Prosecutor’s office refuses to initiate criminal case for oppositionists’ abductions

Minsk prosecutor’s office has denied a request of the deputy chairperson of the “Young Front” Nasta Palazhanka and an activist of the organisation Dzyanis Karnou who demanded to find persons who had abducted them and beaten them up.

On March 25 the young people were detained by the unknown who had certificates of Internal Affairs ministry and hid their faces under masks, Radio Svaboda reminds.

Nasta Palazhanka and Dzyanis Karnou were first beaten in a car, and after that the girl was released near the village of Tarasava not far from Minsk, and Karnou was taken to a forest near Dzyarzhynsk. There he was beaten up, his jeans were torn, and he was forced to stand on the snow on his knees. Mobile phones of the Young Front activists were seized.

Nasta Palazhanka and Dzyanis Karnou addressed the prosecutor’s office with a request to open a criminal case and find the criminals.

Earlier, on December 2009, the unknown abducted the leader of “Young Belarus” Artur Finkevich was thrown our of a car near Rakau. Police initiated a criminal case, however it was dismissed a month ago.

In February 2009 Mikita Krasnou, a leader of the initiative “Volnaya Moladz” was beaten up.

In this connection well-known public leaders of Belarus have sent an open letter to the general prosecutor with a request of personal supervision of the investigation of crimes against opposition activists.

The letter was signed by Alyaksandr Kazulin, Paval Sevyarynets, Alyaksandr Milinkevich, Vyachaslau Siuchyk, Uladzimir Khalip, Henadz Buraukin, Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu, Syarhei Zakonnikau, Zinaida Bandarenka, Ina Kulej, Myachyslau Hryb and others.

Copes of the address to the Prosecutor General were sent to the Internal Affairs Ministry, to the presidential administration, representations of the OSCE and the European Commission, European Embassies and independent mass media.