CIVICUS Urges Immediate Release of Belarusian Human Rights Defender, Aliaksandr Bialiatski
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation strongly condemns
the arrest of Aliaksandr (Ales) Bialiatski, prominent Belarusian human
rights defender, vice president of the International Federation for
Human Rights (FIDH) and head of the Minsk-based human rights centre
Viasna.
"We have abundant reasons to believe that any alleged charges
currently against Bialiatski are directly intended to silence his
active support of human rights in Belarus”, said Will Lasky, CIVICUS
Eurasia Coordinator. "CIVICUS believes his detention to be politically
motivated and unlawful.” Bialiatski’s arrest is yet another instance in a
pattern of harassment and intimidation towards civil society in
Belarus.
Bialiatski was arrested by unidentified persons who also searched his
apartment. His wife, who was reportedly in the apartment at the time of
the search, was not afforded the chance to examine the papers of those
who presented themselves as 'finance police officers’. Earlier in the
day Viasna was reportedly surrounded by members of the Belarus KGB.
“I have no doubt that these actions in respect to Ales Bialiatski and
the Viasna Human Rights Centre are primarily connected with their
serious and professional activities in human rights protection. The
events taking place now greatly harm Belarus’s human rights movement”,
said Andrey Yurov, Head of the International Observation Mission of the
Committee on International Control over the situation with human rights
in Belarus.
Bialiatski is widely regarded as one of the founders of the Belarusian
civil movement, active in campaigning for freedom of expression,
assembly, association and free elections. Since the 19 December 2010
elections, he has been the subject of a radio smear campaign and
labelled as "public enemy number one”, among other forms of harassment.
Viasna Human Rights Centre, which is headed by Aliaksandr Bialiatski,
was denied government registration in 2003 because of its election
monitoring actions and has been under intense pressure since the
December 2010 elections that were widely regarded as fraudulent. Human
rights advocacy groups continue to face extreme difficulties in
obtaining registration in Belarus, without which their activities are
deemed illegal under the country’s Criminal Code (Article 193.1).
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation calls for Aliaksandr
Bialiatski's immediate and unconditional release and for the immediate
cessation of government harassment of Belarusian civil society. “It is
high time that the government of Belarus comply with their international
obligations by guaranteeing the fundamental freedoms of all people in
Belarus, or risk becoming a pariah regime”, said Lasky.
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation is a global
movement of civil society dedicated to strengthening citizen action and
civil society across the world
For more information contact:
Will Lasky
Eurasia Project Coordinator
CIVICUS
Tel: +27 11 833 5959
E-mail: will.lasky@civicus.org
or
Adam Nord
Lobbying and Engagement Manager
CIVICUS
Tel: +27 11 833 5959
E-mail: adam.nord@civicus.org
For more information on the arrest and on civil society in Belarus contact:
- Representative of the International Observation Mission, Tel: + 375 33 636 0500
- Tatiana Reviako, Viasna Human Rights Centre, Tel: +375 29 682 14 81
- Marina Tsapok, coordinator of the Kyiv Information Centre of the Committee on International Control over the Situation with Human Rights in Belarus (Ukraine), Tel: +38 097 96 17 346
- Viktoria Gromova, deputy head of the International Observation Mission (Russia), Tel: +7 915 582 27 45
For more about CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation, refer to www.civicus.org.za.
To view other NGO press releases, visit: www.ngopulse.org/group/home-page/pressreleases.
