The United States said Friday it is prepared for “significant” improvement in the chilly relationship with Belarus, but will be looking closely at the conduct of elections in that country next month as well as other issues. Belarus this month released what were believed to be its last three political prisoners. VOA’s David Gollust reports from the State Department.
Czech Vaclav Havel supports Ukraine, Belarus’s entry to NATO
Prague- Ukraine and Belarus are part of the Euro-Atlantic geographical region and should be members of the European Union and NATO, former Czech president Vaclav Havel said on a television discussion programme today.
“European Belarus” activist arrested for calling to boycott and protest against falsification
The Leninski district court of Minsk sentenced activist of the civil campaign “European Belarus” Paval Luksha to ten days of arrest for distribution of “Vybor” newspaper calling to boycott the oncoming “parliamentary election” and protest against possible rigging of the “election” results.
“Statement saying there are no political prisoners is treachery of us!”
A number of statements saying there remains no political prisoners in Belarus after release of Kazulin, Kim and Parsyukevich has increased lately. Participants of the trial of 14, sentence on them has recently come in force.
Russia’s Aggression Is a Challenge to World Order
In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Georgia, the United States and its trans-Atlantic allies have rightly focused on two urgent and immediate tasks: getting Russian soldiers out, and humanitarian aid in.
It’s Time to demonstrate power
The nature of the “election” and their result is quite clear today. The number of only 0.07% of democrats out of the total number of precinct commissions’ members vividly demonstrate that the regime is not going to lose control over the chief element of the elections: votes’ count. At the same time opposition representatives make about 40% of the total number of candidates to deputies, the leader of the civil campaign “European Belarus” Andrei Sannikov writes.
Russians dig in despite promised Georgia pullout
POTI, Georgia – Russian troops held their position in the key town of Gori and were digging in deeper in other strategic areas of Georgia on Friday, the day that Russia’s president said a pullback would be complete.
In reality 10 political prisoners remain in Belarus
In reality, there are 1o more political prisoners left in Belarus.”Restriction of freedom” for persons on trial at “the Process of Fourteen” is a very strict measure of restrain. On August 20 due to pressure of the Belarusian opposition and international community political prisoners Syarhei Parsyukevich and Andrei Kim were released. Despite of the fact that accusations had been obviously falsified, and verdicts were unjust, like in the case of Alyaksandr Kazulin, they were released by a presidential decree of pardon, not by a decision of judiciary establishments.
Lukashenka calls actions of Russia in Georgia “beautiful”
Alyaksandr Lukashenka called actions of Russia during the war in Georgia quiet and accurate. “Everything has been done perfect, in a very calm, wise and beautiful manner,” A. Lukashenka said in Sochi at the meeting with Russian President Dzmitry Medvedev. “Russia has done everything very accurately,” the Belarusian ruler added, noting that actions of the West in the same situation would be such that “the whole world would be stirred”.
David Miliband: Russia must face consequences of Georgia ‘aggression’
The Foreign Secretary said Moscow had engaged in “19th century forms of diplomacy” during the five-day war over South Ossetia and its leaders must understand that “the Soviet Union does not exist any more.”