Leader of Public Association Gets Expelled from Session of Smarhon District Deputy Soviet
Remuald Ulan, deputy of Smarhon District Deputy Soviet, founder of “Novaja Gazeta Smorgoni” edition:
?#152;The third session of Smarhon Deputy Soviet of the 24th Convocation, took place on 25 June. The most important event was, to my mind, the exile of Alina Suravets, Head of Belarusian Association of Journalists, ex-editor of “Novaya Gazeta Smorgoni”. N. Shysh, Head of the Soviet, called this edition “illegal” and for this reasons proposed deputies to vote for non-admitting A. Suravets to the session. The majority of deputies shamelessly supported this lawless proposal.
A. Lazowski, editor of the State district newspaper “Svetly Shliakh” was among those “supporters”. In his speech he even called himself a democrat. The session was waiting for A. Suravets to leave on her own for half an hour. Finally, Head of the Soviet rudely pressed on the deputy M. Liakhowski, a police official, telling him to execute the session decision. The duty policeman Viktar Rahinski executed the official’s order.
In the end of the session the situation seemed hardly manageable. Deputy Ramuald Ulan wasn’t allowed to speak in the section of “miscellaneous” because he allegedly posed many remarks during the session and depleted his time limit. Deputy Khramenkow had pretensions to “Novaya Gazeta Smorgoni”, that its pages had no publications about him. Head of the Soviet asked his colleagues whether the session could close the newspaper at all, but M. Liakhowski categorically said that the session had no rights for that. Many of the deputies, and the Head of the Soviet wanted it very much, though.
In the end of the session the deputies also decided to establish a commission for checking Ramuald Ulan’s income declaration and possible annihilation of the election results. The reason for it was the film “Pavutsinne” (“Cobweb”) with the information that Ramuald Ulan had an account in a Vilnius bank. They didn’t even listen when I said that I wasn’t in Lithuania in 2002 and couldn’t receive any income.”
