The Human Rights Center “Viasna”

This afternoon Minsk courts have considered the administrative cases of persons detained yesterday during so called “silent protest” in the city center.

Today, in Minsk, FIDH representatives hold a press conference to present the fact-finding mission report on the situation in Belarus. Participants in the Mission collected dozens of witness testimonies from candidates for the presidency of Belarus and representatives from campaign headquarters for presidential candidates, who had been freed from detention by that time, relatives of those arrested, attorneys, members of human rights organizations, journalists, and representatives of European diplomatic missions.

On 29 June, Minsk “Ў” gallery hosted the presentation of a documentary entitled “The cause of death is -------”, created as part of the “Human Rights Defenders against the Death Penalty” civil campaign.

Some 250 people were detained during the so called “silent protests” across Belarus yesterday. Minsk police detained over 160 protesters, including a number of journalists. Some of the detainees were reportedly beaten.

The US-based Freedom House international NGO has released its annual report “Nations in Transit 2011”, providing a comparative study of democratic development in 29 countries, including Belarus.

Zmitser Shurkhai, Brest regional coordinator of the Belarusian Christian Democracy organizing committee, has been convicted of disorderly conduct (Art. 17.1) by Brest Maskouski District Court this morning.

On 25 March 2011, Front Line launched its second Annual Report on Human Rights Defenders, which highlights global trends and developments in the situation of human rights defenders in 2010 and analyses the situation in each region of the world.