Prisoners' godparenthoood: Jean-François Steiert adopts Ilya Vasilevich
Swiss member of parliament Jean-François Steiert (Social Democrats) adopts a prisoner’s godparenthood for Ilya Vasilevich.
The Swiss MP explains his engagement as follows:
“Ilya Vasilevich seems to be only in prison because he has publicly stated some non-conform opinions. I would like to – jointly with hopefully many colleagues across the political spectrum – contribute that all people in Belarus are allowed to publicly state their opinions. This is for me about assuring human rights all around the world and about collective security in Europe. For this collective security, any totalitarian government is a danger, which we have to overcome.
The Prisoner’s Godparenthood campaign for political prisoners in Belarus was initiated by the human-rights organisation Libereco – Partnership for Human Rights to support the prisoners and their families. Currently 11 members of parliament have taken over a godparenthood for a political prisoner in Belarus.
The 19-years old student Ilya Vasilevich took part in protests against irregularities during the presidential election on 19th December 2010. He is not member of any political party but wanted to show his objections against the current autoritarian regime. During the violent crackdown of the peaceful protests, Ilya Vasilevich was arrested and sent to prison for 10 days. Only few days after his release he was arrested again at his college. During a apparently unfair trial he was found guilty of stirring mass riots and was condemned to 3 years of imprisonement on the 13th of May 2011.
Belarusian and international human-rights organisations regard Ilya Vasilevich as a prisoner of conscience and are calling for his immediate and unconditional release.
