Andrei Haidukou’s mother worried about counsel’s limited access to her son

Independent media coverage of the so-called “spying case” of Andrei Haidukou gives hope for his release, says the mother of the 23-year-old operator of Navapolatsk-based “Naftan” oil refinery, accused of “treason through intelligence activities.”

Volha Haidukova knows little about the situation of her son, who was arrested on November 8 in Vitsebsk allegedly “while making a dead drop with information that may be of interest to foreign intelligence services.” Since then the Navapolatsk activist, who was one of the founders of the Union of Young Intellectuals and member of Andrei Sannikau’s campaign team during the 2010 presidential election, has been held in prison.

Andrei Haidukou’s mother knows about her son only from the words of the lawyer. Last time he met with Andrei Haidukou was January 22. These meetings are very rare – the previous was on January 3 – except for the fact that the lawyer was present on January 15 at the confrontation with Haidukou’s friend Ilya Bahdanau.

“It is important that the lawyer could not just meet and talk with the detainee, but to consult him on something, ask about his health. Attending the investigation activities is too little. Other meetings are almost never allowed: more precisely, the permission is given, but they say that there is no vacant room in the KGB detention center, where they hold Andrei... After the meeting on January 22, the lawyer told me that Andrei behaves himself with dignity, he finally received a package sent back in 2012,” says Volha Haidukova.

She believes it is important that the independent media should monitor the fate of her son in prison. Through an independent site, Andrei’s associates launched a fundraising campaign for the activist’s family. Part of the donations has already been passed, and one of local entrepreneurs, who preferred to remain anonymous, gave the family food stuffs, www.freeregion.info reports.

Meanwhile, no meetings with relatives are allowed – neither during his detention in Vitsebsk prison nor in the KGB detention center in Minsk.

Another suspect in the “spy case” — Navapolatsk activist Ilya Bahdanau is at large, no preventive measures have been applied to him.