Court imposes 7-day jail term on Slonim resident, seizes car for ‘opposition colours’

A man driving a red car with two white stickers on it was detained on the M11 highway. in the town of Slonim.

According to Hrodna regional Directorate of Interior, the 31-year-old man decorated his car in ‘opposition colours’ – he put a sticker with the emblem of Pahonya on the hood and pasted two white stickers on the roof.

The policemen drew an administrative protocol upon the detainee for ‘violating the order of organising or holding mass events’.

The driver appeared before court; the judge sentenced him to 7 days of administrative arrest. His Ford Fiesta car was confiscated as ‘an instrument which was used to commit the offence’.

In 1991, the white-red-white flag and the emblem Pahonya (Pursuit) were adopted as national symbols of the country. However, they were official until the 1995 referendum, when on the tip from Belarusian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who is an ardent adherer of the USSR, they were replaced by the Soviet ones. For years, pro-Lukashenka officials have been linking the white-red-white colours to the opposition. Last December, the authorities warned that those Belarusian citizens who would hang out ‘unregistered symbols’ even on their windows or balconies might be penalised under administrative law.

In late February, Belarusians launched a petition for adding the white-red-white flag to the emoji bank as an alternative to the state flag of Belarus: it has already collected over 48 thousand signatures.

belsat.eu