Candidate Receives Warning for Distribution of Independent Editions

On December 13 a UCP deputy contender Alexander Protska received a warning for distributing Narodnaya Vola and Tovarishch independent newspapers when collecting signatures on the streets of Homel.

The commission of election district #15 (headed by Mikalai Maly) considered his actions illegal.

The warning was also pronounced to the head of the regional UCP organization Vasil Paliakou, a candidate on election district #13. Vasil Paliakou was distributing leaflets “Will there be an election?” where the previous three election campaigns were analyzed. In particular, it mentioned the big difference between the turn out data announced by election commissions and by independent observers, – informs the BAJ Monitoring Service.

“The actions of Protska and Paliakou have nothing to do with the election. One of them was distributing registered editions and the other one was giving out leaflets containing information about the previous elections campaigns. I am surprised at the fact that election commissions pronounce warnings for it”, – pointed out Mikhail Pastukhou, Head of the Law Center for Media Protection at the Belarusian Association of Journalists.

– It is necessary to mention that the commission considered the fact of distribution of registered Belarusian editions illegal. This fact characterizes the political atmosphere of this election campaign, – said Mikhail Pastukhou.