Action of support for Kazulin broken up in Saligorsk

Violent detentions of demonstrators followed an action of support for ex-candidate for the presidential post Aliaksandar Kazulin held in Saligorsk. Activists of the local democratic youth movement lit candles and posted up a portrait of Aliaksandar Kazulin in the evening of July 22, on the central square of Saligorsk. Also the young people were distributing leaflets with the information about the sentence passed to A.Kazulin and with the appeal to express solidarity with the politician.

According to the press service of A.Kazulin, the demonstrators were detained in 20 minutes after the beginning of the action. Ivan Shyla was the first to be detained and pushed into a police car. His brother, Illia Shyla, who was making pictures of the detention, was detained as well. The two brothers were beaten up violently and taken to a police department where protocols were filed on participation in a non-sanctioned action. Ivan and Illia were exonerated when their parents came to the department.

Uladzimir Shyla, the father of the boys, is to appeal to the public prosecutors office against the detention on July 24. Several people who were present at the detention of the brothers claimed they would witness for the victims, as A.Kazulins press service reports.

Brothers Shyla took an active part in the hunger strike that was held in the end of May - beginning of June all over Belarus. Several dozens of young activists demanded to exonerate political prisoners, to stop of criminal persecution of the Malady Front activists and to reinstate one of them in technical college #72 of the city of Saligorsk.
Source: www.charter97.org