Imprisoned ex-presidential candidate to be moved from prison to penal colony


Mikalai Statkevich is to be transferred from prison to colony on January 12, 2015, after the end of the three-year term of prison regime, he says in a letter to journalist Barys Vyrvich.

In the absence of admonitions, he could be returned to a colony in 1.5 years, but, as he writes, ‘this is not an option for political prisoners’, HRC ‘Viasna’ cites the imprisoned politician.

“They can return me to prison again then, but it won’t change my position,” he writes.

In his letter dated December 6 Mikalai Statkevich also noted that he hadn’t received letters from the journalist for several months, as well as letters from other people. Meanwhile, Mr Vyrvich sent him a letter or a postcard with the latest news from the life of the democratic circles of Mahiliou region every month. Statkevich has been receiving only letters from relatives more or less regular, because he informs his father and wife which letters from them he has got.

Mikalai Statkevich is the last 2010 presidential candidate to be in prison. The sentence given to Mr Statkevich in 2011 was one of the toughest: six years of imprisonment in a maximum security penal colony. The reason might be explained by the fact that in his election speech Mikalai Statkevich addressed to the current president demanding “to give back all that you have stolen”. The authorities are trying to embitter Statkevich’s life even in prison putting him to a disciplinary cell or making him share a ward with an AIDS sufferer. However, the former presidential candidate keeps mantaining his innocence and refuses to ask President Lukashenka for pardon.

www.belsat.eu/en

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