Relatives receive the first letter from Andrei Haidukou

The “Naftan” worker, arrested for “state treachery”, has been kept in custody for more than a month already: at first at the Minsk KGB prison, no in the Vitsebsk pre-trial prison #2.

In the letter, dated 29 November, he asks the relatives to find a new lawyer.

Andrei Haidukou was detained in Vitsebsk on 8 November. According to the official information of the KGB, he was detained why making a hiding place for the data, which could be interesting for foreign intelligence services”.

“A week ago Andrei's friend received a letter, but we did not receive anything. I know that our letters didn't reach him either – only two postcards from sister... Now we have received the first letter, sent on 3 December, thought it had been written on 29 November, in Minsk. The letter is sad, not as optimistic as that sent to his friend. But maybe it is just my impression, because others who read it said it was a normal letter... He writes that the falsification against him can reach absurd and asks to find another counsel,” says his mother, Volha Haidukova.

After Andrei's detention, several counsels worked with him. At first there was a Vitsebsk-based counsel. Then – a duty lawyer in Minsk, and after it – a lawyer who was hired by the parents.

“Now Andrei is in Vitsebsk. It is necessary that the lawyer should live here – so that he could meet and talk with him. It is hard for Andrei there. He wrote an application to the investigator to be provided with the Vitsebsk lawyer who was his first one. Most probably, they have some contact, if he wants to do so. We already have a service agreement with her – it was concluded right after the arrest.”

Volha Haidukova asks the new counsel to visit Andrei at prison on Friday, 7 December. Haidukou's friend and the head of the unregistered group “Union of Young Intellectuals” Yauhen Kanstantsinau, received a summons to the Vitsebsk regional KGB department for that day.

Prior to his arrest, Andrei Haidukou was involved in the registration of the “Union of Young Intellectuals” with the state. According to his friends, his detention can be connected with his civil activities, because he received threats from KGB officers for his oppositional views.

Andrei Haidukou is currently charged under Article 356 of the Criminal Code, “State treachery in the form of intelligence activity”, a charge his friends and relatives consider as absurd.