BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

05/08/2006

Belarus court imprisons poll monitors

MINSK: A court handed jail terms of between six months and two years yesterday to four activists who tried to organise independent monitoring of March's presidential election.

The members of the Partnyorstvo election monitoring group, Timofei Dranchuk, Nikolai Astreiko, Enira Bronitskaya and Alexander Shalaiko, were found guilty of participating in an unregistered non-governmental organisation leading to an infringement of citizens' rights.

Astreiko was sentenced to two years in jail, Dranchuk was sentenced to one year and both Enira Bronitskaya and Alexander Shalaiko were sentenced to six months.

EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner condemned the sentence and called for the immediate release of the activists.

"I condemn unreservedly any detention of members of civil society exercising their fundamental rights of freedom of expression and association and I call for their immediate release," she said in a statement.

The US said the sentences were illegal.

"While the sentences are not the maximum possible, we do not consider it to be a legal process," said Jonathan Moore, the charge d'affaires at the US embassy. "We believe that all political prisoners in Belarus ... should be released."

The four have been in jail since they were detained on February 21 in the run-up to the March 19 election, in which President Alexander Lukashenko clinched a third term although observers alleged widespread ballot-rigging.

Partyorstvo activists across the country were rounded up ahead of the election by armed security men wearing masks and office equipment belonging to the organisation was confiscated.

The four were originally accused of plotting a coup d'etat with Washington's support ahead of the presidential elections. - AFP

Source:

http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=100985&version=1&template_id=39&parent_id=21