people such as Uzbeks and Kazakhs, to assimilate and "pass" as Turkmen under threat of a loss of job, which in Turkmenistan is tantamount to being sentenced to a lifetime of poverty.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:25 0 comments links to this post

Platon Lebedev, Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s closest business partner, has been moved to the punishment cell, his lawyer told the Ekho Moskvy radio station on Friday.

The move is intended to punish him for refusing to take the daily walk, the lawyer said.

Prison officials confirmed the news. The Interfax agency quoted a high-ranking official from the Federal Service for Corrective Institutions as saying that Lebedev was moved from a general cell to a punitive cell on Friday for one week “because Lebedev had broken the rules of confinement and was rude to the prison administration”.

Back in 2004 Dr. John O’Grady, eminent British specialist in hepatology who analyzed Platon Lebedev’s medical history, concluded that he suffered from a dangerous type of hepatitis that may result in hepatic cirrhosis and other grave complications. His report contradicted that of prison doctors who say Mr. Lebedev’s health is satisfactory and holding steady. Since then Lebedev’s lawyers claimed that his condition had worsened and that he may even be suffering from liver cancer.

For now, Lebedev has spent most of his term in the prison’s hospital, the lawyers added.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:10 0 comments links to this post

Kazakhstan's Constitutional Council announced today (19 August) that the country will hold early presidential elections on 4 December. The decision puts an end to a long-standing controversy between pro-government and opposition politicians in the Central Asian nation over the timing of the vote. Observers say the decision means a likely reelection for incumbent Nursultan Nazarbaev, as it leaves potential challengers with little time to prepare.

The Senate today was in the process of being selected by regional and local officials and Nazarbaev himself, with no popular voting involved. Otan candidates were expected to make up a majority of the seats, and no opposition candidates were in the running.

Experts say Nazarbaev is likely to win the early December poll, as his popularity remains high. The Kazakh parliament abolished presidential term limits in October 1998. If he wins, this would be Nazarbaev's third term in office.

Observers say Kazakh authorities have led a widescale campaign aimed at weakening the political opposition.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:07 0 comments links to this post

Before the republic gained independence in 1991, Ozbekiston Adabiyoti va San’ati served as one of Uzbekistan’s more critical and insightful newspapers, publishing ground-breaking articles advocating recognition of Uzbek as the official language, an immediate end to cotton-monoculture, protection for the Aral Sea and the restoration of Central Asia’s cultural and religious heritage.

During the early years of independence, Ozbekiston Adabiyoti va San’ati would sometimes stake out a position as a government watchdog. In early 1992, for example, Uzbek security forces ruthlessly quelled a student riot at Tashkent State University, leaving several students dead or seriously wounded. In sharp contrast its Andijan coverage, Ozbekiston Adabiyoti va San’ati deplored the unnecessary loss of life during the student protest and demanded a thorough investigation.

A full month after the Andijan events Ozbekiston Adabiyoti va San’ati had not provided a full and impartial description of what went on. Instead, the newspaper has offered a steady stream of attacks on alleged Islamic radicals who organized and participated in the Andijan events. Ozbekiston Adabiyoti va San’ati’s editorial voice has not differed substantially from all other Uzbek media outlets. Commentaries during this period have seemingly aimed to achieve two goals: reinforce the notion that it was every citizen’s duty to support the administration in its struggle to defeat "extremists" and "terrorists; and to convince Uzbeks that the government, since independence, has sought to address the spiritual needs of the population.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:03 0 comments links to this post

Starting August 10, major shopping centers in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, are being raided by officers in civilian clothes who seize merchandise of orange color. Where retailers object their visitors threaten with police summons.

Retailers say they were warned in advance against selling goods of orange color and ordered to withdraw such items from their shops. Now, those who ignored the warning are watching despondently their orange merchandise destroyed in bonfires.

Baku’s largest shopping malls — Sadarak and Bina — have already been fully purged of orange-colored items including children’s clothes and expensive leatherwear. Textile retailers are suffering the heaviest losses as orange-colored fabrics have been especially popular latterly prompting retailers to import large quantities.

The government has repeatedly urged retailers to give up orange colored goods voluntarily. Those, who fail to comply, would face high fines, officials say. Local entrepreneurs have voiced concern over the arbitrary measures.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:00 0 comments links to this post

The Uzbek Prosecutor General's Office on Saturday denied a report that one of the four men who fled to Kyrgyzstan after May's riots in the Uzbek city of Andizhan but have later come back to Uzbekistan died under torture.

All four "are charged with direct participation in the attacks on the buildings of the regional administration and law and order [agencies] and on a military base, with killing hostages and civilians, and with hijacking cars," Svetlana Artykova, spokeswoman for the office, told Interfax.

She said the four former refugees were currently in preventive detention.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:54 0 comments links to this post

The term of imprisonment of the Belarusian political prisoner, former Minister of Foreign Economic Relations, Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of Belarus Mikhail Marynich has been reduced by one year due to the amnesty dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the Victory in the Great patriotic War. The press center of the Charter’97 was informed about it by the son of the political prisoner, leader of the civil initiative “Freedom to political prisoners!”, member of the “Free Belarus” Igor Marynich.

After the amnesty Mikhail Marynich, who had already served a year and a half, would have to serve his term for a year more. “However now, taking into consideration his state of health, father has every reason for being released earlier,” Igor Marynich said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:33 0 comments links to this post

Speak out for justice in Belarus!

During the last week of December 2004, Mikhail Marinich stood before a court in Belarus, accused of stealing computers. Marinich was not a typical petty thief. A former economics minister and ambassador, he was a prominent figure in the political opposition. The case against him was hardly compelling: The U.S. State Department, who owned the supposedly purloined computers, denied they had been stolen at all.

But Marinich was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison. The outcome had been certain from the beginning. This is the price Belarusians pay for opposing their president, Alexander Lukashenka.

A recent Amnesty International report observed that 'it is becoming increasingly dangerous to criticize the regime in Belarus. Leading members of the opposition, human rights defenders and journalists who voice criticism risk criminal charges for slandering the President.' Many journalists and activists have been arrested; others have died in mysterious circumstances or simply disappeared. In a speech on 21 April 2005, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice described Belarus as the ‘last true dictatorship’ in Europe.

Marinich, who suffers from high blood pressure, has been kept in harsh conditions without medical treatment. On 7 March, after being denied medication for four days, he suffered a stroke. He has had relapses of ill health ever since.

Worldwide protests have already led to some improvements in Marinich‘s situation. His sentence was reduced to three and a half years in response to the outcry, and was then reduced by a further year as part of a general amnesty in August 2005. International pressure also forced the Belarusian government to let Marinich have medical treatment outside the prison colony after his stroke. However, he is still not permitted to see his lawyer or to appeal against his conviction.

We must keep up pressure on the Belarusian authorities until Marinich -- and all political prisoners in Belarus -- are free. You can help by signing and returning the attached letter to the Belarusian embassy.

The Volodymyr Campaign is a voluntary initiative devoted to informing the public about human-rights issues in the former Soviet Union. To learn more, please visit http://volodymyrcampaign.blogspot.com/ or e-mail us at volodymyrcampaign@btinternet.com.

His Excellency Alyaksei Mazhukhou
Ambassador of Belarus
6 Kensington Court
London W8 5DL

Excellency:

I am writing to you about the opposition politician Mikhail Marinich, who is currently serving a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence for the theft of computer equipment.

It is my understanding that the United States government, the owner of the computers in question, denies that they were stolen and has called for Mr Marinich to be set free. There are further reports that Mr Marinich was not given a fair trial and that he was arrested because of his activity with Belarus‘s political opposition. If true, this constitutes a grave violation of his rights to a fair trial, to free expression and to participation in government (Articles 9-11 and 18-21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights). I understand that Mr Marinich’s health has declined in prison and that he has been denied meetings with his lawyers.

On humanitarian grounds, I appeal to the Belarusian government to do the following:

To release Mr Marinich pending a full and fair review of the charges against him.
To allow him fair legal representation.
To permit him to receive any medical treatment necessary.

Thank you very much.

Yours sincerely,

His Excellency Mikhail Khvostov
Ambassador of Belarus
1619 New Hampshire Avenue., N.W.
Washington, DC 20009

Excellency:

I am writing to you about the opposition politician Mikhail Marinich, who is currently serving a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence for the theft of computer equipment.

It is my understanding that the United States government, the owner of the computers in question, denies that they were stolen and has called for Mr Marinich to be set free. There are further reports that Mr Marinich was not given a fair trial and that he was arrested because of his activity with Belarus‘s political opposition. If true, this constitutes a grave violation of his rights to a fair trial, to free expression and to participation in government (Articles 9-11 and 18-21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights). I understand that Mr Marinich’s health has declined in prison and that he has been denied meetings with his lawyers.

On humanitarian grounds, I appeal to the Belarusian government to do the following:

To release Mr Marinich pending a full and fair review of the charges against him.
To allow him fair legal representation.
To permit him to receive any medical treatment necessary.

Thank you very much.

Yours sincerely,

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:02 1 comments links to this post

When the organizers of the National Congress of democratic Forces, where the single opposition candidate for presidential elections is to be nominated, would not be able to find premises for holding this forum is Belarus, in would be held in Kyiv.

The decision to choose Ukrainian capital has been made on August 17 at the meeting of the Standing Committee of the democratic forces. The parties that constitute the standing Committee, addressed 50 institutions of executive authorities to rent a hall for holding a Congress, but they were denied everywhere. Leaders of the five parties – members of the Standing Committee, addressed Alyaksandr Lukashenka to solve the problem of the premises for the forum, Radio Svaboda informs.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:49 0 comments links to this post

Today deputy head of the Union of Poles in Belarus Wieslaw Kiewlak was released from Kastrychnitski special remand prison of Hrodna. The court found him guilt of organizing an unsanctioned protest by the Polish House in Hrodna. On that day, August 1, the UPB was visited by the deputy chairman of Polish Sejm Donald Tusk. As the building of the Polish House was encircled by policemen, the meeting took place outside the house.

“In order to wear through the day, we were reading a book by Jan Pavel [Pope John Paul] II, and discussing different topics. We prayed to go through detention safely. These 15 days of detention one thought had been disturbing me, the thought of my unfair arrest. I was taken from my family, from my three children. My youngest son turns only half a year in a couple of days. We have been deprived of our farm unjustly, and I have been fired from work unjustly. All this things were unjust,” told Wieslaw Kiewlak to Radio Svaboda after release.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:44 0 comments links to this post

President Robert Kocharian’s Western-backed efforts to amend the Armenian constitution suffered a setback on Thursday when the country’s largest opposition group vowed to campaign against the passage of his draft constitutional changes at a national referendum due in November.

The Artarutyun (Justice) bloc argued that the authorities have refused to meet any of their demands for more serious limits on the sweeping powers enjoyed by the president of the republic. Its leaders also appeared to have bridged their simmering differences on the issue that threatened the unity of the nine-party alliance.

The Artarutyun bloc has made its support for the reform conditional on the authorities’ acceptance of three specific amendments. The most important of them is the removal of a draft amendment giving the Armenian president the right to dissolve parliament if the latter twice rejects prime ministers nominated by him. Artarutyun leaders say this provision would nullify other changes giving more powers to the National Assembly.

Artarutyun also demands a direct election of the Yerevan mayor by the city residents. But Kocharian and his coalition want the mayor to be chosen by an elected municipal council. A recent opinion poll found that the overwhelming majority of Yerevan residents want their future mayors to be directly elected by voters.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:22 0 comments links to this post

Created a year ago, the website published two-minute-long animated cartoons satirizing Belarusian politicians, opposition leaders and ordinary people. Some of the cartoons were about Lukashenko and electoral fraud, Belarus' isolation and Lukashenko's well-known fondness for sports. The Third Way members drew the cartoons at home and circulated them among themselves by e-mail.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:20 0 comments links to this post

President Alyaksandr Lukashenka has issued a decree prohibiting organizations and individuals from receiving and using foreign technical assistance for purposes deemed "unconstitutional," Belapan reported on 17 August, citing the presidential press service. In particular, the decree restricts providing such assistance for seminars, conferences, and public discussions. The organizers of such events are required to apply for official permission to the Cabinet of Ministers' Commission on International Technical Cooperation and the Economy Ministry. The measure drew criticism from the opposition. "It would be more logical to ban elections altogether," United Civic Party leader Anatol Lyabedzka commented on the decree. "Nongovernmental organizations and political parties will not be able to train observers and volunteers with assistance of trainers from Lithuania, Poland, Russia, and Ukraine." However, Mikalay Astreyka, a coordinator of an election-observation network, said the decree will not affect so much election monitoring as internationally sponsored conferences. "Our election-monitoring system is based on volunteers who are not paid for their work," Astreyka said. "But the decree provides authorities with legislative tools against harmless seminars and conferences. In fact, it gives the authorities a free hand to take any action against civic society."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:17 0 comments links to this post

There will be no polling stations opening in Kazakhstan tomorrow when half the members of the Senate are selected. The general public does not have a say in who represents them in the upper house of parliament.

Of the 39 Senate seats, seven are awarded by President Nursultan Nazarbaev. Each of Kazakhstan's 14 regions has two deputies. The two largest cities -- Almaty and the capital Astana -- also have two each. It falls to regional and local officials to choose who will fill those 32 seats.

Senate elections rotate. Every three years, half the seats are up for new candidates, meaning this year only 16 deputies will be selected. Forty-one candidates were registered to participate in the selection process. Of them, 21 of them are from Otan [the ruling party].

Otan already has a majority in the Mazhilis, the lower house of parliament, and seems sure to have a majority in the upper house. Otan's dominance may play a key role in determining if Kazakhstan will next hold presidential elections in December 2006, as currently scheduled, or schedule an early vote in January 2006, when Nazarbaev's term expires.

Some in Otan have already called for early presidential elections. Perhaps for this reason, the Senate selection has piqued the interest of politics-watchers outside Kazakhstan. For the first time, according to Lazzat Suleimen, a member of the Kazakh Central Election Commission, international observers will be on hand to watch the selection process.

So international observers will be watching -- but, by contrast, there will be no Kazakh monitors. Dos Koshim is a longtime opposition activist and the head of the Independent Observers Network of Kazakhstan. He explained why his group is not interested in monitoring the Senate process.

"For five years we have stayed away from observing Senate elections," Koshim said. "The reason is because this chamber does not represent the people. That's why we refused."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:02 0 comments links to this post

Anti-Terrorist police raided last Sunday's (14 August) worship service of a registered Baptist church, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. After the service, Forum 18 was told, police questioned church members, confiscating all Turkmen-language Bibles and Hymnbooks. The police took particular interest in children at the service, and were diappointed they were in the service with parental permission. Next day, church leaders were summoned for "more thorough interrogation," and told that the Baptist Church's national state registration is "not valid for northern Turkmenistan." This claim has been made elsewhere in the country, and Baptists strongly dispute it. Police pressured church leaders to sign a declaration that the church will not meet until it had state registration. "We met for worship before 'your registration' existed, and will continue to meet now we have registration, even if you did not recognise it. And we will continue to meet in future as our faith does not depend on registration," church leaders told police.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:00 0 comments links to this post

Chief of the Interior Ministry’s Department of Constitutional Security Data Akhalaia has been accused of fabricating case against lawyer Giorgi Usupashvili, who is the brother of opposition Republic Party leader Davit Usupashvili and intimidating court executive Irakli Sioridze, the Justice Ministry’s officer who carries out court orders, to testify against Usupashvili.

The Department of Constitutional Security opened criminal case against Giorgi Usupashvili and accused him of extortion from his clients, who have been suing the Telasi electricity distribution company. Usupashvili won the case and the Telasi paid to seven plaintiffs up to 200,000 Lari, according to the court’s ruling.

“But now the law enforcers are intimidating my clients to testify against me and to say that I have taken this money and they received nothing,” Giorgi Usupashvili said in an interview with the daily Rezonansi published on August 17.

Usupashvili said that the Chief of the Interior Ministry’s Department of Constitutional Security Data Akhalaia “forces” court executive Irakli Sioridze to give evidence against him and to say that Usupashvili bribed him to “promptly execute” the court’s order in an attempt to receive money from the Telasi company.

“But Sioridze refused. Because of this refusal he was cruelly beaten up by Akhalaia and charged with misuse of power and now is under custody [Sioridze was arrested on August 3], although he is absolutely innocent,” Giorgi Usupashvili said.

In an interview with Rezonansi on August 16 Sozar Subari said that he has already launched probe into this case. “If [Sioridze and Usupashvili’s accusations against Akhalaia] are confirmed, then of course I will demand [of Akhalaia] be held accountable… But at this stage the case is not yet confirmed, as I have to listen to another side as well,” Sozar Subari said

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:54 0 comments links to this post

Investigators impounded on 17 August two computers from the Baku offices of the opposition youth group Yeni Fikir, according to Turan on 17 August and echo-az.com on 18 August. Yeni Fikir leader Ruslan Bashirli was arrested on 3 August and faces charges of plotting to overthrow the Azerbaijani leadership with financial support from Armenian intelligence.

Van den Linden said he will stress during his talks with President Ilham Aliyev the need for Azerbaijan to release all political prisoners, which was a condition of its admittance to the Council of Europe in 2001. He declined to comment on the recent attacks on the headquarters in Baku of the opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front Party (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 9 August 2005), saying only that if such attacks have indeed taken place, the Azerbaijani authorities should intervene to enforce the law "in an effective and nondiscriminatory fashion."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:38 0 comments links to this post

The investigation in the criminal case against a well-known human rights activist, deputy head of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee Harry Pahanyajla is extended. According to Radio Svaboda, the lawyer was informed about that by the Prosecutor’s Office of Minsk. Harry Pahanyajla is accused of insult of the president of Belarus, and he can be sentenced to up to 4 years of imprisonment.

The case lasts since October last year, when Pahanyajla gave an interview to a Swedish TV channel. He told about allegations that some high-ranking officials, including president Lukashenka, were involved in abductions of oppositionists.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:15 0 comments links to this post

The Belarus domestic security service — the KGB — has raided apartments of several students who had set up the Multclub web-site offering daring cartoons that featured the country’s autocratic leader, Alexander Lukashenko.r, Alexander Lukashenko, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported Wednesday.

KGB officers seized 12 computers and discs with software, according to the report.

The controversial Web site was launched by the members of the civil initiative group Trety Put (The Third Way) that unites students of Belarusian universities. The students established an animated cartoon club on the Web and posted their products on their site. The cartoons featured Alexander Lukashenko and other top government officials, opposition leaders and ordinary citizens.

KGB officers also searched apartments of cartoon-makers all of whom were questioned by investigators. One of the activists was detained but later reportedly discharged under a travel ban.

At the moment the site http://mult.3dway.org/ is blocked. It is not clear whether it has been done by the owners of the Cartoon Club or the KGB officers who attain passwords.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:11 0 comments links to this post

Unidentified persons have profaned a memorial to the victims of Nazism in the Belarus capital of Minsk.

Burnt plastic wreaths were found at the scene, vice president of the Union of Belarus Jewish Social Organizations and Communities, Yakov Basin, was quoted by Belarus media as saying. The defilers have also thrown away pebbles put in Jewish tombs to commemorate the dead. “The unknown persons have put a branch with a cluster of ashberries near the memorial and stuck a black raven’s feather into it which symbolizes the triumph of violence over life,” Basin said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:08 0 comments links to this post

Yesterday, the President of KR Kurmanbek Bakiev met the representatives of Kyrgyz Government.

At the meeting, Bakiev said: "It would be reasonable to create the constitutional meeting, which would consider rules of the basic law anew". "We should approach to a question of change of the Constitution with great responsibility. All changes should be accepted only after all-national discussion. If we change the Constitution every 2-3 years, we discredit our basic law", Bakiev said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:01 0 comments links to this post

A leading figure from the Liberty Institute has accused the head of the Shida Kartli regional police Vladimer Jugheli of holding prisoners illegally and preventing lawyers and public defenders from meeting with them.

Speaking at a press conference on August 16, Tea Tutberidze stated that lawyers were blocked from speaking with twelve detainees in Gori for more than twelve hours.

Regional police officials have not responded to the claims so far.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:59 0 comments links to this post

Five Belarusian opposition parties have so far elected 194 candidates throughout Belarus to a national congress that is to name a single opposition candidate to challenge President Alyaksandr Lukashenka in the 2006 presidential election, Belapan reported on 16 August. In the past two months the parties held more than 100 raion-level conferences involving more than 4,000 representatives of opposition forces and nongovernmental organizations, frequently under the open sky outside cities because local authorities often refuse to provide venues for such gatherings.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:56 0 comments links to this post

Rauf Arifoglu, who is a deputy chairman of the opposition Musavat party and editor of the newspaper "Yeni Musavat," has been ordered to report on 17 August to the Prosecutor General's Office to answer questions about the ongoing investigation into the 2 March murder of Elmar Huseinov, editor of the journal "Monitor," Turan reported on 16 August. In a recent issue, "Yeni Musavat" claimed that 30 million manats ($6,438) was paid for Huseinov's murder and that one of his suspected killers, Tahir Khubanov, is already dead.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:55 0 comments links to this post

Elchin Gambarov, an attorney representing Ruslan Bashirli, leader of the opposition youth group Yeni Fikir, was quoted on 17 August by echo-az.com as saying that Bashirli was systematically beaten the day following his arrest earlier this month in such a way as not to leave marks on his body. Bashirli was taken into custody on 3 August shortly after returning from a visit to Tbilisi during which -- to judge from video footage shown on Azerbaijani television -- he accepted money from men identified as Armenian intelligence agents and pledged to destabilize the political situation in Azerbaijan.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:53 0 comments links to this post

Bloc "Azadlyg" decided to postpone pickets to be held on 15, 16, 17 and18 August in front of Presidential apparatus and “YAP” buildings, deputy chairman of the PPFA-reformers Hasan Kerimov reported.
Pickets were designed to protest against campaigns of pressure and counterpropaganda against the PPFA, however, the executive power of Baku did not permit pickets. In his words, after the interference of international organizations and diplomatic corps, attacks on the PPFA subsided and no actions are held before the PPFA headquarters. In Kerimov’s words, should attacks on the PPFA continue, pickets would be held regardless of the decision of the executive power of Baku.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:43 0 comments links to this post

The August issue of the Russian edition of “Rolling Stone” magazine will not be found in Belarusian newsstands. As said by private vendors, the magazine simply had not been received by the trade. The suppliers from the Belarusian side, having received the bulk quantity of the “Rolling Stone” magazine, send it back to Russia. Retailers say that they have not seen these magazines themselves. There had not been any order by the authorities. It was idea of suppliers who had decided not to take risk. Probably, if it were not for the cover and the journalists’ tradition of catchy headlines, nobody would care for the content of the magazine. The matter is that one of the central articles of August issue is called “Belarusian order”, telling about impressions of the magazine’s reporter who visited Lukashenka’s country. The headline of the article is placed on the cover, on the third page and continues on the pages 58-65.

By agreement of the author, Boris Akimov, and the editorial office of the magazine, the Internet-portal “Tuzin hitou” (“A Dozen of Hits”) (http://music.fromby.net) placed the full article “Belarusian Order” in Belarusian translation.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:53 0 comments links to this post

On 11 August Brest District Court fined Ihar Maslouski, chair of Brest regional branch of Belarusian Helsinki Committee and Valiantsin Lazarenkau, chair of Brest regional organization of the Free Trade union of Belarus were fined 510 000 rubles for organization of summer camp.

Ihar Maslouski thinks that the police purposefully composed the reports against him and some other participants of the summer camp:
-- Such actions of the authorities are directed against certain activists of political opposition. When the police entered the hall where we held classes, they immediately called several surnames, including mine. It is clear they executed political order.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:51 0 comments links to this post

The criminal case concerning disappearance of the seal of the Union of Poles in Belarus has been initiated. On August 15 Andzelika Borys was interrogated as a witness in the police department of Lenin district of Hrodna. The interrogation lasted for about an hour and a half. It had been planned to carry out an investigative experiment, but it was cancelled later.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:50 0 comments links to this post

On Monday, August 15, the internet-site of the Young Front was blocked by unknown. According to the co-chairman of the Young Front, Zmitser Dashkevich, blocking of the site has been done by representatives of special services.

“We connect blocking of our site with the active work of the branches of the Young Front all over the country, and with a rise of our informational activities. From the beginning of the year 2004 and till 2005 the site previously found at the address www.mfront.org, was not there, as somebody had bought it over our head for the term of five years”.

“One cannot fail to notice that blocking of our site has taken place after many occasions of the United Civil Party’s site blocking. Only owing to saving the site information and quick contact with the owners of the hosting, we were able to restart the work almost immediately after blocking of our page,” Zmitser Dashkevich told.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:47 0 comments links to this post

A court in Moscow sentenced Pavel Lyuzakov, an independent journalist known for his sympathies with Chechen separatists for two years in jail on Tuesday for illegal possession and carrying of firearms, the Interfax news agency reports.

Lyuzakov, who worked as the editor in chief of the Svobodnoye Slovo (Free Word) newspaper, was arrested in January 2005 and charged with illegally carrying a handgun. Apart from working in Svobodnoye Slovo, Lyuzakov worked as a freelance columnist for the Kavkazcenter web-site — the media outlet of radical Chechen separatists. Lyuzakov’s articles clearly showed that his sympathies were with the separatists. He also used to head the Separatist newspaper and repeatedly published his own views attacking the Russian government for fighting in Chechnya.

After his arrest in January the journalist claimed that he had been framed and the gun was planted on him by security service officers.

One of Lyuzakov’s colleagues, however, recalled in a newspaper interview that Lyuzakov had been convicted at the age of 18 on charges of terrorism. “I don’t remember the details, but it had to do with weapons. He spent a couple of years in prison, and was a grown man when he got out,” the source said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:43 0 comments links to this post

For the first time in the newest history of Uzbekistan, major businessman, who is the leader of recently established new political movement Sunshine Uzbekistan, who called the government to resign, brought an action against the local newspaper.

On 11 August, Sanjar Umarov appealed to Shayhantahur district court of Tashkent with civil suit against Tashkent weekly Zerkalo XXI on levy of 50 million soums (,000 USD) for moral damages after the publication of the un-checked information, that slandered his honor, dignity and business reputation.

The article by unknown author Aziz Tangriberdiev under the title "Sly werewolf" was run in Zerkalo XXI in the beginning of August 2005. The author calls the activity of entrepreneur Sanjar Umarov "criminal" with "detractive connections" and threatens the plaintiff with words: "...only stubbing such creature (Sanjar Umarov) out of our country, we can achieve our purpose - the development of fair entrepreneurship to strenghen the economic prosperity of our country."

After Andizhan events of last May, Zerkalo XXI actively began publishing "angry" articles on oppositionists and foreign radio stations as well as major American politicians, who demanded the international investigation.

As the chief editors of all print publications of the republic are confirmed by the president`s apparatus, the editorial board of the newspaper has to publish such materials, which are brought to their office by the staff of Security services or apparatus of president. When the newspaper refuses to publish such articles, the chief editors may lose their positions.

As a rule, such articles contain references to c-asia.org, website which cooperates with Uzbek special services. The authors of these articles sign by false names.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:34 0 comments links to this post

Tadeusz Kruczkowski, an activist of the Union of Poles in Belarus (SPB) who remains loyal to the authorities, told Belapan on 15 August that he expects local SPB cells to name delegates to a repeat SPB convention before the end of this week. Kruczkowski was replaced by Anzhelika Borys as SPB leader at a congress in March, but the authorities invalidated the results of this gathering. In July, police evicted Borys from the SPB offices in Hrodna and installed Kruczkowski in her place. Kruczkowski and his supporters have arranged for a repeat SPB congress in Vaukavysk, Hrodna Oblast, on 27 August. The controversy over the SPB leadership has led to a bitter diplomatic spat between the Belarusian authorities and Warsaw, which sponsors SPB activities.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:21 0 comments links to this post

The outside world has received few accounts of life in Andijon since 12-13 May. In a series of reports broadcast on 10-12 August, RFE/RL provided a rare glimpse of the fear lurking behind the superficial normalcy that has settled over the city since the bloody events of May.

A local woman confirmed that the fear has arisen in a climate of pervasive surveillance. "People are afraid to talk," she said. "While I was riding a bus..., a woman started talking about the Andijon events. She talked about how there were brains splattered on the ground in front of the administration building and how they paid people 1,000 soms [$1] an hour to clean them up. The woman got off when she reached her house. A young guy got off after her. She didn't make it 10 meters before he handcuffed her and then they led her off somewhere."

Another woman described a similar incident. "Now there are more people in civilian clothes listening in on what people are saying," she said. "Recently, a woman was drinking carbonated water at Yangibozor [New Market] with a young child. She was telling the water vendor that the government organized the disturbances. A guy who was standing off to the side came up to the woman and pulled the woman by the hand. She started screaming. The young man pulled out a tape recorder and played back a recording of everything she'd been saying to the vendor. Then he took her away. Everyone watched."

Andijon residents told RFE/RL that torture is common, although the torturers make efforts to cover their tracks. "There's a videotape of the people who took part in the demonstration," one local said. "If the people they arrest are on the videotape, they bring them down to a cellar and beat them brutally. Even the ones who aren't on the tape get beaten. Afterward, they make them sign a statement saying that they didn't harm them before they let them go."

Another woman recounted one case of torture that ended in death of a teenager. "He went out to watch on [13 May] and got shot in the shoulder," she said. "They brought the child to a clinic. After he'd been lying there for three days, they brought him to the police. Despite his wound, they stuck him in a filthy room for three days. There were so many people there wasn't enough room to sit or lie down. They really made this poor kid suffer. Then they gave him an injection and sent him home. After that they called him in for interrogation every day. That shot they gave him must have been a lethal injection, since he died after about a month and a half. The wound never healed and his bones crumbled. The day before he died, he told how he'd been tortured. Even though it's shameful, I'll say it: They sodomized him with a piece of metal and a billy club. While the child was in the hospital, he'd told people that the soldiers shot him. When they tortured him, they said it was so that he wouldn't tell anyone else."

Another person told RFE/RL that once someone is imprisoned, appeals are useless. "They arrested my son and took him away from the house," the local said. "At the police station, he was forced to confess. His wife is at home with three children. Even if I wanted to look after them, I still have children of my own who aren't married yet. You know what the economy's like. Who's going to listen to our appeal? Who's going to defend us? We encounter oppression at every turn. The women are fed up; I mean, the women of those who are in prison. All of the adults know why the economy's so bad. Everyone's smart enough to figure it out. These men who are making life hard for the women, I wonder how they square it with their conscience. We say that our ruler is just, but I can't figure out how that's so. He's only just to those who help him. He hasn't achieved any justice for Muslims. But if people talk about this, they disappear along with their children and grandparents."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:17 0 comments links to this post

Russia's Supreme Court today lifted a ban on the radical National Bolshevik Party.


In June, a Moscow court ordered the party to disband. Prosecutors had argued the group violated registration procedures and was involved in extremist activities.

The party has attracted wide attention with demonstrations and pranks. Thirty-nine of its activists are currently on trial for seizing a government building in December.

It claims a total of some 17,000 representatives in 57 Russian regions.

The National Bolshevik Party numbers about 17,500 activists with an average age of 20. They are best known for their colorful antics — hitting politicians with tomatoes, mayonnaise, eggs and carnations — to protest against President Vladimir Putin’s policies on social benefits, housing and electoral reform.

The party was founded in 1994. It was first regarded as a countercultural oddity with neo-fascist and nationalist ideas. Now, its leader, writer Eduard Limonov, quoted by Washington Post calls his group a “classical left-wing party.”

The party’s leader, writer Eduard Limonov, was detained in 2001 on charges of planning terrorist acts, establishing armed units and illegal storage of arms. He was released after 30 months.

Dozens of party members are currently detained for attacking state buildings.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:15 0 comments links to this post

Jehovah's Witnesses have told Forum 18 News Service that they can see a pattern of obstruction to their regional congresses. This month (August 2005), for example, an Arkhangelsk newspaper asked "Is there really anything to stop Jehovists from killing hundreds of people - in Arkhangelsk, for example - in the name of a deity or some crazy idea?" Two attempts to rent buildings for a regional congress in the city were thwarted. At the third venue, police stepped onto the stage demanding that all 714 delegates leave "in view of the threat of terrorist attacks." Police then began to conduct a search, and a fire department inspector announced that the building was unsafe. When Jehovah's Witnesses refused to leave, the fire inspector ordered the stage lighting and then the entire electricity supply to be switched off. A Jehovah's Witness speaker continued by torchlight and the police couldn't search the building in darkness, so power was switched back on. The fire inspector then ordered the building's closure. Arkhangelsk regional public prosecutor's office told Forum 18 that they are investigating the Jehovah's Witnesses' complaint.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:14 0 comments links to this post

Ferghana.Ru: What claims do the Uzbek authorities make on Forum 18?

Igor Rotar: No claims at all. I was not officially charged. I was kept in what was essentially custody for two days despite my regular demands to explain their motives and permit me to call embassies. I'm an employee of a Norwegian organization and a citizen of Russia but I was not permitted to call the Russian Embassy or the US Embassy. (Norway does not have an embassy in Uzbekistan, you know.) By the way, I surely appreciate the trouble taken by the US Embassy. An American diplomat came over five times. Unfortunately, he was not permitted to talk to me even through the glass. I was always led away. No explanations were offered for two days in a row. Afterwards, I was led to meet with some men who I think were from the Uzbek KGB. They introduced themselves as immigration officials but they had known details of my private life in Tashkent. In fact, they even implied that they had fought in Andizhan. So, these men just told me, "How much longer do you plan to irritate us? Get a ticket and get out, or stay here to face the music..." That's what I was told.

Ferghana.Ru: Has sheer strength been applied?

Igor Rotar: This is what they did. When I objected that I was not permitted to call the embassy, they told me that officially I did not exist. I do not understand this logic. They said, "You have not crossed the border. Formally, you are not on the territory of Uzbekistan." This was their logic. Other passengers were not permitted to approach me, and border guards did not answer my questions. As I see it, it was intended as psychological pressure. Whenever I tried to call the embassy, they wrestled the cell phone from me.

Ferghana.Ru: Did they?

Igor Rotar: Yes. I'm not saying they battered me or something. No. They treated me politely otherwise, they even permitted me to dine in the restaurant. But even when I needed to go to the bathroom, a border guard accompanied me. He never said anything, he was just a constant presence hovering nearby. By the way, the man himself felt awkward. He said once that I was not to call anyone and that it was not his decision. "Igor-aka," he said, "you are not supposed to call anyone." And "No, I cannot give you any information." They urged me to buy a ticket and depart every half hour. I kept on refusing. I insisted on official deportation.

Ferghana.Ru: How did the Uzbek authorities know who to detain? Had you been under surveillance since Bishkek?

Igor Rotar: The National Security Service has a black list of unwanted persons. All four years of my being the Central Asian correspondent, border guards on the Uzbek border have always been extremely polite and asked me to wait a bit. They call the National Security Service and wave me through only after a call. I crossed the border on at least 30 occasions already. They made a slip a couple of times and admitted that my name was on the black list. I knew it. They were smart enough before the events in Andizhan and never kicked up a scandal. They merely kept me under surveillance. Border guards called secret services and let me through. This was the first time I was detained. "Patience of the Uzbek people has run out," these alleged representatives of the immigration service told me. They added that I was the worst slanderer of all. I was told it by one of the men who threatened me.

Ferghana.Ru: How did the state of affairs with human rights in Uzbekistan change with the events in Andizhan? What shall we expect from thee Uzbek authorities in this sphere now?

Igor Rotar: At least four embassies made inquiries concerning my detention - embassies of the United States, Switzerland, Norway, and Russia. Russia was the least active, by the way. I'm ashamed of being a citizen of Russia. It was the Americans who defended me. An official of the US Embassy came on five occasions. He said afterwards that when they had called and demanded explanations, the men on the other end of the line replied that the matter was handled on a higher level and hang on. When I told the men who had detained me that it was stupid and could damage Uzbekistan's image in the eyes of the West, they said that they did not give a damn. Before the events in Andizhan, Uzbekistan made at least a half-hearted effort not to encroach on human rights openly. Afterwards, after Andizhan and the demands to the Americans to withdraw their base, the authorities must have decided to do away with this camouflage.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:13 0 comments links to this post

Azerbaijani Prosecutor-General Zakir Qaralov today warned former President Ayaz Mutalibov and another prominent political exile against returning to Azerbaijan to take part in the 6 November legislative elections, saying they would face immediate arrest.


Addressing reporters in Baku, Qaralov said nothing prevented Mutalibov and former parliament speaker Rasul Quliyev from being registered as candidates in the upcoming polls. But he said both men, who are wanted for allegedly plotting against the state, would be detained upon their arrival.

Mutalibov, who served as president in 1991-92, has been
iving in exile in Russia since his resignation.

Quliyev is the chairman of Azerbaijan's Democratic Party. He has been living in exile since 1996.

The Council of Europe has long been pressing council member Azerbaijan to allow both men return and take part in the country's political life.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:01 0 comments links to this post

Azerbaijani Prosecutor-General Zakir Qaralov today accused unspecified political groupings of plotting to forcibly come to power.


Addressing reporters in Baku, Qaralov said his office had collected evidence showing that some "radical forces" were contemplating seizing power through unconstitutional means.

Qaralov gave no further details, but warned that any attempt at toppling President Ilham Aliyev's government would be met "adequately."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:59 0 comments links to this post

Akhali Taoba writes that opposition political parties have become suspicious of a "political terror" in the country and the Republican Party is not exempt. The article says the Republican Party has become suspicious of a political terror since a criminal case was filed against party leader David Usupashvili's brother.

According to Akhali Taoba, Republicans make other accusations against the government. They say law enforcement bodies have detained and severely beat a staff member of the Ministry of Justice. Khidasheli stated that he had been tortured to give the evidence against David Usupashvili's brother.
The paper states Republicans aren't going to be silent about the incident and threaten to declare what has happened throughout the world. The paper reports that they demand the government to abstain from carrying similar actions since political revenge will not be of any help to them.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:56 0 comments links to this post

Yektan Turkyilmaz, a Turkish scholar who was arrested in Armenia two months ago, walked free from a court in Yerevan on Tuesday after being given a two-year suspended prison sentence for attempting to illegally take old Armenian books out of the country.

The court in the city’s Malatia-Sebastia district convicted Turkyilmaz of two counts of smuggling but chose not to imprison him at the last-minute request of state prosecutors that cited his partial acknowledgement of his guilt and cooperation with investigators. The doctoral student of the U.S. Duke University will have to stay in Armenia until the verdict’s formal entry into force on August 31. He will then be free to leave the country and visit it again.

“I’m now free, right?” an incredulous Turkyilmaz asked journalists that surrounded him immediately after the announcement of the ruling. “I am happy to be free,” he said after hearing a positive answer. “I now want to concentrate on my doctoral dissertation. I was, I am and I will remain a friend of the Armenians.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:53 0 comments links to this post

The Moscow Center for Human Rights on Monday released a report on the growth of racial, ethnic and religious discrimination in the first half of 2005. But human rights activists at a news conference called to discuss the report expressed as much concern over the self-professed anti-fascism of the pro-Kremlin Nashi youth movement as they did over ultranationalist groups.

"I'm convinced that Nashi is a fascist organization acting under the banner of anti-fascism," said Vladimir Ilyushenko, a political analyst. He said that he considered the group's role in supporting Kremlin interests comparable to that of the Hitler Youth.

"Look at whom they condemn as fascists: Irina Khakamada, Vladimir Ryzhkov; Gary Kasparov -- the whole row of liberal politicians," he said.

In speeches and pamphlets, Nashi has attacked liberal politicians as agents of Western influence and has blamed them for a decline in Russia's international prestige. Nashi has also targeted oligarchs and bureaucrats.

Ilyushenko attributed the appearance of the movement to political inactivity by the cultural elite. "Our intelligentsia, our artists, our writers, are all in such a fearful state that they won't speak out against the threat of fascism themselves," he said. "Against that background, pseudo-intellectual fascist organizations like Nashi appear."

Alla Gerber, president of the Holocaust Foundation, said, "What is most frightening about Nashi is the implicit division of the population into who is 'us' and who is not. That can take a dangerous turn at any time."

Nashi's press secretary, Ivan Mostovich, denied that the movement had ever labeled particular politicians fascists. "When we say 'us,' we mean anyone who lives and works for the good of our country," he said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:45 0 comments links to this post

Yukos' former head Mikhail Khodorkovsky, currently being held at the Matrosskaya Tishina preliminary detention center, now has 16 cellmates, Khodorkovsky's lawyer Anton Drel told Interfax on Monday.

On August 12, it was reported that Khodorkovsky had been moved to a 13-men cell.

Drel complained that his client had not been receiving any newspapers and that the cell's TV set was in poor condition and impossible to watch.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:31 0 comments links to this post

The Economic Court of Minsk ruled to evict the Belarusian Free Trade Union from the office situated in the building № 24 in Zakharau Street, in behalf of the renter, the Housing maintenance and municipal services division of the Partyzan district of the capital.

This decision was passed on August 9. Later the leadership of the Housing maintenance and municipal services division prolonged the contract of tenancy with the Free Trade Union for three months. After that however, they cancelled the contract and demanded to leave the premises. The Belarusian Free Trade Union has been occupying these premises for 10 years.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 14:20 0 comments links to this post

On August 12 an action in support of independent newspapers “Barysauskiya Naviny” and “Kurjer iz Borisova” was held in Barysau. First these newspapers were denied distribution through the state network, and later it was forbidden to sell them in the streets. Barysau oppositionists demand to stop pressure on independent newspapers. The journalists of “Barysauskiya Naviny” and “Kurjer iz Borisova”, as well as several dozens of activists of the youth movement “Zubr” and the “Young Front”, civil initiative “Volat” gathered in the central square of the town, in front of the city executive committee. In their hands protesters were holding issues of independent newspapers, popular among the inhabitants of the town.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:28 0 comments links to this post

August, 15 is the birthday of the Belarusian political prisoner, chairman of the All-National Strike Committee of Vendors, member of the Council of Civil Initiatives “Free Belarus” Valery Levaneuski. He turns 42 today. Family and relatives, activists of the All-National Strike Committee, the steering committee, the press center of the Charter’97, the Council of the Civil Initiatives “Free Belarus”, colleagues and friends, businessmen and vendors wish him health, courage in his struggle for freedom and democracy in Belarus, and also a quick release.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:26 0 comments links to this post

Today members of the “Young Front” will meet their Zmitser Dashkevich and Artur Finkevich, who are to be released after a 10-days arrest for unsanctioned picket in front of the Polish Embassy in Minsk on August 5. The picket was held under the motto of Polish-Belarusian solidarity.

Political prisoners are traditionally met near the gate of the special detention center not only by fellow party members. There were occasions when policemen transported prisoners from the detention center to a police department two hours before the end of the term, in order to spoil the celebratory meeting. Once members of the Young Front ordered an orchestra to the Akrestsyn Street. Their friends were met under white-red-white flags, Radio Svaboda reminds.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:18 0 comments links to this post

The former leader of the Solidarity movement in Poland has said he would support a people`s revolution in neighbouring Belarus. Lech Walesa who won a Nobel Peace Prize and went on to become Poland`s president, was speaking on the 25th anniversary of the union`s founding. In an interview for the BBC`s "World This Weekend" program, he said Belarus should expect no support from the West. He said the European Union should be ready to support a reformed Belarus.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:12 0 comments links to this post

The office of the Kazakh international bureau on human rights and the rule of law in Almaty, the republic’s capital, was robbed over last weekend, Interfax reported Monday.

“A total of six monitors and 13 processors were stolen from the office and papers were strewn in many office rooms,” Zhemis Turmagambetova, deputy director of the organization, was quoted by Interfax as saying.

She thinks the robbers did not rob the office equipment to sell the stolen equipment. “I cannot say that the office was robbed with the aim of selling or reselling the equipment: the fax machines, telephones and printers that remained were intact. They are also valuable things,” she said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:58 0 comments links to this post

The number of people with racist views in Russia has increased by more than 20 million, a respected daily reported Monday citing the results of a survey carried out by the All-Russian Public Opinion Center (VTsIOM).

The survey revealed that the number of people with these views had gone up from 11% to 16% within a year, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported. The Levada Analytical Center said its research showed that 58% of Russians supported the idea of a “Russia for Russians.”

The Levada Center said 25% of Russians would back a ban on non-ethnic Russians occupying senior civil service posts. Nearly 30% said they would approve of moving Caucasus and Chinese people from the territories that historically belonged to Russia. Another 31% of Russians suggested, “the number of non-ethnic Russians living in Russian cities should be limited.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:53 0 comments links to this post

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov has decided to create in Moscow a youth TV channel with a strong ideological trait, Kommersant learnt. The channel will be bankrolled by the Moscow Government. The new project will come as a part of a massive propaganda campaign to suppress “orange sentiments” among the youth. Experts suppose, though, that the mayor may use a teenager resource for his political ends as well.

The special channel is only a part of a large-scale “youth campaign” of the Moscow mayor. It was officially launched in late July when Moscow mayor signed an instruction to set up the Civil Relief youth movement and allocated for it 3 million rubles from the city coffers. An array of steps to “improve social work with young people in Moscow” will be considered at the city government’s session on September 13, according to Kommersant. The draft program sets its goals with an extreme frankness. The Moscow Government is going to cut short “orange sentiments” in the youth environment. “The participation of students in color revolutions in Georgia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan proves the fact that destructives forces may take advantage of the youth, who do not receive enough of the authorities’ attention, to disrupt public peace and order,” the document runs. More than 130 million rubles is to be allocated from the city budget to carry out the program. Most substantial sums, over 60.5 million rubles, are to be assigned for the IT and mass media committee. What is more, it is not a budget of new mass media, but funds for the development of new projects, a source of Kommersant in the government said.

“This is going to be mainly an interactive channel with live stand-ups from youth venues, like Pushkinskaya square, universities and night clubs,” Dmity Vityutnev, deputy head of the youth policy committee, says. Movers of the project say there are going to be many movies, musical programs and even news, whose “ideology” the Moscow government will take on.

Experts of media market do not highly estimate the prospects of this format. “All TV channels are now fighting for young people but they prefer not to watch TV and have fun somewhere else,” analysts say.

The Kremlin is not of high opinion of the idea either. “This is crap,” says a high-placed source of Kommersant in the presidential administration. “The cable is a highly isolated chain of poor quality. The Moscow authorities will certainly try and “gather it together” by dictator methods. The Moscow government’ endeavors are basically viewed as an attempt to join the popular federal “youth” trend. But, to say the truth, Moscow has started suppressing “orange sentiments” extremely late.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:47 0 comments links to this post

Yevgeny Adamov, former Russian atomic energy minister, believes that there are political motives behind the criminal charges being brought against him.

"It is high time to realize that there are several clearly political messages being masked by criminal packaging," he states in an article published in the daily Izvestia on Monday.

Adamov referred to former American ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow who had called the case purely criminal and who immediately demanded greater access to Russian nuclear facilities.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:44 0 comments links to this post

Chairman of the Central Electoral Commission of the KR Tuigunaaly Abdraimov met with International Aide of the UNDP Project for Elections Oscar Lenner on August 11, 2005.

The two discussed cooperation perspective of the UNDP “Support of democratic elections in the Kyrgyz Republic” Election Project, and approved a plan of joint activities for the nearest future.

The CEC Chairman told Mr. Lennon about activities planned by the CEC, including forming of a work group on drawing out of amendments and additions to the KR Election Code, with involvement of UNDP, OSCE experts and lawyers of Kyrgyztsan and Russia. Amendments to the Electioon Code are expected to be submitted for discussion of the Jogorku Kenesh after the Constitutional reforms.

Among primary tasks on improvement of election systems is creation of a training center for observers and members of constituencies.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:29 0 comments links to this post

The General Prosecutor’s office reported on August 13 that a sort of lea bargain has been reached in the case of ex-President of the Georgian Football Federation Merab Zhordania. Zhordania was released after paying to the government an unspecified amount of money, which he allegedly misappropriated while serving as the president of the Tbilisi football club Dynamo. Zhordania has already been arrested once for tax evasion.

The system of plea bargaining, where former officials suspected of corruption are released without trial after agreeing to pay money, has been widely used since Saakashvili’s government came to power in 2003.

The system was criticized by the Council of Europe and the Georgian authorities pledged to cease this practice.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:04 0 comments links to this post

The Uzbek government has now (13 August) officially deported Forum 18 News Service's Central Asia Correspondent, Igor Rotar, after detaining him without justification at Tashkent Airport on 11 August. The detention was ordered, so Forum 18 was told, "for political reasons at the highest levels," on the instructions of the National Security Service secret police. Initially the Uzbek intention was to try and force Igor to buy his own ticket out and claim that he was not deported, but his principled strong objections to this tactic resulted in his official deportation. Igor Rotar's unjustified detention in Uzbekistan attracted strong expressions of support and concern from a wide range of individuals, human rights organisations, foreign ministries and news and other international organisations.
Forum 18 and Igor Rotar would like to say a very big THANK YOU to everyone who by their prayers and practical actions helped end this totally unjustified detention.
The case has shown how religious freedom is an excellent "litmus test" of the state of human rights, and attention should remain on the extremely grave human rights situation still faced by Uzbekistan's people.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:30 0 comments links to this post

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: We were invited to attend the conference titled “Democracy without Borders.” However, no conference took place. There were no German representatives, nor people from abroad. There were Georgian Merabi and Armenians only.

INVESTIGATOR: I’d like to show you an article in “Azadlyg” of 2 August 2005 titled “Ruslan Bashirly held important meetings in Georgia.” The article said that chairman of “Yeni fikir” had allegedly spoken at the regional conference in Georgia, touching upon democratization problems in Azerbaijan. If there had not been any conference at all, what goal did you pursue when published such an article?

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: I went to Georgia to take part in the event. So it was natural for me to return home saying that the conference did take place and I took part in its work.

INVESTIGATOR: You should not have told lies. Why did you misinform mass media as saying that you attended the conference, spoke there and even met with senior officials?

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: There was no conference. A month ago, our movement went on hunger strike due to the dismissal of Namik Feyziyev from the institute. International organizations showed interest in this action. A certain Merabi Jibutia came from Georgia. He visited participants of the strike as saying that he was a leader of a Georgian NGO. He insisted that he was a member of Saakashvili’s team. He promised to organize our trip to Georgia and help us.

INVESTIGATOR: Where did you meet with him?

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: At a tea-house near Nizami cinema theater.

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: We introduced him to chairman of the PPFA Ali Kerimly, and Merabi had a 50-60 minutes talks with him.

INVESTIGATOR: Have you maintained contacts with Merabi?

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: Yes, he E-mailed me twice and phoned.

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: After his departure he phoned Ruslan and spoke to him. It was me or Said who interpreted the conversation, since Ruslan is not proficient in Russian.

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: Merabi asked me to give him my passport for allegedly for registration. I declined from giving my passport to him as saying that I was going to return to Baku this evening. No meeting took place.

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: Then Merabi came to the hotel and asked us to give him our passports allegedly for legalization of a grant. He took our passports and said he would return in several hours. He returned but without our passports. He explained the delay that there were no officials to register us, so I’ll give them back to you tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. However, I insisted that we need passports now. Merabi said something in Georgian to his driver; he went away and returned in 20-30 minutes with our passports.

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: Merabi suggested us to go and see his office. We agreed.

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: On 29 July at 12-13 p.m. Merabi’s driver and the bodyguard arrived as saying that Merabi had a meeting at the Presidential apparatus. In 30-40 minutes Merabi came together with a tall, stout man. In Merabi’s words, this was a businessman. Finally, we went to the office.

INVESTIGATOR: What was his name?

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: George. Then we went to the office.

RUSLAN BASHIRLY: Merabi said I’d like to do you a friendly service. I know that your wedding is approaching. So I’d like to help with your wedding, on the one had, and develop democracy in your country, on the other hand. I said nothing. When we entered the room, George took money out of his pocket and gave it to Osman as saying they are designed for democracy development. Osman gave money to me.

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: He gave $2,000 to Ruslan and demanded a receipt from him. Ruslan signed the receipt, which said that $2,000 had been given to the youth movement “Yeni fakir.”

INVESTIGATOR: What else did they say?

OSMAN ALIMURADOV: George added that in 12-15 days I will give another $20,000 or more. Your organization, he stressed, will be receiving $2,000 monthly. If necessary, we can provide you with weapons and ammunition arrange provocations, violate cease-fire regime in Nagorno Karabakh. Also, the Armenian party may arrange a mutiny against Aliyev’s regime. We are in position to do all that. We want you to come to power and create all necessary conditions for us to do business in oil area. Ruslan Bashirly promised him to comply with all his requests. Also, Bashirly added he would inform Kerimly about these $2,000, as well as about $20,000 to be received later. I’ll invite you to Baku and introduce you to him.

INVESTIGATOR: What mutiny or revolution did they hint at?


OSMAN ALIMURADOV: The point was about the Parliamentary elections. Ruslan said that the elections would be held on 6 November and on 7-8 November we would come to power i.e., the “orange revolution.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:18 0 comments links to this post

Police will prevent all future unsanctioned protest actions, Interior Minister Ramil Usubov told reporters on Friday.

The Minister said that if major opposition Popular Front Party (PFPA) wants to hold any protest over the recent arrest of youth movement chairman Ruslan Bashirli, it may proceed strictly with the permission of the mayor’s office.

Usubov said that only sanctioned protests will be allowed. The opposition’s August 27 rally will be given a go-ahead as well, he added.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:15 0 comments links to this post

The Ukrainian and Georgian presidents today called for the setting up of a new regional alliance that would champion freedom and democracy in their countries and throughout the region.

Ukraine's Viktor Yushchenko and Georgia's Mikhail Saakashvili said in a statement that the Commonwealth of Democratic Choice will become a powerful tool for promoting human rights.

They said the new alliance would be inaugurated at a summit in Ukraine this fall and invited the United States, the European Union, and Russia to attend as observers. The two said that the new grouping would unite democracies of the Baltic, Black Sea, and Caspian regions, but wouldn't elaborate which specific nations could join.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 11:06 0 comments links to this post

Lawmaker of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly has brought in an initiative to change the Russian Constitution provisions on the third presidential term.

Igor Rimmer made a project of a bill on an amendment to the Constitution in order to increase the terms of the Russian president’s authorities.

Rimmer’s version of this amendment reads that “one and the same person cannot hold the post of the Russian president for more than three consecutive terms,” Interfax news agency reported.

Earlier, a group of deputies of the local legislature in the Russian Far East region of Primorye had drafted amendments to the Constitution enabling Putin to run for the third term.

Putin has recently said that he “maybe would like to” (run for president in 2008) but the Constitution did not permit to do so.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 10:45 0 comments links to this post

At the Ukrainian Embassy in Tel Aviv, cultural attache Maksym Osavoliuk said on Wednesday that his government would investigate the incident.

"Our official stance is to fight anti-Semitism and xenophobia as much as possible," he said.

Jewish organizations, meanwhile, warned of a possible escalation in anti-Semitism. Only a few weeks ago in the eastern city of Dnepropetrovsk, two synagogues were vandalized.

Those involved are tied to the Interregional Academy of Personnel Management (known in Ukraine by its acronym, MAUP), a sizable college and unabashedly anti-Semitic publishing house. MAUP recently presented a blacklist of "media and organizations who distribute and defend or support Jewish racism, Judeo-Nazism and Jewish organized crime in Ukraine." In June, its conference titled "Dialogue of Civilizations: Zionism as the Greatest Threat to Contemporary Civilization" attracted the likes of white supremacist and former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.

The letter could revive concerns about Yushchenko's commitment to protecting the country's Jewish population.

According to The Kyiv (Kiev) Post, Yushchenko, Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk and Finance Minister Viktor Pynzenyk have previously served on MAUP's board of trustees. Some Jewish groups defended Yushchenko, however, noting that he had gone to Auschwitz for the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of its liberation, and that he joins a Kiev synagogue each year to light Hanukka candles.
One of Yushchenko's defenders was Ukrainian Chief Rabbi Yaakov Bleich, who told The Jerusalem Post in March that Yushchenko "is definitely not anti-Semitic, but he is maybe too tolerant of people who are."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 10:39 0 comments links to this post

A leader of Belarus' ethnic Polish minority has been given a second 15-day prison term, in an apparent escalation of tension with the authorities.
Tadeusz Gawin, the former head of the Union of Poles, was accused of beating his cell mate - a claim he denies.

He was initially jailed for 15 days for arranging a meeting between a visiting Polish MP and ethnic Polish activists.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 10:33 0 comments links to this post

Chairman of major opposition Musavat party Isa Gambar has invited President Ilham Aliyev to dialogue.

Although the authorities should be the most interested side in the dialogue, they intend to breach it by making meaningless arguments, he said. Leaders of political parties included in the Azadlig (Freedom) bloc, who also comprises major opposition Popular Front and Azerbaijan Democratic Parties, met at the Musavat office on Thursday.

Gambar told a news briefing after the meeting that the bloc’s rally scheduled for August 27, the Armenia-Azerbaijan talks on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement, the authorities-opposition dialogue and changes to election commissions were discussed.

The opposition leaders also considered issuing identity cards to citizens, voter lists and the recent arrest of Ruslan Bashirli, chairman of the Yeni Fikir youth movement charged with cooperating with Armenian secret service.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 10:24 0 comments links to this post

Charges of grave crimes including terrorism and brigandage were pressed against a prominent Tajik oppositionist, leader of the Democratic Party of Tajikistan.

Makhmadruzi Iskandarov's saga resembles a mystery novel. Charges of terrorism, brigandage, dereliction of duty, forgery, illegal possession of arms, illegal bodyguards, abuse of power, and embezzlement were pressed against Iskandarov last autumn. The authorities, however, failed to arrest him in Tajikistan at once.

Iskandarov turned up in Moscow where he was arrested on the request from the Tajik Prosecutor General's Office in December. Russian law enforcement agencies found no reasons for his extradition, however, and Iskandarov was released from detention cell on April 3, 2005. Iskandarov even sent a letter of appreciation to the president of Russia.

This state of affairs did not last. The opposition leader was abducted from the town of Korolev near Moscow on April 15. Ten days later Tajik Prosecutor General Bobodzhon Bobokhonov announced that Iskandarov had been arrested in Dushanbe on April 22 and put into a detention cell of the State Security Ministry.

Iskandarov's trial began last week. The defendant looked cheerful to camera crews (journalists were granted permission to attend the hearing). Prosecution was the first to address judges. Mekhrodzh Khakimov of the Prosecutor General's Office presented the bill of indictment. Not everything went smoothly. Khakimov said for example that the defendant had been arrested in Russia with a forged Russian passport. It collided with Bobokhonov's statement to the effect that the arrest had been made in Dushanbe.

In fact, the prosecution made a mess even of the forged passport episode. It does have Iskandarov's photo but he himself never put his signature on the document. It means that every expertise will inevitably proclaim the signature forged. In fact, whoever arranged all of that did not even bother to invent a plausible Russian name for Iskandarov. The passport with his photo was forged with the unlikely name of Gennadi Nikolayevich Beelinov. "Why not Megaphonov?" Dododzhon Atovulloyev, Chairman of the Forum of Democratic Forces of Central Asia, sneered. [Beeline and Megaphone are two major operators in the market of cell communications in Russia - Tr.]

Iskandarov's lawyers asked the Supreme Court to give them time to get acquainted with new materials. The Supreme Court obliged despite protestations from the Prosecutor General's Office.

The next hearing took place on Wednesday. It began with a scandal. Iskandarov told judges that his confession the prosecution was referring to had been obtained under torture. The defendant said that he had been tortured and deprived of food and sleep in the detention cell. Witnesses the prosecution had counted on either never turned up or denounced their former testimony. Atovulloyev is convinced, however, that the outcome is clear and conviction of the leader of the Democratic Party of Tajikistan is just a matter of time.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:22 0 comments links to this post

Raffi Hovannisian, a prominent Armenian opposition politician, on Friday strongly condemned the arrest and prosecution of Turkish historian Yektan Turkyilmaz, saying that it is dealing a “powerful blow” to the long-running efforts at international recognition of the Armenian genocide.

Hovannisian, who served as Armenia’s first foreign minister in 1991-92 and now leads an opposition party called Zharangutyun (Heritage), believes that the scholar was simply not aware of Armenian customs regulations. “I think Yektan violated the Armenian laws apparently without realizing that,” he said. “Let him and his colleagues know and respect those laws from now on. They must also be free to access our state archive. The matter should not have reached the court in the first place.”

Similar arguments have been made by more than 200 Turkish, U.S. and Armenian scholars that have signed an open letter to President Robert Kocharian calling for their colleague’s immediate release. Kocharian has still not reacted to the letter.

Among its signatories is Richard Hovannisian, the Zharangutyun leader’s father and a prominent U.S. historian of Armenian descent. He has even offered to post bail to secure Turkyilmaz’s release pending trial. The U.S.-born ex-minister said the authorities not only rejected the offer but also reneged on their pledge to allow his father to visit Turkyilmaz in a maximum security jail in Yerevan.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:08 0 comments links to this post

A Turkish scholar facing up to eight years in prison for trying to take old books out of Armenia insisted on his innocence in a Yerevan court on Friday as prosecutors pressed the unusually harsh smuggling charges leveled against him.

Yektan Turkyilmaz, who was arrested at Yerevan’s Zvartnots airport almost two months ago, pleaded not guilty to the most serious of the accusations and reiterated that he was unaware of an Armenian law that requires a government permission for the export of such books and other “cultural values” from the country.

That the ex-KGB was instrumental in Turkyilmaz’s arrest and prosecution was confirmed at the trial. It emerged that NSS officers stopped Turkyilmaz and had customs officers double-check his baggage just as he was about to board the Istanbul-bound plane. It is not clear what prompted them to do that. The Turkish national had already passed customs and passport control and checked in his two suit cases where most of the books were later found stashed.

The very fact of NSS agents checking a foreign passenger is extraordinary in itself. Sources familiar with the case told RFE/RL earlier that the security agency initially suspected Turkyilmaz of espionage but lacked the evidence to prosecute him on relevant charges. Piloyan refused to comment on the claims. The prosecutor also said NSS officers involved in the arrest will not testify at the trial.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:07 0 comments links to this post

Andrzej Pisalnik, spokesman for the Union of Belarusian Poles (SPB), was released from a detention center in Lida, Hrodna Oblast, on 11 August, Belapan reported. Pisalnik, who is also editor in chief of the SPB newspaper "Glos znad Niemna," had served a 10-day sentence on charges of organizing an unauthorized demonstration in the city of Shchuchyn in July and disobeying police orders. Also on 11 August, SPB magazine "Magazyn Polski" Editor Andrzej Poczobut was released from the Lida detention center. Poczobut served a 15-day sentence on charges of organizing the same demonstration for which the authorities punished Pisalnik. Meanwhile, Belarusian border guards on 10 August confiscated video and audio tapes from Mikolaj Wawrzeniuk, a journalist for Polish Television, who was returning from Hrodna in Belarus to Bialystok in Poland and possessed the required accreditation for working in Belarus. The seized recordings reportedly included interviews with SPB activists.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:04 0 comments links to this post

Unidentified individuals systematically combed two Baku shopping centers on 10 August, demanding that shop owners voluntarily hand over all items of clothing and accessories colored orange or be required to report to local police, Turan reported. The confiscated goods were then burned on an adjacent lot. Customs officials are similarly demanding that importers hand over orange articles. In a mark of solidarity with the Orange Revolution in Ukraine last winter, numerous participants in recent opposition demonstrations in Azerbaijan have donned orange shirts.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:02 0 comments links to this post

Sarvan Sarkhanov, a member of the opposition youth group Yeni Fikir, whose leader Ruslan Bashirli has been charged with plotting to overthrow the Azerbaijani leadership, was summoned on 11 August to the Prosecutor-General's Office, Turan reported. Investigators demanded that Sarkhanov provide testimony incriminating Azerbaijan Fopular Front Party Chairman Ali Kerimli, whom the authorities depict as Bashirli's mentor. Sarkhanov was beaten and threatened with arrest when he refused to comply with that demand but subsequently released.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:01 0 comments links to this post

Igor Rotar, Forum 18 News Service's Central Asia correspondent, is still today (12 August) being held at Tashkent airport. Forum 18 has been told by reliable sources that the detention was "for political reasons at the highest levels," on the instructions of the National Security Service secret police. International condemnation of the detention is growing, as Igor Rotar is a respected religious freedom journalist. Rachel Denber of Human Rights Watch stated that "this is an ugly situation, and it is in line with the repressive measures that this government has taken against the media and freedom of religion." Alex Lupis of the Committee to Protect Journalists said that "we are very concerned for Rotar's safety and call on the Uzbek authorities to release him and to end their campaign of harassment and intimidation against the independent media." Amnesty International told Forum 18 that it "is concerned for his safety and see his detention as part of a wave of intimidation and harassment of journalists and human rights defenders by the authorities of Uzbekistan." The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and diplomats from a number of countries continue to closely follow the detention.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:51 0 comments links to this post

Representatives of civil society in Belarus and the Executive Council of the Rada of the Belarusian Republic are appealing to the European Commission (EC, executive arm of the European Union) and the German government-connected international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle Radio, to correct their recent decision to start broadcasting to Belarus in the Russian language, instead of using the native language of the country.

The EC recently held a tender to broadcasters for a contract to launch a daily, 30-minute news-and-analysis radio program to Belarus, to be aired in the Russian language. The project forms part of the European Union's stated intention to create alternative and accessible information sources for Belarus (an intention that in turn forms part of the EU's draft action plan to promote democracy in Belarus). However, the EC provides a meager €138,000 annually for the radio project. DW plans to launch the program in September through its Russian-language service.

That choice of language has been met with consternation and criticism from Belarusian democratic opposition and intelligentsia representatives. An appeal from those circles, penned by Popular Front leader Vintsuk Vyachorka and prominent analyst Vital Silitski, notes that the decision reflects a "complete misunderstanding" of the potential for revival of the democratic nation in Belarus. Referring to the experience of post-Soviet transformation, the appeal notes, "The recovery of national identity is a key factor in the democratization of any nation." President Alexander Lukashenka's regime understands this fact and is therefore discriminating against the Belarusian language in favor of Russian, telling the country and Europe "that the Belarusian language has no prospects and that there is no demand for it among Belarusian citizens."

The EC is not known to have responded publicly. For their part, Deutsche Welle representatives defensively cite the terms of the EC's tender and contract, which only authorize funding for DW's Russian Service to launch Russian-language broadcasting to Belarus. That Service's chief, however, went further in an interview with an independent Belarusian news agency, where she rationalized the decision on three grounds. First, DW has already been broadcasting a Russian-language program to Central Asia for four years. Second, broadcasting to Belarus in Russian is at least "doing something," and thus better than the alternative option of "doing nothing." And, third, "it is stupid to say that Russian is bad and Belarusian is good," the chief is cited as arguing (Belapan, August 8).

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:48 0 comments links to this post

Amnesty International is concerned for the safety of Igor Rotar, a correspondent for several Western media outlets including Forum 18, a web-based news service on religious freedom issues.

The journalist was detained by the Immigration Service and Border Guards when he arrived at Tashkent Airport on a flight from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on 11 August at 10.25am local time. Igor Rotar continues to be held at the airport by the Uzbekistani authorities.

“Igor Rotar’s detention is part of a wave of intimidation and harassment of journalists and human rights defenders by the Uzbekistani authorities that escalated following the events in Andizhan in May this year,”said Amnesty International today.

Reportedly, his detention took place on the orders of the National Security Service of Uzbekistan. However, when approached by a Western Embassy, the Uzbekistani authorities reportedly denied ever having heard of Igor Rotar, let alone holding him at the airport.

Amnesty International is concerned that recent unrest in Uzbekistan, in particular the events in Andizhan in May 2005, have been used by the authorities to justify a further clampdown on dissent and freedom of expression, association and assembly in the name of “national security” and the “war on terror”.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:43 0 comments links to this post

The eminent Belarusian academic, Professor Yury Bandazhevsky, was conditionally released from prison on 5 August, after serving four years of an eight year sentence. Speaking to Amnesty International, Yury Bandazhevsky said that he is now spending his time getting used to his freedom and looking into work possibilities. He was released suddenly under a recent amnesty declared by President Lukashenka on 5 May, to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II.

However, Amnesty International is concerned that Yury Bandazhevsky will remain under the authorities’ control for the next five years, subjected to various conditions which include having to report regularly to the police, and being prohibited from assuming any managerial or political functions. Amnesty International will continue to campaign for the conditions to be lifted.

On 18 June 2001, Professor Yury Bandazhevsky was sentenced to eight years' imprisonment after being convicted of taking bribes from students seeking admission to the Gomel Medical Institute, where he was a rector. He has always maintained his innocence. Both domestic and international trial observers believed the trial to be unfair and Amnesty International was concerned that he did not have access to a lawyer during his pre-trial detention. Amnesty International adopted him as a Prisoner of Conscience, believing that he was convicted on trumped up charges because of his open criticism of the authorities’ response to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

Since 1999, Yury Bandazhevsky’s case has been taken up by numerous national and international human rights organizations as well as by celebrities, including the popular Russian rock band, Leningrad, and the English rock band, The Cure.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:40 0 comments links to this post

Collection of aid for the persecuted Poles in Belarus and members of the opposition begins in Warsaw tomorrow. The city authorities appealed to the people to support the action, which will last until next Friday.
Basic necessities, like canned food, tea and coffee as well as detergents, electric heaters and school equipment are most needed.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:37 0 comments links to this post

Kazakhstan’s Constitutional Council is expected to issue a decision soon on two pieces of legislation concerning non-governmental organizations that have the potential to influence the course of the country’s political development.

The two laws stand to curtail the operational capabilities of NGOs engaged in democratization-related activities. The laws -- officially named "On the Activities of Branches and Representative Offices of International or Foreign Non-Commercial Organizations" and "On the Introduction of Amendments and Additions into Certain Legislative Acts of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Matters Related to Non-Profit Organizations – would significantly tighten government oversight of financial interaction between local NGOs and international entities. The legislation would also prohibit local NGOs from funding political parties and supporting the candidacies of a particular Kazakhstani politicians. Taken together, most local NGOs would effectively be barred from playing a significant role in the political process, given that foreign donors comprise the major part of their funding base. If the Constitutional Council upholds the laws, Zhovtis asserted that "it will create serious damage to the process of democratization."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:26 0 comments links to this post

YUKOS former CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky was transferred from the special to the mass cell of Matrosskaya Tishina prison because of repair, the sentence execution authorities announced August 10. At the same time, Group MENATEP head Platon Lebedev had to leave the hospital department of detention facility for the mass cell at Matrosskaya Tishina.

According to officials, there are 13 more inmates in the cell besides Khodorkovsky, though it can accommodate from 18 to 20 people, so the conditions are acceptable. Khodorkovsky will be able to use a TV set and a fridge, provided he owns them, and continue receiving newspapers he has subscribed to, the officials said.

Kommersant found out the detention facility No. 99, which Khodorkovsky had to abandon, is really repaired, though the repairs are minor.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:18 0 comments links to this post

Poland's president appealed Thursday to Russian President Vladimir Putin to track down the men who attacked two Polish diplomats and a journalist in Moscow in recent days, saying the violence was "leading to a harmful escalation of hostility."

President Aleksander Kwasniewski's appeal came in a written statement released to the Polish media late Thursday. Earlier in the day, a Polish journalist for the leading Rzeczpospolita newspaper was beaten in Moscow, while two diplomats with the Polish Embassy in Moscow were attacked in separate incidents earlier in the week.

The incidents follow the July 31 mugging of three sons of Russian diplomats in a Warsaw park, during which the boys' cell phones were stolen.

Putin's government demanded an apology. The Polish Foreign Ministry expressed "deep regret," but said it owed no apology for what it said was a criminal act.

The incidents also come amid rising tensions between Poland and Belarus, whose autocratic President Alexander Lukashenko enjoys Putin's backing.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 20:16 0 comments links to this post

On 10 July [sic] Hrodna Leninski Borough Board of Internal Affairs summonsed Anzhalika Borys who is not recognized as the chair of the Union of Poles in Belarus by Belarusian authorities. The reason for the summons was the complaint of Tadevush Kruchkouski, former chair of the Union of Poles, whom the authorities still consider as the chairman.

After 40 minutes at the BBIA Anzhalika Borys said to journalists:
-- I was summonsed to the police on Kruchkouski’s delation. He wrote that the official seal and flags disappeared from the office of the Union of Poles in Hrodna. I had to give explanations. I wrote that in presence of witnesses riot police pulled us out of the office and I left all my belongings there. I also wrote that the computer of a journalist of Gazeta Wyborcza was left at the office as well. The police haven’t returned anything to us and that they didn’t let us in the office.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:59 0 comments links to this post

In the evening of 10 August during the check-up at Hrodna customs office Belarusian boarder guards detained the journalist of Polish TV Mikola Wauraniuk, who was going by train from Hrodna to Bielastok. They confiscated from him video tapes with materials about Belarus and returned him back.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:58 0 comments links to this post

A suit seeking to cancel the results of the 2003 parliamentary elections in Russia has been officially submitted to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg on Thursday, the Gazeta.Ru Web newspaper reports.

The suit was brought in by the liberal-oriented Yabloko party, the Committee 2008: Free Choice opposition group and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.

The plaintiffs pointed out grave violations which led to vote rigging. The Kremlin campaigners had intentionally misinformed the voters about the activities of opposition parties effectively unleashing a smear campaign against liberals and communists, they said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:53 0 comments links to this post

The National Security Service of Kyrgyzstan is searching for leader of “Mekenim Kyrgyzstan” Movement Urmat Baryktabasov and his associate Dastan Kadyrov. They are searching for on the fact of attempt at capture of authority and organizing disorders.

It is necessary to note that Kyrgyz General Prosecutor Azimbek Beknazarov informed that U.Baryktabasov promised to appear for interrogation voluntarily. However, the leader of “Mekenim Kyrgyzstan” has not appeared yet. U.Baryktabasov is suspected in organizing disorders and attempt to capture the Government House on June 17.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:45 0 comments links to this post

Mr. Miklos Haraszti, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Vienna AUSTRIA

Paris, 11 August 2005

Dear Mr. Haraszti,

Reporters Without Borders would like to share with you its concern about the action of the Belarusian authorities in preventing Polish journalists and journalists from Belarus' ethnic Polish minority from freely working on several occasions since March. The frequency of these press freedom violations has increased since 6 July.

To our knowledge, a total of four journalists of Polish nationality or from Belarus' Polish minority have been sentenced to prison sentences of 10 to 15 days. We have also registered at least 13 cases of journalists being arrested, two cases of journalists being fined and two cases of journalists being banned from re-entering Belarus.

Andrei Pochobut, the editor of the publication Magazyn Polski, and Ihar Bantsar of Glos znad Niemna, a Polish-language weekly published in Belarus, were fined 2,000 and 200 euros respectively on 6 July for taking part in a demonstration against the action of the Belarusian authorities in publishing four falsified copies of Glos znad Niemna.

Andrei Pochobut of Magazyn Polski was sentenced to 15 days in prison on 27 July for "participating in an illegal demonstration in Shchuchin on 3 July and civil disobedience." Two of his colleagues, Josef Pazhetski and Mieczylau Jaskiewicz, were sentenced to 10 days in prison for the same offence. They had participated in a protest against the government's takeover of the Union of Belarusian Poles.

Three Polish journalists, Waclaw Radzinowicz and Robert Kowalewski of Gazeta Wyborcza (the biggest Polish daily) and Agnieszka Romaszewska of the Polish television station TVP1, were arrested by the police on 27 July when they came to cover their colleagues' trial.

Ten Belarusian and Polish journalists with Gazeta Wyborcza, Associated Press, Glos znad Niemna, Nasha Niva, Pressbol and the www.pahonia.promedia.by website who were present when special forces took over the headquarters of the Union of Belarusian Poles at 10 p.m. on 27 July were detained and taken to a police station before being released two hours later.

Andrzej Pisalnik, the editor of the weekly Glos znad Niemna and a contributor to Gazeta Wyborcza, was sentenced by a court in the western city of Lida on 4 August to 10 days in prison for "participating in an illegal demonstration in Shchuchin on 3 July and civil disobedience."

Marcin Smialowski, the former correspondent in Belarus of the Polish news agency Polska Agencja Prasowa and a stringer for the Polish public radio station Polskie Radio and the privately-owned television station TVN, was refused entry by Belarusian border guards on 5 August despite having a visa and the necessary accreditation.

Adam Tuchlinski, a Polish news photographer with the weekly Przekroj, was arrested on 6 August in the western city of Grodno as he was about to board a train to return to Poland. Officials said Tuchlinski, who was travelling on a tourist visa, did not have the necessary accreditation. He is now banned from visiting Belarus for five years.

Knowing your commitment to press freedom, we appeal to you to intervene with the appropriate authorities with the aim of guaranteeing the safety and freedom of journalists in Belarus. Our organisation believes that journalists should not be the direct of indirect victims of the current diplomatic crisis between Poland and Belarus.

We trust you will give this matter your careful consideration.

Robert Ménard

Secretary-General

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:40 0 comments links to this post

Six political parties failed to comply with the requirement that they provide the Justice Ministry with detailed up-to-date membership statistics by 8 August, Justice Ministry official Eduard Markarian told Arminfo on 10 August, according to Groong. Markarian named the parties in question as: the Conservative Democratic Party; the Liberal Democratic Party; the Armenian Socialist Congress Party; the National Democratic Party; the Labor, Law and Democracy Party; and the National Unity Party. The ministry issued a reminder two months ago that a party must number no fewer than 2,000 members within six months of registration, with a minimum of 100 members in each of Armenia's 10 provinces and also in Yerevan, Noyan Tapan reported on 21 June.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:38 0 comments links to this post

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on 9 August welcomed recent decisions by Azerbaijani courts to clear the criminal records of seven opposition leaders sentenced on charges of fomenting public unrest nearly two years ago in Baku. The unprecedented move in principle allows them to run in the November parliamentary polls. But dozens of other oppositionists cannot run because of similar convictions that have not been overturned.

All seven men can now – at least in theory -- take part in the upcoming polls.

But Azerbaijan’s rights campaigners say many more opposition figures remain barred from the November election because, although most have been released from jail, their sentences have not been quashed.

These opposition figures break into two groups. The first are former political prisoners, who -- like former Interior Minister Iskander Hamidov -- were sentenced under late President Heidar Aliyev in the mid-1990s. Although Ilham Aliyev has pardoned most of them, none can run for parliament because their convictions remain in force.

The second group comprises the 135 opposition activists convicted for their alleged role in the 2003 unrest.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:35 0 comments links to this post

The fight for the hearts and minds of Uzbeks has intensified since the Andijon bloodshed on 13 May. The government has clamped down on independent journalists and led a campaign against foreign media for reports that contradict the official version of the events. State propaganda now seems to be getting the upper hand, with television broadcasts of so-called "documentaries" about Andijon. One of the films shows Akram Yuldoshev, whom the government accuses of founding the alleged Akramiya Islamist group. In the film, Yuldoshev admits to being behind the May unrest -- despite the fact that he has been in prison since 1999.

The film "Temptation Leading Toward The Abyss" was broadcast on Uzbek state television on 30 July.

In the documentary, Yuldoshev also appears to implicate another alleged Akramiya member, Qobiljon Parpiev, in the unrest. Parpiev, who was in the Andijon regional administration building on 13 May and held negotiations with Uzbek Interior Minister Zakir Almatov, managed to escape the violence. He fled Uzbekistan and instantly became one of the country's most wanted men. Parpiev spoke to RFE/RL from an undisclosed location.

"I haven't seen the film myself, but I spoke to those who had," Parpiev said. "They and I believe [Yuldoshev] was in a very difficult situation. He was tortured, because he looked very different -- not like he looked before, when some people visited him [in prison]. He looked very thin and exhausted. It was clear that he was tortured."

Another film, "The Flame of Ignorance," was broadcast on 5 August and was devoted to Andijon city prosecutor Ganijon Abdurahimov, who was killed, allegedly by Andijon militants, on 13 May.

Parpiev saw this video but said it was government troops -- not his fellow demonstrators -- who murdered Abdurahimov.

Another video, “The Night That Shook the Golden Valley,” broadcast on 16 July, accuses the international community of “having geopolitical interests in Central Asia” that have led to “attempts by some major powers to make Central Asia dependent on them” and “bring Uzbekistan under their control."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:31 0 comments links to this post

Igor Rotar, Forum 18 News Service's Central Asia Correspondent, was this morning detained by the Uzbek authorities on arrival at Tashkent Airport. He is still being held by the Uzbek authorities, who are forcibly preventing him from communicating with anyone. Reliable sources indicate that the detention was ordered "for political reasons at the highest levels" and that the detention was carried out by the Immigration Service and Border Guards, on the instructions of the National Security Service secret police. The Uzbek authorities are refusing to comment on the case, but the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and other international diplomats are following Igor Rotar's continuing detention closely.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:26 0 comments links to this post

Azadlig bloc of three major opposition parties, known for holding frequent protest actions, will organize its next rally on August 27.

The protesters will demand holding a free and fair parliament election in November and ending the ‘campaign’ that the authorities launched against Azadlig in the last few days, said PFPA chairman Ali Karimli.

The bloc has not issued a final decision on the venue for the rally, Karimli told a news briefing after a meeting of opposition Popular Front Party (PFPA), Musavat and Azerbaijan Democratic Parties included in the bloc.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:05 0 comments links to this post

The concert of the folk-band Palats was to have taken place in Belaia Viezha club in Minsk on 18 August. However, the culture board of Minsk City Executive Committee didn’t permit the concert. The officials reject this information, and the musicians state that the former ones keep silent about their actions and secretly expand their black book. This concert was to have been the first one after the concert of 21 July 2004 at the oppositional meeting in Banhalor Square.

A similar incident happened to Krambambulia project in Reactor club in Minsk. Liavon Volski, one of the project founders, said:
-- We have received prohibitions before, but after the appearance of black books many groups don’t play anywhere. Most probably, it is a part of the general policy. Now it is very difficult to hold a concert, because the bureaucratic command system functions quite well.

Alieh Khamienka, the leader of Palats band, was also the author and the host of the Nastaunitskaia (Teachers’) program at the Lad channel of Belarusian TV. However, after the concert in Banhalor Square the program was prohibited and the band was fired from Belconcert.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:43 0 comments links to this post

A group of deputies of the local legislature in the Russian Far East region of Primorye have drafted amendments to the Constitution enabling President Vladimir Putin to run for the third term, the NTV television reported on Wednesday.

The proposal was approved on Wednesday by the Law Committee of the Legislative Assembly of the Primorye Region. The legislature will consider it in early September and if approved, the document will be submitted to the State Duma.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:26 0 comments links to this post

Jailed Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky is ready to take part in the upcoming State Duma by- elections but thinks that he will be barred from running in the poll.

"I am absolutely confident that they will not allow me to run. But if I receive letters from people whose opinions are important for me, I will agree, even being aware of the fact that, firstly, they will not let me win the elections, and, secondly, that renewed repression will follow," Khodorkovsky's lawyer Yury Shmidt quoted the former Yukos CEO as saying.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:22 0 comments links to this post

The pages of Uzbek publications continue being filled with the flood of articles, re-published from the site "c-asia.org".

Unknown authors of this Internet resource, specializing on defamation of the requirements of international independent investigation of the Andizhan events, looks like received a new order.

Now, the most active representatives of the opposition in Uzbekistan - Sunshine Coalition and Ozod Dekhqonlar as well as the local human rights fighters have become their main target.

To prevent the population to join these groups, the authorities try to slander upon the leaders of these organizations, and urge the local press to publish such "revelatory" materials.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:19 0 comments links to this post

Some 200 supporters of a pro-government group in Azerbaijan attempted to storm the headquarters of an opposition party Wednesday in a new sign of tension ahead of November 6 parliamentary elections, an AFP correspondent on the scene said.

Protestors chanted "Shame!" as they pushed against a police cordon in the ex-Soviet republic's capital Baku while trying to break into the opposition National Front party building. The crowd, from the Muasir Musavat (Modern Unity) party, said they were incensed by an opposition leader's alleged contacts with agents from Azerbaijan's neighbor Armenia.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 21:09 0 comments links to this post

Reporters Without Borders today condemned threats and physical attacks that have taken place in the past four days on the Khagani Street building in Baku that houses several opposition newspapers and the headquarters of the opposition Popular Front of Azerbaijan. The victims blame the attacks on government supporters.

The opposition daily Azadlig has been singled out in recent days in the governmental media, with the television station Lider TV and the newspaper Yeni Azerbaidjan carrying reports that it has been occupying its premises illegally since 1992. The real targets appear to be several other media and journalistic organisations in the same building, namely the news agency TURAN, Bizim yol paper and the Confederation of Journalists.

On 6 and 8 August, the building was attacked by "demonstrators" who included members of the youth wing of the pro-government party Yeni Azerbaijan as well as plain-clothes police and municipal employees. They tried to break the building's windows, threw stones, eggs and tomatoes, and insulted and hit journalists present, shouting, "We are going to throw you out."

The journalists who work in the building and Popular Front of Azerbaijan members were yesterday warned of threats to set fire to the building. Azadlig staff members and journalists with independent media are taking turns to keep a constant watch in the building in an attempt prevent the threats from being carried out.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:59 0 comments links to this post

The Minsk City Court on 9 August dismissed an appeal by opposition politician Andrey Klimau against the sentence imposed on him in June (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 13 June 2005). Klimau was sentenced to 18 months in a correctional-labor colony on charges of disturbing the public peace during an opposition protest he organized in Minsk in March. Since Klimau has already spent three months in a pretrial detention center, where each day is counted as two in executing a sentence of imprisonment, his term was cut to one year. He is expected to be sent to an open-type correctional facility in the near future.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:57 0 comments links to this post

Three Jehovah's Witnesses are being prosecuted under the Criminal Code for missionary activity, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. Religious minorities are normally prosecuted under the Administrative Code and the last known criminal prosecution – against a Jehovah's Witness and Pentecostal Christians – was in late 2004. All three Jehovah's Witnesses are from small congregations, which do not meet the legal membership threshold for gaining state registration. Questioned about how people from such small congregations can, under Uzbek law, meet for religious activity, Bezgot Kadyrov, of the state Religious Affairs Committee, told Forum 18 that congregation members must travel to towns where registered congregations exist. The nearest registered congregations for the three on trial are over 500 km. (310 miles) east of their homes. In a separate development, the largest registered Jehovah's Witness congregation may be in danger of losing its registration.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:55 1 comments links to this post

Members of the Ukrainian Conservative Party and editors of several of the country's media have called on the president to launch a criminal case against "judo-Nazis" from the Chabad movement, Interfax news agency reported.

Chabad is a trend in Hasidism (Chassidism), a Jewish religious movement founded in Poland in the 18th century. It stresses the mercy of God and encourages joyous religious expression through music and dance. Hasidism spread rapidly in Ukraine, Galicia, central Poland, Belarus and Hungary. In the 20th century its stalwarts became the staunchest defenders of tradition against increasing secularism in Jewish life. Since the Holocaust, the main centers of Hasidism are in the U.S. and Israel.

In an open letter to Viktor Yushchenko, the public figures described the Chabad members them as "judo-Nazis" and demanded persecution of several rabbis for distributing their holy book Tania and teaching it in Judaic schools and synagogues, a practice which the signatories said would mean "children's retraction in this misanthropic religious system."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:49 0 comments links to this post

The meeting authority –opposition scheduled for 10 August at the premises of the Civil Solidarity Party (CSP) delayed, CSP chairman Sabir Rustamhanli told Trend.

He noted, on 9 August he telephoned to the representatives of authorities. Heads of three pro-governmental parties – New Azerbaijan, Ana Veten and Social Welfare refused to participate a the meeting in case the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA, reformists) be present there.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:42 0 comments links to this post

The OSCE Office in Baku condemned today the recent violent attacks against members of the Popular Front Party and its offices in Baku and Nakhchivan following the detention of opposition politician Ruslan Bashirli.

On 5 August, people threw rocks and other hard objects at the party's offices in Nakhchivan and beat up party members. They also sprayed insulting messages all over the walls of the premises. Such attacks were repeated on 6 and 8 August in Baku.

"We strongly condemn these acts of violence. It is unacceptable that groups of private citizens decided to take justice into their own hands," said Ambassador Maurizio Pavesi, Head of the OSCE Office in Baku.

Mr. Bashirli, whose Yeni Fikir movement is considered to be affiliated with the Popular Front Party, was arrested on 3 August", according to Article 278 of the country's Criminal Code, on charges of having attempted the "forcible seizure of power and overthrowing of the constitutional structure".

After the arrest, the Prosecutor General's Office said that Mr. Bashirli had received money illegally from abroad to organize a revolution in Azerbaijan. Such charges carry imprisonment for 10 up to 15 years or even imprisonment for life.

"This case is under investigation and nobody has been sentenced yet," Ambassador Pavesi said. "I hope the government will take all necessary measures to prevent damages to private properties, and violent and unauthorized public meetings, which would result in an unjustifiable deterioration of the electoral campaign."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:41 0 comments links to this post

Tamaz Bakuridze claims his one-year detention has been unlawful and accuses the Batumi City Court for making an unfair decision on his case, Prime News reported on Monday.
The former press secretary of Aslan Abashidze and the former director general of Adjara TV was arrested for tax evasion, misappropriation of public funds and abuse of power on August 8, 2004, and was sentenced to six years and six months imprisonment by Batumi City Court on July 21.
Bakuridze complained that the questioning of 25 witnesses lasted for eleven months because the court was dragging out the process and in fact needed only one month.
The procession presented 16 charges against him but he was found not guilty in ten. Bakuridze claims however that the other six charges were virtually identical to the ones rejects.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:35 0 comments links to this post

A senior Polish diplomat has denied reports claiming that courses were organized in Poland that allegedly instructed people on how to act during mass disturbances and rallies, which Azerbaijan described as part of preparations for a revolution or a coup on its territory.

"Everything that has been written about preparations in Poland for a revolution or some coup in Azerbaijan is untrue," the Polish charge d' affaires in Azerbaijan told Interfax on Tuesday.

"Poland is not organizing such courses. I categorically deny these rumors," he said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:30 0 comments links to this post

International and interconfessional initiative "Soglasiye" establishment meeting took place on the 6-th of August. Baptist, Catholic and Belarus autonomic churches, as well as Ukraine, German, Gypsy, Polish, Belarusian-Tatar and Cossack-Tatar Diaspora's representatives took part in it. A cooperation protocol was signed during the meeting. This was reported by executive secretary of international and interconfessional initiative "Soglasiye" Alexander Zelko.

But the beginning of meeting was clouded by an incident: one of the conferee and organizers Nikolay Kalinin was arrested by OMON officials, supposedly for ID checking.

- This arrest was undoubtedly political and connected with social activity of Nikolay Kalinin. He was arrested on theft suspecting. But it was just an excuse. After spending three hours in the police office Nikolay was released – said Alexander Zelko in the interview to UCP press-room.

Meeting participants had established that unfortunately national minorities' and non-Orthodox confessions' rights are being infringed, their problems have been kept in silence. Address, defending "Union of Poles in Belarus" was written to Alexander Lukashenko. A new common cooperation plan is going to be worked out as the result of the meeting.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 19:04 0 comments links to this post

New: August 9, 2005: Today Mikhail Khodorkovsky was transferred from building # 4 to building # 1 of the Matrosskaya Tishina pre-trial detention center. He now shares a cell with 11 other inmates where he is not permitted to receive any newspapers or watch TV.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:57 0 comments links to this post

Flowers became weapons in Azerbaijan's capital Baku Tuesday when a bid by opposition activists to charm pro-government supporters with fresh bouquets degenerated into a pitched fight.

The confrontation between about 100 pro- and anti-government demonstrators started as an attempt to make peace, following clashes on Monday in which the two sides showered each other with bottles and stones.

Elderly female supporters of the National Front opposition party brought carnations to a group of pro-government female demonstrators in conservative Islamic dress. But the gesture was refused and soon both sides were using the flowers against each other, before resorting to egg throwing.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:47 0 comments links to this post

An opposition member of the Central Election Commission (CEC) claimed on Tuesday to have found serious discrepancies between Armenia’s recently amended electoral code and its copies circulated by the government-controlled body.

Felix Khachatrian said the 5,000 copies distributed by the CEC to its territorial divisions contain glaring omissions that could facilitate fraud in the next parliamentary and presidential elections. He singled out a missing sentence in the code’s Article 7 which obligates the electoral authorities to release final figures for the nationwide voter turnout during an election by next mid-day.

The Armenian opposition has accused the authorities in the past of inflating the number of people taking part in elections in order to falsify their results. Such allegations were sometimes given weight by international observers, most recently during the May 2003 parliamentary elections characterized by voter apathy. Anecdotal evidence at the time suggested that the turnout in Yerevan may have been lower than was claimed in official reports.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:45 0 comments links to this post

A Turkish scholar who researched Ottoman history in Armenia’s state archives went on trial in Yerevan on Tuesday nearly two months after his controversial arrest on smuggling charges which caused an uproar in U.S. and Turkish academic circles.

Yektan Turkyilmaz, a 33-year-old doctoral student at the U.S. Duke University, is facing between four and eight years in prison for trying take old books out of Armenia without a mandatory government permission.

The opening session of the trial adjourned less than an hour after its beginning at the request of one of Turkyilmaz’s newly hired lawyers who said he needs more time to familiarize himself with the case. The presiding judge at the court of first instance in Yerevan’s Malatia-Sebastia district scheduled the next hearing for Friday. Among those attending the first hearing were local human rights activists and officials from the U.S. embassy in Armenia.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:43 0 comments links to this post

Richard Aedy: When did things begin to sour between you and the government?

Catherine Eldridge: Most obviously last year. After the revolution in Georgia when the government here took fright and thought the same thing could happen here as happened in Georgia, that the government would be swept from power, and they clamped down on foreign NGOs, foreign Non-governmental organisations, basically trying to control them, and in the run-up to the elections last year, which were in December, the Uzbek authorities started a series of investigations into what Internews was doing, and to the activities of Internews. And in August, they froze our bank accounts. So effectively since last August, haven’t been able to run the program because we can’t get any money.

Richard Aedy: What did they do to the TV stations and media people that you had contact with?

Catherine Eldridge: Well the authorities directly didn’t do anything, but all the independent stations received a fax from the National Association of Independent Broadcasters, which is like an umbrella body, saying that they should stop dealing with Internews. And those that didn’t then found themselves having trouble with renewing their licences, or paying their bills or things. Nothing’s ever very open here, but fairly obviously, if you don’t do what you’re told, then you have problems.

Richard Aedy: So what happens now, Catherine?

Catherine Eldridge: Well we’ve been waiting for a week for the judge to deliver his verdict and in fact we’ve given up going to the court.

Richard Aedy: It seems, from what you’re saying, that Internews is going to be closed down though, doesn’t it?

Catherine Eldridge: Well it sounds like we are, and so we’re preparing for the worst, and sorting out all our affairs, trying to work out what we should do next. But it hasn’t been a very good time lately.

Richard Aedy: No. How is this affecting the local media?

Catherine Eldridge: Well in the last year, the local media have sort of stopped working with Internews.

Richard Aedy: Have they been cowed and intimidated by the government though?

Catherine Eldridge: Yes, the whole society is cowed and intimidated by the government. The consequences of stepping out of line are really severe.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:24 0 comments links to this post

According to Azattyk-Radio, “March people’s revolution” Public Movement was founded on August 4, 2005 during a session in Osh.

According to executive secretary Murzabek Akmatbayev, it was called to control actions of activities of the powers in partnership with other NGOs.

Founders of the new public organization intend to attain real actions from officials, directed toward increase of life standards of the population. Chosen methods for influence will be protest actions, works through political parties, appeals to the President of the Kyrgyz Republic and the people.

The “March people’s revolution” pledges to become one of mass movements in south, because currently it includes as many as one and half thousand members. According to spokesmen for the movement, there are a lot of adherents of the movement also in northern regions of Kyrgyzstan. According to Akmatbayev, reasons for mass discontents are the same: there are no results in struggle against corruption, corrupted officials are still in power, and moreover, criminals rush into power.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:21 0 comments links to this post

Mikhail Khodorkovsky said Monday that he had no money to support political parties opposed to President Vladimir Putin.

"As far as the financing of any political project by me is concerned, it is unfortunately impossible in the foreseeable future," Khodorkovsky said in a statement via his lawyers and distributed by his press service.

"All my funds have been taken away by a group of people who have seized and ruined Yukos, once the most successful and flourishing company in the country," he said.

Many analysts have suggested that Khodorkovsky was still rich enough to be a major political player ahead of the 2008 presidential elections.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:29 0 comments links to this post

More than five months after the death of journalist Elmar Huseynov, the editor’s widow and members of a public watchdog group formed to monitor the state investigation into Huseynov’s death claim that the government is deliberately dragging its feet on solving the case. The government points a finger at Georgia for refusing to extradite two prime suspects, both Georgian citizens, to Azerbaijan for prosecution. Meanwhile, as the investigation continues, Huseynov’s death has become a prominent lightening rod for Azerbaijan’s opposition as it prepares for parliamentary elections this November.

The Public Investigation Group (PIG), a watchdog organization established by a group of lawyers and friends of Huseynov to monitor the state investigation, say they have serious complaints about how the inquiry into the 38-year-old editor’s March 1, 2005 death is being handled. Shahbaz Khuduoglu, a friend of Elmar Huseynov and member of PIG, says that the group has evidence of intentional delay.

"The government did not take any serious steps to find suspects, while we do not know why the state investigation suspects [certain] people in the assassination and ignores other names," Khuduoglu said. The Ministry of National Security, responsible for the investigation, named Tahir Khubanov and Teymuraz Aliyev, both Georgian citizens and ethnic Azerbaijanis, after studying video tapes recorded by metro stations’ and shops’ security services on the eve of the March 2 assassination. According to information released to PIG by state investigators, the pair allegedly returned to Georgia on March 2.

The Azerbaijani government sent two investigators to Georgia to track the suspects, but the Georgian government, however, has refused to extradite the two men. Under Georgian law, citizens cannot be extradited for prosecution. The office of the Georgian general prosecutor has stated that the pair will be arrested only if the Azerbaijani government hands over compelling evidence of their guilt. In the meantime, a wanted notice for the two men has been posted by Interpol at the request of Azerbaijani law enforcement agencies.

The magazine editor’s widow Rushana Huseynova, now a frequent guest at opposition rallies, says that she is confident that the Azerbaijani leadership already knows who murdered her husband. "I remain sure that someone among the authorities did order the assassination of my husband. I am more than sure that President Ilham Aliyev knows who ordered the assassination," said Huseynova. "He promised that the killer would be found within 40 days after the assassination. But [five] months have passed and we have nothing so far. The president should keep his promises."

Both Huseynova and PIG report that they have received little information about the investigation since the national security ministry took charge in April. National Security Minister Eldar Mahmudov placed a condition of non-disclosure on information about the investigation provided in a July 14 meeting to Aflatun Amashev, head of the Press Council, Arif Aliyev, chairman of the Yeni Nesil Journalist Union and Mehman Aliyev, director of Turan News Agency. Mamudov had mentioned the existence of other suspects, Aliyev told EurasiaNet, but the union head declined to elaborate further.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:22 0 comments links to this post

Belarus frontier guards have not let a delegation of Polish deputies of the European Parliament enter the country.

The delegation containing of four Polish deputies was headed by Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, deputy speaker of the European Parliament. He coordinates the Eastern neighborhood politics in the parliament.

The deputies planned to get acquainted with the Polish minority situation in Belarus, meet the opposition and non-governmental organizations. They also planned to meet the members of the local Union of Poles.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:15 0 comments links to this post

Political opposition in Kazakhstan may find itself penniless in the near future. Rustam Ybyiraiymov, Senior Deputy Chairman of the Agency for Combating Economic Crime and Corruption, said at his press conference in Astana on August 5 that criminal charges had been pressed against Bolat Abilov, a prominent businessman and politician. Abilov, 47, is charged with fraud running into millions and tax-evasion to the tune of $3.5 million.

Representatives of the financial police deny political motives of the criminal charges. They say that the businessman would have never encountered any trouble had he always abided by the law. Abilov is of a different frame of mind. He claims that fiscal structures are acting on the orders from their political masters.

Butja General Director Abilov is one of the wealthiest citizens of Kazakhstan. The company owns a wide network of stores in major cities of the republic (the stores deal in everything from Adidas articles to clothes from European designers to food to furniture.) Abilov owns Ramstore supermarkets, Zangar Trading House (the former Central Department Store in Alma-Ata), Butja auto center, Toyota service centers, and Astana-Motors. There are the rumors as well that Abilov deals in spirits via affiliated companies.

In 2000, Abilov became a deputy of the parliament representing Otan or Fatherland, the political party of President Nursultan Nazarbayev himself. He was ousted from the parliament for participation in establishment of the oppositionist Kazakhstan's Democratic Choice barely a year later.

In the meantime, Abilov became one of the leaders of the moderately oppositionist Ak-Zhol or Bright Way. He even participated in establishment of Movement For Fair Kazakhstan, the political structure that consolidated all of the republican opposition afterwards.

Abilov never bothered to hide the fact that he sponsored the opposition. He was always taciturn on the subject, but nobody doubts that the sums in question are considerable. After all, Abilov's personal fortune amounts to millions by even a rough estimate.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 18:00 0 comments links to this post

Some 300 pro- and anti-government demonstrators in Azerbaijan showered each other with stones and bottles Monday in a clash over an opposition leader's alleged contacts with Armenian secret police, but there were no reports of serious injuries.

A pro-government rally faced off with the opposition across a traffic-packed street in central Baku just days after prosecutors announced the arrest of the leader of an anti-government youth group for his alleged contacts with agents from Azerbaijan's rival Armenia. About 150 members of the opposition National Front of Azerbaijan party chanted "Freedom!" and whistled as an equal number of pro-government demonstrators shouted into loud speakers just meters away, an AFP reporter on the scene saw.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:53 0 comments links to this post

The mother of a Turkish researcher facing up to eight years in prison for attempting to take old books out of Armenia pleaded with the authorities in Yerevan on Monday to set him free and end his controversial prosecution.

Gulsin Turkyilmaz spoke to RFE/RL after visiting her 33-year-old son Yektan in a maximum security prison in Yerevan where he has been kept since his arrest on June 17. “I hope that they won’t imprison him,” she said. “If he knew that [he is violating Armenian laws] he wouldn’t do that.”

Turkyilmaz was allowed to see his mother the day before the start of his trial which is expected to be attended by representatives of Duke University in North Carolina where he is pursuing a Ph.D. in Ottoman history. The unusually harsh charges leveled against him have drawn protests from U.S. academic circles, prominent Turkish intellectuals and a retired pro-Armenian U.S. senator.

Turkyilmaz, who is fluent in Armenian and several other foreign languages, carried 88 Armenian books which he bought or was presented with in Yerevan. Seven of those books, including a 17th century Bible, were particularly old and required government permission for being taken abroad. The doctoral candidate told investigators and his mother that he was unaware of that requirement.

Individuals detained while trying to smuggle cultural treasures have rarely been imprisoned in Armenia. Such cases usually end in heavy fines and the confiscation of those artifacts.

Turkey’s government has still not officially commented on the prosecution of the Turkish national. Turkyilmaz is among few Turks who have publicly challenged Ankara’s vehement denial of the 1915-1923 genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.

Adding his voice to the outcry on August 2 was Bob Dole, a former U.S. Senate majority leader and Republican presidential candidate known for his staunch advocacy of Armenian issues. In a strongly-worded letter to Kocharian posted on Groong.com, he demanded that Turkyilmaz be released “at once,” saying that the Criminal Code article used against him is “unique in the community of free nations.”

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:50 0 comments links to this post

Adam Tuchlinski, a Polish news photographer with the weekly Przekroj, was arrested by the Belarusian authorities on 6 August in the western city of Grodno as he was about to board a train to return to Poland.

He was taken to a police station and held for several hours. Officials said Tuchlinski, who was travelling on a tourist visa, did not have the necessary accreditation to work in Belarus. As a result, he is now banned from visiting the country for five years. He returned to Poland after being released.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:49 0 comments links to this post

Kyrgyzstan says that three European countries have confirmed their willingness to grant asylum to 15 Uzbek refugees who are currently in a Kyrgyz detention facility, RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service reported.

Taalai Kydyrov, Kyrgyzstan's Deputy Foreign Minister, today told RFE/RL in Bishkek that Finland, Sweden, and the Netherlands have offered to take the refugees.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:45 0 comments links to this post

Beyond the welter of far-fetched mutual accusations in the media, however, Bashirli and his defenders have admitted to the accuracy of at least some of the content of the videotape. Thus, they concede that Bashirli has accepted a $2,000 donation -- the receipt for which he is seen signing and heard confirming on the videotape -- and a promise for a further $20,000 donation later this month. By way of mitigating circumstances, they cite Bashirli's assertion -- on tape and again to the court -- that he would use the initial donation to buy technical equipment for Yeni Fikir and to cover expenses for his wedding party.

Kerimli told a news conference that the case is a provocation by the authorities "aiming to discredit Yeni Fikir, [out of] fear that the movement will grow in the run-up to the election." Bashirli "should be held responsible morally, not criminally. He makes incorrect and inappropriate statements that the United States is preparing a revolution in Azerbaijan … He wants to present himself as a more important figure [than he is] in order to impress his interlocutors. All this is of course regrettable and makes him responsible before his comrades-in-arms," Kerimli stated. He cautioned PFAP members to refrain from attending dubious meetings or drinking alcohol, and generally to control their emotions (ANS TV, Turan, August 5).

For his part, Gambarov told a news conference that the donation was part of a grant received via Georgian non-governmental groups. Bashirli was to have spent part on it on his wedding party planned for August 10 (ANS TV, August 6; Turan, August 6, 8). Yeni Fikir's vice-chairmen, Said Nuriev and Fikret Faramazoglu, while defending Bashirli, told their press conference that their leader was "drunk and bragging" (AFP, August 5). In fact, drink was a topic of discussion several times on the videotape -- an element seized on by the authorities to discredit an opponent in this Muslim nation.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:43 0 comments links to this post

Ruslan Bashirli's father Djalil, who is a member of the ruling Yeni Azerbaycan Party, told a news conference in Baku on 6 August that film footage incriminating his son was selectively edited, Turan reported. He denied that his son had a homosexual relationship with Kerimli [Kerimli, chairman of the Azerbaijan Popular Front Party], whom pro-government parliamentarians and newspapers have repeatedly insinuated is gay. Kerimli is the father of two children. Djalil Bashirli also said he and other family members have been harassed since Ruslan's arrest on 3 August, and that stones have been thrown at the family home in Zardob Raion.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:38 0 comments links to this post

Nelson Ledsky, who is regional director for Eurasia of the U.S. National Democratic Institute, told RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service by telephone on 5 August that there is no truth to the allegation by the Azerbaijani Prosecutor-General's Office that the NDI provided funds to the Azerbaijani youth organization Yeni Fikir. That youth group's leader, Ruslan Bashirli, has been charged with plotting to overthrow the Azerbaijani authorities (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 5 August 2005). Ledsky explained that the NDI conducts programs in 50-60 countries worldwide but does not provide funds to individual parties or groups and is banned by U.S. law from doing so.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:37 0 comments links to this post

Andrei Isayev, a senior United Russia State Duma deputy, on Friday accused the nationalist Rodina party of receiving money from jailed oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

In a statement posted on United Russia's web site, Isayev said that a letter by Khodorkovsky published in last Monday's Vedomosti newspaper had much in common with an article by Sergei Shargunov, leader of Rodina's youth wing.

Rodina leader Dmitry Rogozin dismissed Isayev's statement as "nonsense."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 17:31 0 comments links to this post

Russians have been corrupted by western-style entertainment, from rock videos to "reality" shows, and have lost the unconditional conviction that once led them to triumphs in war, culture and science, say officials at a new state-run TV channel to promote patriotism.

Zvezda, or Star, is the channel that aims to revive that old-fashioned love of Motherland with a 24-hour lineup of upbeat "pro-Russian" programming, including Soviet movies, military documentaries and interviews with war veterans.

In addition to launching Zvezda, the government will subsidize artists, journalists and educators who agree to introduce themes of national pride into their work. Software experts will be hired to develop patriotic computer games and, for the first time since the Soviet era, schoolchildren will be required to take rudimentary military and civil defence training.

The Kremlin has also sponsored a nationwide movement of patriotic youth, Nashi - or Ours - which increasingly looks like the former Soviet Young Communist League.

Zvezda, which kicked off in March and currently reaches about 50 million Russian households, mainly shows old Soviet movies that depict a nation united behind its leaders and determined to overcome any challenge - such as to industrialize the economy, win the Second World War or beat the Americans in the space race.

The powerful Russian Orthodox Church, which often takes its cue from the Kremlin, launched its own national TV network, Spas - or Saviour - which will feature religious, historical and "patriotic" programming. It will have no beer ads or sexual titillation.

The outside world, which Kremlin officials often accuse of misunderstanding Russia, is not to be left out.

A $30-million US English-language, 24-hour satellite news channel called Russia Today is set for launch later this year by the state-run RIA-Novosti news agency. It aims to bring the "positive news" about Russia to the world.

"I frequently watch the foreign television channels, and almost everywhere they are saying the same things (about Russia)," President Vladimir Putin told a meeting Nashi youth leaders last month.

"All they can talk about is crisis and breakdown."

Meanwhile, foreign journalists covering Russia increasingly run into obstacles.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:29 0 comments links to this post

THE DAUGHTERS of two of the most prominent critics of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, are to enter politics with the aim of challenging the Kremlin’s “mounting cynicism and authoritarianism”.
Zhanna Nemtsova, whose father Boris is a charismatic member of the opposition, is to run for a seat in Moscow’s city parliament in December. Barely 21, she would be Russia’s youngest parliamentarian if elected.

Her political ambitions are shared by Maria Gaidar, the daughter of Yegor Gaidar, first post-Soviet prime minister, who is praised in the West but vilified at home as the architect of Russia’s market reforms of the 1990s.

Gaidar, 24, has been asked to join the Union of Rights Forces (SPS), an alliance of liberal opposition parties.

Nemtsova and Gaidar are the first children of Kremlin opponents to follow in their fathers’ footsteps. Their move, which they hope will bring new blood to the country’s beleaguered opposition, comes at a time when anxiety over the Orange revolution in neighbouring Ukraine has prompted Putin to seek the support of Russia’s young.

In a country where liberal-minded reformers are blamed by most voters for the economic hardships they have endured since the collapse of communism, the young women’s privileged upbringing and political pedigree are a considerable handicap. “It will be an uphill battle but the only alternative would be to leave Russia,” said Gaidar.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:22 0 comments links to this post

THE European Union is set to provide cash for opposition parties in the former Soviet republic of Belarus.

Western leaders fear that president Alexander Lukashenko, widely regarded as Europe's last dictator, will attempt to influence next year's presidential election in order to stop pro-Western or pro-reform candidates taking power.

EU diplomats are considering direct funding to allow Belarus's opposition parties to compete with the pro-government campaign. If approved, it would mark a major shift in EU policy towards promoting democracy.

It would also mark a significant ramping up of pressure on the authorities in Minsk, but would risk antagonising Moscow. Russia has a close relationship with Belarus and is still smarting over what it sees as Western interference in Ukraine, which is looking to join the EU and Nato.

A document prepared by the EU policy unit says that the "Lukashenko regime is becoming increasingly repressive", pointing to the harassment of the opposition and of lobbyists for reform, and asks whether "direct/indirect opposition support" should be considered.

Brussels is also considering visa restrictions on Belarussian officials and the freezing of some of the country's overseas assets.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:18 0 comments links to this post

Tashkent-based Zerkalo 21 newspaper published an article entitled “Cunning werewolf” signed by Aziz Tangriberdiyev, which was initially posted on c-asia.org website. The unknown but very well informed author reveals machinations of a renowned entrepreneur Sanjar Umarov and his numerous relatives.

Umarov is a businessman who in April announced creation of the Sunshine Coalition – a group positioning itself as a constructive opposition – and openly spoke about the urgent need for economic reforms.

The coalition put forward a number of required immediate measures, including reduction of taxes, freeing farmers from state slavery and giving lands to them, fast and transparent privatization of all sectors of economy, which are controlled by the family of the president – oil, gas, gold, ferrous metals etc.

However, the main crime of the Sunshine Coalition leader was that he dared to state publicly that the economic policy of Islam Karimov had led the country to a deep crisis, and that the situation could be solved by replacing the government that had discredited itself.

The punishment followed very quickly. Crowds of representatives of the prosecutor’s office, tax inspection and the national security service were sent to all enterprises belonging to large and prosperous family of Umarovs to immediately find a lot of violations and arrears. No objections and complaints were considered. As a result, accounts of these enterprises were frozen, some of Sanjar Umarov’s close relatives were arrested, while others had to flee the country. Today, most of the enterprises related to Sunshine Coalition leader are on the brink of bankruptcy.

Like any other campaign to destroy the enemy in the country, repressions against businessmen that openly stated their disagreement with the government policy had to be ideologically grounded. As a result, the above-named article appeared, which is meant mostly for those not closely familiar with the background of the matter.

Arena wrote earlier that similar articles are given to newspaper editors either by the national security service agents directly or by couriers from the president’s office. The editor cannot refuse to publish the article, otherwise he or she will be fired immediately.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:38 0 comments links to this post

Kyrgyzstan will send 15 refugees back to Uzbekistan, where the United Nations fears they may face torture or execution, in 10 days unless a third country offers them asylum first, its top prosecutor was quoted by Reuters as saying on Friday.

Uzbekistan, which has been pressing its smaller Central Asian neighbor to return the refugees, says they are criminals and terrorists. They were among 500 people who fled a government crackdown in the eastern town of Andijan in May.

More than 400 refugees were flown under UN supervision to Romania last week, but the 15, believed by the Kyrgyz to have escaped from jail in Andijan, have remained in police custody.

Kyrgyz Prosecutor General Azimbek Beknazarov, who has repeatedly said they are criminals, told a radio station that no foreign state had yet come forward to offer them asylum.

“We will give them to a third country if that country takes responsibility for what they did before the Andizhan events. These were grave crimes. Then I will hand them over,” he told Radio Liberty’s Kyrgyz service, Azattyk. However, he did not specify the crimes they were accused of.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:36 0 comments links to this post

Belarusian police detained five members of the Belarusian opposition Friday who were meeting in support of the Belarusian Union of Poles near the Polish Embassy in Minsk, the Belarusian capital.

The pro-governmental youth organization, the Belarusian Republican youth union, also gathered near the Polish Embassy, accusing the Polish side of cooling bilateral relations.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:27 0 comments links to this post

The authorities in the former Soviet state of Azerbaijan said Thursday they would clamp down on political parties, vowing to increase control ahead of parliamentary elections and to crackdown on financing from abroad.

The authorities will "strengthen control over the activities of political parties ahead of parliamentary elections," the head of the justice ministry's department for registering parties, Fazil Mamedov, said in televised remarks.

Foreign finance of political parties "will be prevented," he added.

Mamedov said violators would have their registrations revoked, while those responsible for offences within political parties would be punished.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:16 0 comments links to this post

The opposition Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA) will appeal to Georgia to achieve a transparent conduct of investigation into the incident related to chairman of the Yeni Fikir (New Thought) youth movement Ruslan Bashirli.

Bashirli has been arrested on charges of plotting with representatives of the Armenian secret service to stage a coup in Azerbaijan.

PFPA chairman Ali Karimli told a news conference on Friday that his party will make every effort to draw Georgian secret service bodies to the investigation. “This may help the investigation to identify those who are said to be employees of the Armenian secret service,” he said.

Karimli added that their goal is not to acquit Bashirli but to ‘ascertain the truth’.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:14 0 comments links to this post

Two deputy chairmen of Yeni Fikir, Said Nuriev and Fikret Faramazoglu, gave a different account of Bashirli's encounter in Tbilisi [a videotaped meeting in which he supposedly took money from Armenian agents] at a news conference in Baku on 5 August, day.az reported. Nuriev said Bashirli was offered the $2,000 by representatives of Georgian and Armenian "democratic forces." They said he was drunk at the time and hypothesized that his drink might have been spiked. They said that Bashirli returned the money the following day. Legal expert Tofig Guliev told the same 5 August news conference that none of Bashirli's actions were unlawful and that there was no talk of seizing power in Azerbaijan. Bashirli's current whereabouts are unknown.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:08 0 comments links to this post

A Tashkent court on Thursday overturned the closure of a U.S.-based media support organization and pardoned two of its workers after convicting them of illegally publishing and producing video materials.

Catherine Eldridge, Internews Network's country director, told reporters that the judges at the Yakkasaray criminal court ruled that prosecutors should have filed their case seeking to close Internews in civil, not criminal, court.

She also said the court convicted former director Khalida Anarbayeva and accountant Olga Narmuradova, but then immediately pardoned them in accordance with a presidential amnesty, she said.

Prosecutors refused to say whether they would refile the case.

"So I suppose we can just expect the case to go to a civil court, we can only wait and see what will happen with the future of the organization in Uzbekistan," Eldridge said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 13:05 0 comments links to this post

The Russian Foreign Ministry may take measures to reduce the number of correspondents working for Radio Liberty/ Free Europe after its journalist Andrei Babitsky interviewed Russia's most wanted terrorist, Shamil Basayev, for U.S. television network ABC.

A spokesman for the ministry said ABC's assertion that the interview had been broadcast at Babitsky's initiative was ridiculous.

According to the source, RL/FE used loopholes in Russian legislation in the sector of information and immense foreign resources to create an extensive network of freelance correspondents in Russia. The spokesman said this was prohibited by Russian media laws.

The source said the Foreign Ministry would consider the possibility of restricting the activity of the radio station's correspondents in Russia.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:54 0 comments links to this post

The opposition Republican Party will not participate in the upcoming MP by-elections, party leader Davit Usupashvili said on August 5, citing obstacles created by the authorities and the Central Election Commission (CEC).

At a news conference, Usupashvili explained that last year the Republican Party underwent registration in the CEC – a routine legal procedure necessary to participate in elections. The new CEC, which was set up in June, recently decided that the Republican Party's registration by the previous CEC was invalid and canceled it.

“After that we re-submitted our registration request on Monday [August 1], but the CEC rejected it, citing that it contained formal legal mistakes,” said Usupashvili, who himself is a legal expert.

He said that the CEC and the authorities are creating all possible obstacles to prevent the Republican Party from participating in the October 1 MP by-elections scheduled for majoritarian seats [single-mandate constituencies] in the Adjaran towns of Kobuleti, Batumi and Shuakhevi, the west Georgian town of Tkibuli and Tbilisi’s Isani district.

The chairman of the CEC said that according to the law, a political party willing to undergo registration and participate in the elections has to submit a number of documents, including “the name of the party’s representative in the CEC and indicate the exact authority assigned to said representative.”

“In the registration form submitted to the CEC on August 2 the Republican Party named Zurab Marakvelidze as its representative to the CEC, but did not indicate his authorities. After that, we informed the Republican Party to make its representative’s authority clear and now the party has two more days to re-register,” Chairman Kavtaradze said.

He also said that a similar case occurred with another opposition party, the Conservatives. “But after we informed them to specify their representative’s authority, they did so without making any noise,” Gia Kavtaradze said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:51 0 comments links to this post

The opposition Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (AXCP) says unidentified attackers today ransacked its offices in the exclave of Nakhichevan.

Azerbaijan's independent Turan agency quotes Nakhichevan AXCP leader Asaf Quliyev as saying the assailants, numbering 25 and armed with metal bars, beat up party activists, and destroyed furniture before escaping. There was no immediate comment from regional authorities.

Quliyev links the attack to the anti-government rally that took place in Nakhichevan on 26 July. The demonstration, sanctioned by regional authorities, took place without noticeable incident.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:48 0 comments links to this post

The leader of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (AXCP) today described the arrest of youth leader Ruslan Basirli as part of a government plan to intimidate the opposition, but vowed to continue campaigning for free and fair parliamentary elections in November, RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service reported.

Addressing reporters in Baku, Ali Kerimli said Basirli's arrest was a provocation organized by the government of President Ilham Aliyev.

"These provocations, these attacks, these psychological campaigns and blackmail attempts will not succeed in distracting us from our struggle for free and fair elections," Kerimli said. "Their goal is to occupy the agenda, to artificially raise new issues and to distract us from our struggle for free and fair elections."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:46 0 comments links to this post

Armenia on Friday flatly denied any role in an alleged conspiracy to overthrow Azerbaijan’s government which claims to have foiled it with the arrest of a young Azerbaijani oppositionist announced the previous night.

The National Security Service (NSS) in Yerevan dismissed as “ridiculous” Azerbaijani allegations that it recruited Ruslan Bashirli, the arrested leader of the Yeni Fikir (New Thinking) youth movement, to foment a violent coup d’etat in Baku.

A statement issued by Azerbaijan’s Office of Prosecutor-General late Thursday said Bashirli secretly met Armenian security agents in Tbilisi last week and was paid $2,000 to stir up trouble ahead of the Azerbaijani parliamentary elections slated for November. Azerbaijani state television aired footage, allegedly shot in the Georgian capital, of Bashirli accepting cash from three men. The oppositionist was consequently charged with attempting "to take power by force."

“We knew that the new head of Azerbaijan’s special services is not a specialist,” the NSS said in a statement, tartly referring to Eldar Mahmudov’s police background. “But hardly anyone would predict that he will cast his subordinates in negative light.”

The NSS chief, Gorik Hakobian, compared the case with trumped-up espionage charges leveled by the late Soviet dictator Josef Stalin against his potential rivals. “My advice is this: You can’t solve Azerbaijan’s internal political problems with the long-forgotten methods that were used in the USSR during the 1920s and 1930s,” Hakobian was quoted as saying in the statement.

The Armenian security agency avoided any comment on the specifics of the Azerbaijani accusations, though.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 12:43 0 comments links to this post

The Ministry of Education didn’t permit the traineeship in the United States of America to the sixty Belarusian school-children who won the context of FLEX exchange program, announced by the state newspaper Nastaunitskaia Hazieta in October 2004. The ministry officials refuse to comment on this event.

In March 2005 Aliaksandr Lukashenka signed the decree “About certain measures to counteract human beings trafficking”. On the basis of this document the Ministry of Education adopted a special instruction. The officials explained to the parents that their children couldn’t go to the US because one of the instruction paragraphs was violated and they hadn’t been informed about the contest and its conditions.

FLEX American exchange program for school-goers has acted in Belarus for 13 years already. For this time more than 600 Belarusian children have travelled to the US.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:30 1 comments links to this post

A youth opposition leader in former Soviet Azerbaijan has been arrested for planning to overthrow the government in a plot allegedly hatched by the US' National Democratic Institute (NDI), Armenian secret police and the local opposition, prosecutors said late Thursday.

Opposition leaders denounced the arrest of Ruslan Bashirli as an attempt to smear their groups, and comes amid increasing government pressure on opposition political parties ahead of parliamentary elections in November.

Ruslan Bashirli, the charismatic leader of the Yeni Fikir youth movement which has called for President Ilham Aliyev's ouster, was arrested on charges of attempting "to take power by force," the General Prosecutor's office said in a statement.

Bashirli was arrested on Wednesday after a member of Yeni Fikir informed the authorities that the group's leader had taken 2,000 dollars (1,600 euros) from operatives of Azerbaijan's rival Armenia at a secret meeting in neighboring Georgia, the statement said.

AzTV, an Azerbaijani state-owned network, broadcast footage allegedly shot in Georgia of Bashirli sitting in a room with three men where he accepted a wad of cash from them.

Bashirli told the Armenians he represented forces "acting on the instructions of the National Democratic Institute of the USA," and had received "specific instructions from representatives of this organization to prepare a revolution in Azerbaijan," according to the statement.

NDI is a US non-governmental organization dedicated to promoting democracy in developing countries, but has been criticized by regimes in the former Soviet Union who accuse it of supporting the revolutions that have swept Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan over the past two years.

Yeni Fikir's deputy head Fikret Farmazogly confirmed Bashirli's arrest but denied the group's involvement in an Armenian funded plot to overthrow the government.

"This is yet another one of the authorities' games, this event was organized by the Ministry of National Security," Farmazogly told AFP.

Farmazogly said he suspected the Yeni Fikir informant was an Azerbaijani security services agent, but would neither confirm nor deny weather Bashirli had accepted money from the men shown in the footage.

Prosecutors also said Bashirli's plans were being backed by one of Azerbaijan's leading opposition parties, the National Front of Azerbaijan Party.

"This is an attempt by the authorities to discredit the youth movement," said Ali Kerimli, who leads the National Front party. "They are trying to prevent the youth from fighting for democratic freedoms."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:23 0 comments links to this post

Kazakhstans new law "On additions and amendments to laws of the Republic of Kazakhstan relating to national security," signed on 8 July by President Nursultan Nazarbaev, continues to cause strong criticism among international and local human rights organisations, as it substantially restricts freedom of religion or belief in the country. Professor Roman Podoprigora, a professor of jurisprudence who specialises in religion, thinks that the only real innovation in the law is that it makes the registration of religious communities compulsory, which the professor believes will substantially "limit believers' rights".

The law intends to forbid all unregistered religious activity, which previously had been a de facto but illegal requirement imposed by officials (see F18News 20 July 2004 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=365 and 30 May 2005 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=572 ). The new law gives justification for this official attitude by banning the activity of all religious organisations which have not been registered "in the proper manner" (see F18News 15 July 2005 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=608 ). Kazakhstan thus joins two other Central Asian republics, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, whose religion laws ban the activity of unregistered religious organisations, in defiance of the international human rights commitments they have freely made.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:18 0 comments links to this post

Leader of the Union of Poles in Belarus Angelica Borys has been officially warned by prosecutors in the western city of Grodno to stop her activities otherwise she will be charged. She was instructed not to organize meetings outside the UPB seat in Grodno, which the Belarusian authorities regard as an instigation to domestic violence.

Borys said after the questioning that she did not intend to stop meeting other Poles. Earlier she handed out leaflets calling on Poles to boycott the forthcoming congress of ethnic Poles in Belarus.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:04 0 comments links to this post

For now, though, opposition and privately owned media report that they sense themselves under constant scrutiny for their election coverage. Baloglan Mirzoyev, head of the private television station Lankaran TV, based in the city of Lankaran, the largest in Azerbaijan’s south, told EurasiaNet that he has faced pressure from the local department of the Ministry of National Security for airing news about opposition activities in the region. “They threatened me with tough measures if I continue to cover the opposition,” Mirzoyev said.

Ali Rza, deputy editor-in-chief of the opposition Azadlig newspaper, reported that on the eve of the visit to Ganja by PACE co-rapporteurs Andreas Gross and Andreas Herkel in early July, the city’s Azadlig correspondent “was called into the police station and warned to say ‘the right things,’” Rza said. “We feel more and more pressure as election day gets closer.” The Azadlig magazine has since been banned from sale in Baku, and one vendor detained by police, magazine editor Rovsan Haciev told the Russian news agency Regnum on 2 August.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:01 0 comments links to this post

A leading international media organization was accused on Thursday of meddling in the politics of Uzbekistan while two of its local employees were found guilty of criminal activities.

A Tashkent district court convicted two employees of Internews Network of a conspiracy to engage in unlicensed production of TV programming and illegal publishing — a crime punishable by up to six months in prison. Internews and its employees denied the charges.

In delivering his verdict to a closed court, the judge said that Internews had “started meddling in the politics of Uzbekistan and in the politics of the president and that’s why the proceedings were instituted."

Internews Network, a US-based non-profit media development organization working in over fifty countries, began operations in Uzbekistan in 1995 where it has helped develop the country’s independent, private television stations through trainings, technical assistance and support of local news and information programming.

Because the defendants are women, they were automatically eligible for a presidential amnesty so will not serve time in jail. But they will have criminal records.

Many of the most influential people in Uzbekistan's media have been trained by Internews, whose projects in Uzbekistan have been supported by the US Agency for International Development and EuropeAid (the international aid branches of the United States and the European Union, respectively) and the US State Department.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 07:55 0 comments links to this post

The Foreign Ministry's decision not to extend the accreditation of ABC television journalists appears to be meant as a reminder to all foreign journalists not to cross a line when writing about Chechnya and especially rebel leaders.

But it is unlikely to change foreign media coverage about Russia or even have much effect on ABC.

Journalists, including Russian nationals, employed by foreign media organizations cannot work legally in Russia without accreditation.

The Foreign Ministry said Wednesday that this was the violation committed by Andrei Babitsky, the journalist with Prague-based Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty who interviewed warlord Shamil Basayev in Chechnya in June.

A ministry official said Babitsky was required by law to obtain two forms of accreditation: one from the Foreign Ministry and the other from the Interior Ministry, which is responsible for areas that are designated as zones of counterterrorism operations, Interfax reported.

Babitsky, who said he obtained the interview on his own time, offered it to ABC, which broadcast it despite Russian objections last Thursday.

The last time the ministry denied accreditation to a foreign journalist was in early 2000, when Frank Hoefling, a German reporter with N24 television, "falsified news reports from Chechnya," ministry spokesman Boris Malakhov said Wednesday.

Authorities accused Hoefling of stealing graphic photographs and a film depicting dead bodies in Chechnya that had been taken by Russian journalists and presenting them on N24 as evidence of the brutality of federal troops against Chechen civilians.

The ministry official said several foreign journalists had been denied accreditation or not had their accreditation extended in recent years, but refused to elaborate.

Several foreign reporters interviewed for this report acknowledged that they had traveled to Chechnya without obtaining Interior Ministry accreditation, which would have immediately restricted their movements to officially approved routes and limited the independence of their reporting.

By doing this, reporters put themselves at risk of losing their Foreign Ministry accreditation and permission to continue working in Russia.

While most earlier denials were done quietly, the ABC decision is a warning to foreign and Russian journalists to curb their professional zeal when writing about Chechnya and terrorism, said Boris Makarenko, an analyst with the Center for Political Technologies. "It is clearly a demonstrative action," he said.

Dmitry Orlov, an analyst with the Agency for Political and Economic Communications, said authorities were overreacting in an attempt to show the Russian public how strong Russia is in its dealings with the Americans.

"In fact, it is clear to everyone that this whole brouhaha will most likely pass unnoticed by most Americans," he said.

Makarenko said it was only a matter of time before the Foreign Ministry allowed new ABC reporters to work in Russia, noting that the ministry had left open the door to the possibility that it will issue accreditation to any ABC journalists who replace the current staff.

"It is not a question of giving or not giving accreditation to ABC; it is a question of doing it a year or two from now," he said.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:23 0 comments links to this post

Young Poles want to use rock music to help Belarus's pro-democracy opposition resist the regime of Belarusian President Aleksyandr Lukashenka.

Pawel Stanczyk, head of Poland's Association of Young Conservatives, says in Warsaw the association has launched a new campaign called "Rock Against The Regime" to lend support to opposition forces in Belarus.

Stanczyk describes rock music as "the music of freedom and independence."

He says the project aims to flood Belarus with "anti- establishment" rock music.

Stanczyk says rock in all media formats will be transported from Poland into Belarus where they will be given to Belarus pro-democracy student and youth organizations for distribution.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:14 0 comments links to this post

In the Siberian Altai region, Catholics have encountered persistent obstacles, Forum 18 News Service has found. The Catholic parish in Barnaul's attempts to regain its church – dating from 1908 – have been blocked since 1992. After the parish began its struggle with the local authority, a café was built onto the church and on top of the cemetery, along with an Orthodox chapel. The local governor claimed his main contribution to Orthodoxy had been in keeping Catholics out. The authorities in the neighbouring Altai Republic have similarly barred a Catholic church being built, despite local support for the church, citing the negative attitude of the Russian Orthodox Church who are "tired from the dominance of sects."

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:09 0 comments links to this post

President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials are not welcome at commemoration ceremonies next month for the victims of the Beslan school hostage crisis because they failed to save lives, said the head of a victims' support group on Tuesday.

Head of the Beslan mothers committee, Susanna Dudiyeva, said: "We do not want to see at the commemoration ceremonies those who should have saved our children... and did not fulfil their duties."

Ceremonies were set to take place on September 1-3 to commemorate the first anniversary of the crisis in a school in the North Caucasus town of Beslan, where militants demanding an end to the war in Chechnya took about 1 100 people hostage on September 01.

Russian forces stormed the building on September 3 and 318 civilians, including 186 children, were killed in the ensuing battle. Twelve Russian servicemen and 31 hostage-takers also died.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:04 0 comments links to this post

An ethnic Polish activist under arrest in Belarus yesterday began a hunger strike as police began to jail local Poles who attended the weekend visit of a Polish politician.

The tension has been caused by the attempt of the authoritarian government of President Alexander Lukashenko to gain control of the Union of Poles in Belarus, which represents the country's 500,000 Poles - 5 per cent of its population. The organisation is the largest of any type not under government control.

The hunger striker, Andrzej Pisalnik, is an informal spokesman for the group. He was sentenced to 10 to 15 days in jail for taking part in an unauthorised concert on July 3 celebrating Belarus's independence day.

# posted by Volodymyr Campaign @ 08:01 0 comments links to this post