British Ambassador and OSCE Representative Visit Valiery Lievanieuski in Jail

On 5 August Brian Bennett, Ambassador of the UK (that now presides the EU) and Vagram Abadzhan, deputy head of the OSCE Office in Minsk, paid a visit to Valiery Lievanieuski, chair of the nationwide strike committee of businessmen.

On 7 September 2004 Valiery Lievanieuski and Aliaksandr Vasilieu, deputy chair of the strike committee, were sentenced to 2 years of jail for alleged libelling of president. In the fly-sheet he distributed there was written: “Come and say you are against somebody’s resting in Austria and skiing there at your expense”. Amnesty International declared both of them prisoners of conscience. Recently Mr. Vasilieu has been granted parole, while Valiery Lievanieuski is still kept in jail in Ivatsevichy. After the meeting the diplomats said the prisoner was in a good mood, despite the hunger-strike he carried out in June.