Maryja Kalesnikava: arrested and taken to the Minsk pre-trial detention center

Vasiliukas, the head of the investigation group of the Chief Investigation Board, called me and informed me that she had been arrested. She offered to bring a package, “said the detainee’s father.

The reasons why the opposition activist was detained have not been officially announced. The woman’s father speculates that Ms Kalesnikava is being prosecuted for criminal proceedings in Belarus following the establishment of the Coordination Council.

The case was initiated on the basis of an article on “incitement to actions to undermine the national security of the Republic of Belarus”.

According to the Belarusian prosecutor’s office, the Coordination Council seeks to gain control of the country. Council members have repeatedly said that the government does not claim that its objective is to recalculate the results of the presidential elections, on the basis of which Alexander Lukashenko won the elections again.

Mr. Kalesnikava was detained on the border with Ukraine in opposition to officials seeking to deport her by force. The opposition reportedly tore up his passport and jumped out of the car.

Unknown people are trying to break into the apartment of Nobel laureate S. Alexeyevich

Unidentified people are trying to break into the apartment of Nobel Prize winner for Literature Sviatlan Aleksiyevich, a spokesman for the international radio station Euroradio said on the chat site of former Belarusian presidential candidate Viktor Babaryka.

“Sviatlana Aleksijevič asks journalists to visit her, because they call her with unknown numbers and call the apartment [duris]”, – wrote the representative.

S. Aleksijevič is a member of the Presidium of the Coordinating Council of the Opposition. On August 26, she was summoned for questioning in the Belarus Investigative Committee as a witness in the Coordination Council case and later refused to testify.

At present, practically all the members of the Presidium of the Coordination Council are detained or expelled from Belarus.

The Belarusian Pen Center publishes Sviatlan Aleksiyevich’s statement: “None of my like-minded colleagues remain on the Coordination Council. All behind bars or thrown out of the country. He took the last one today: Maxim Znak. Initially deprived of the state and now looting the best. Hundreds of others will be trapped alone in our ranks. Rebels in the Coordinating Council. The whole country rebelled. I repeat what I always said. We didn’t have a hit. We did not want to divide the country. We wanted a public dialogue. “The writer also appealed to the” Russian intelligentsia “and called not to keep silent about the events in Belarus.

“Again, strangers knock on the door …” S. Alexeievich’s address ends. Later, S. Aleksijevič opened the door to the journalists who came to her. The woman said she had already received a warning in the morning that someone was on duty at her door.

The writer assured that he had no intention of leaving the country.

Belarusian opposition lawyer arrested for ‘masked men’

One of the last members of the Belarusian opposition Coordinating Council, lawyer Maxim Znak, who was still at large, was detained by masked men on Wednesday, his colleagues said.

Znak, who worked as a lawyer for Viktor Babaryka, a former candidate for the presidency of Belarus, had to attend a video conference but did not show up, simply sending the word “masks” to the group, Babaryka’s press service said.

The report also says that the witness saw 39-year-old men in plain clothes with masks marrying Znak on the street near his office.

The 72-year-old Nobel Laureates in Literature, Sviatlana Aleksijevič and M. Znak, were the last two non-detained members of the Presidium of the Coordinating Council, a total of seven.

All the others were detained or forced to leave Belarus under increasingly strict measures against activists by President Aliaksandr Lukashenko’s regime.

Znak’s alleged arrest was reported the day after Maryya Kalesnikava, the most famous opposition figure still in Belarus, was arrested on the border with Ukraine in opposition to officials seeking to deport her by force. Mr. Kalesnikava’s passport was reportedly torn from him and he jumped out of the car.

The Coordination Council was created to ensure a peaceful transfer of power to the main opposition candidate, Sviatlan Cichanouskaya, without acknowledging Mr. Lukashenko’s declaration that he had been re-elected for the sixth term in the August 9 elections.

The disputed election sparked the largest anti-government demonstrations during Lukashenko’s 26-year rule. For a month, tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets to demand his resignation.

Lukashenko’s security services responded with waves of arrests, bloody violence against protesters and a campaign of intimidation and expulsion of opposition leaders.

V. Babaryka’s headquarters is being registered

An employee of the headquarters secretariat informed the Interfax news agency of a raid on the headquarters of Viktor Babaryka, a former candidate for the presidency of Belarus.

“Investigations are being carried out at headquarters. The Interior Ministry (Interior Ministry) and people in civilian clothes are working,” the employee said.

It confirmed that Maxim Znak, a former member of the Opposition Coordination Council at headquarters, had previously left to accompany people in balaklavs and civilian clothes.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Secretariat of the Coordination Council said Znak may have been detained by force personnel.

The Minsk militia, for their part, stated that they had no information about the arrest of Mr. Znak.

Kalesnikava’s colleagues told what really happened on the border with Ukraine

The representatives of the Belarusian power structures themselves brought the opposition Maryya Kalesnikava to the border with Ukraine, she herself did not intend to leave Belarus, her fellow Executive Secretary of the Coordination Council Ivan Kravtsov said on Tuesday.

“After the arrest, when I was in the Financial Investigation Department, they actively spoke to me. They are probably department employees. They were interested in taking Mary Kalesnikava abroad. First of all, they offered me to go abroad with her and Anton Rodnenkov in my car, “I. Kravcov told reporters in Kiev on Tuesday. But then the officials’ plans seemed to have changed, he said.

“Mary and I talked about this before the arrest, she didn’t want to leave. Apparently they understood that and they put us on the minibuses, then we went somewhere, probably to take Mary, then we stopped at the KGB and they took us to the border, “said the Executive Secretary of the Coordinating Council.” What interested the employees … First of all, they were interested in the possibility of taking Mary Kalesnikava abroad.

This explained the need to de-escalate, in his opinion, the situation in the country, and one of the proposed options was that we cross the border in three of our personal cars, “said I. Kravcov during a press conference in the Ukrainian capital on Tuesday.

He stated that he was convinced that the main task was to take Mr. Kalesnikava abroad. “The main task, which I understand was carried out, was to take Mary Kalesnikava abroad to create a vague media background. And we acted as an instrument of this task, it was not personally related to us, everything was related to the figure. of Maria and the authority she has in society ”, explained I. Kravcov.

A spokesperson for the Coordination Council, Rodnenkov, confirmed that the opposition had broken his passport when crossing the Belarusian-Ukrainian border. “They took him, and it was quite loud, that is, he heard that they pushed him by force, that he resisted, that they forced him into the car, in the back seat … He screamed that he was not going anywhere. . As soon as Mary found herself in the car and saw her passport, she immediately tore it into many small pieces. She took those pieces, squeezed them and threw them out the window at unknown youths surrounding the car, ”Rodnenkov said.

S. Cichanouskaya: Only new elections can save Belarus

Belarusians no longer consider Alexander Lukashenko to be the legitimate leader of Belarus, so only new presidential elections can save the country, said Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Cichanouskaya.

Cichanouskaya, who left Belarus, said Belarusians “will never forget what happened on August 9, 10 and 11 when the people of Belarus took to the streets to defend their voices.”

Cichanouskaya spoke with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki in Warsaw. During the meeting, M. Morawieckis symbolically gave S. Cichanouskaya the keys to the building that will become the new “Belarusian House” in the Polish capital.

“We wish that all Belarusians find their true home in Belarus. However, this fight must be fought from somewhere.” All people who want to continue this fight will receive the support of the EU and the Polish state, “Morawieckis said.

In Belarus on August 9. Presidential elections were held, the results of which are considered rigged.

As soon as the first voting results were announced, massive protests broke out in Minsk and other Belarusian cities, escalating into clashes with the militiamen. Thousands of people were arrested and many protesters were injured. S. Cichanouskaja herself left Belarus on the night of August 11 and lives in Lithuania.