Human Rights Defenders Appeal to Close the Case of Aliaksandr Alesin

Ali­ak­san­dr Alesin

Ali­ak­san­dr Alesin, jour­nal­ist of Belorusy I Rynok, mil­i­tary affairs ana­lyst, was detained on Novem­ber 25, 2014. Infor­ma­tion about the deten­tion and the place of deten­tion became known to the pub­lic only at the begin­ning of Decem­ber.

On Decem­ber 8, his rel­a­tives announced that he had been accused of trea­son (arti­cle 356 of the Crim­i­nal Code) and coop­er­a­tion with spe­cial ser­vices or inves­tiga­tive bod­ies of anoth­er state (arti­cle 356.1). It was also report­ed that he was not the main sus­pect, the main per­son under con­sid­er­a­tion was a for­eign diplo­mat. On Decem­ber 10, the jour­nal­ist was released under recog­ni­zance not to leave the coun­try. He said that the charges of trea­son had been dropped; he has been charged only with coop­er­a­tion with for­eign spe­cial ser­vices.

OPEN LETTER

We, rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the human rights orga­ni­za­tions in Belarus, guid­ed by an inter­est in the devel­op­ment of the Belarus-EU rela­tions and the pro­mo­tion and pro­tec­tion of human rights in the coun­try,

call on the gov­ern­ment to enforce in the near future the fol­low­ing mea­sures of restora­tive nature, which do not require leg­isla­tive changes:

1. close the polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed crim­i­nal cas­es against jour­nal­ist Ali­ak­san­dr Alesin, graf­fi­ti artists Mak­sim Piakars­ki, Vadz­im Zharom­s­ki, Viachaslau Kasin­er­au and Yaraslau Uliya­nenkau, politi­cian Ales Mikhale­vich, as well as to review IN A PUBLIC TRIAL the crim­i­nal case of Mikhail Zham­chuzh­ny (founder of the human rights orga­ni­za­tion Plat­form Inno­va­tion); remove con­vic­tions in order to restore the civ­il and polit­i­cal rights of for­mer polit­i­cal pris­on­ers.
2. remove a ban on entry into the coun­try ear­li­er imposed on Belaru­sian human rights activist Ale­na Tanka­cho­va, and to ensure safe con­di­tions for the return of per­sons who were forced to leave the coun­try due to polit­i­cal per­se­cu­tion.
3. reg­is­ter the Human Rights Cen­ter “Vias­na” and oth­er non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tions who choose to apply for reg­is­tra­tion.
4. put an end to the per­se­cu­tion of jour­nal­ists of the Bel­sat TV chan­nel and Radio Racy­ja, as well as oth­er jour­nal­ists work­ing for for­eign media, and refrain from inter­fer­ing with their pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ty in the coun­try.
5. intro­duce a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions.

In order to improve the sit­u­a­tion of human rights, it is nec­es­sary to enforce the fol­low­ing mea­sures at the leg­isla­tive lev­el:

- repeal Arti­cle 193.1 of the Crim­i­nal Code, as well as a ban on the activ­i­ty on behalf of unreg­is­tered orga­ni­za­tions;

- launch sys­tem­at­ic work with a view to bring­ing the leg­is­la­tion of Belarus in the sphere of human rights in line with inter­na­tion­al stan­dards.

We con­sid­er it impor­tant to estab­lish a dia­logue in this area between the gov­ern­ment and the country’s human rights orga­ni­za­tions, and to devel­op a Nation­al Plan of Human Rights and Civ­il Soci­ety, in close coop­er­a­tion between the state and the civ­il soci­ety of Belarus.

Ales Biali­ats­ki, chair­man of the Human Rights Cen­ter «Vias­na»

Aleh Hulak, chair­man of the Belaru­sian Helsin­ki Com­mit­tee

Andrei Bas­tunets, chair­man of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists

Ale­na Tanka­cho­va, chair of the Board of the Cen­ter for Legal Trans­for­ma­tion

Raisa Mikhailouskaya, chair of the Belaru­sian Doc­u­men­ta­tion Cen­ter

Inna Kulei, chair of the Com­mit­tee of Assis­tance to the Repressed “Sal­i­dar­nasts”

Tat­siana Revi­a­ka, Pres­i­dent of the Barys Zvozskau Belaru­sian Human Rights House

Relat­ed sto­ries:

After Hasty Deten­tion and Release, Jour­nal­ist Still Goes to Ques­tion­ings

Human rights orga­ni­za­tions of Belarus rec­og­nize Mikhail Zham­chuzh­ny polit­i­cal pris­on­er