Milinkevich’s Aide Andrei Kusialchuk Sentenced to 3 Days of Jail

01.11.2006.

The aide of the leader of the Belarusian united democratic forces Aliaksandr Milinkevich, Andrei Kusialchuk, has been sentenced to 3 days of arrest by the court of Kastrychnitski district of Hrodna. Judge Andrei Kavalchuk has found the oppositionist guilty of violation of the article 156 of the Administrative Code (petty hooliganism). Hrodna policemen stated in the court that Kuselchuk allegedly cursed in an answer to their demand to check his car. Pavel Mazheika called the verdict to Andrei Kusialchuk politically motivated. To his mind, the regime continues to crack down on the team of the democratic forces leader in this way.

Andrei Kusialchuk was detained near a railway station in Hrodna. The car of an aide of the leader of Belarusian united democratic forces Aliaksandr Milinkevich was stopped by KGB officers. They searched the car and found several copies of independent newspapers. Kusialchuk was detained on those grounds. However, in the police department of Kastrychnitski district of Hrodna a report was drawn up against him on charges related to Article 156 (petty hooliganism). Milinkevich’s aide spent a night in a special detention center. It hasn’t been indicated in the report that newspapers had been found in Kusialchuk’s car. In the court the police witnesses said that they had checked the car, though the car had been checked by KGB officers. Testifying against Kusialchuk, the policemen said that he his behaviour was impudent. When asked what they consider as impudent behaviour, they told that Kusialchuk was ‘too self-confident’.