I have just come back from Minsk where I was for the Presidential election on December 19 and for the complete defeat of democracy and the savage attack and arrest of the opposition.

I was very proud to be among the fifty thousand people on the Square Sunday night who were not satisfied about the stolen result and who were demanding a new election. I was there together with my friends, Andrey Sannikov who was running for President and his wife journalist Irina Khalip as well as with hundreds of other friends from civil society.

After a staged provocation by the State security forces (which has been documented by independent media) uniformed police cracked down on the demonstrators. Special secret service arrested and seriously beat not the provocateurs breaking windows in Electoral committee building but targeted journalists, human rights defenders and opposition candidates elsewhere in the crowd of protestors.

Hundreds of my friends were put on prison. More than 600 people were detained that night. All of them got 10-15 days imprisonment.

But more serious sentences are facing presidential candidates, their aides and journalists. Today there are 23 persons in KGB prison who have been declared suspects in a criminal case over “mass riot.” They may face up to 15 years in prison. Among them are my close friends Andrey Sannikov, Irina Khalip, Dmitry Bondarenko, Alexander Atroschenkov, Vlad Kobets and Natalia Radina – all from Charter`97. Over a quarter of the people arrested by the KGB worked on Sannikov’s Presidential Campaign and Charter97.

The KGB is living up to its historical reputation. Their interrogators are trying to break the prisoners (and have been successful with some lesser-known candidates), to put the pressure on families, and to create a climate of fear in society. They have threatened to take Sannikov’s and Khalip’s three-year-old son into state custody for the duration of their imprisonment. There is still no information about candidate Vladimir Nekliaev who was seriously beaten before the demonstration and taken from the hospital by people in civil uniform.

Dozens of private apartments and offices of the former presidential candidate, their staff, human rights defenders, and journalists were searched by the police and the KGB on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Among other human rights violations, the KGB raided Vladimir Khalip’s apartment and confiscated computers and documents. Not only had Vladimir helped me with the recent book on disappearances, but he committed the additional crime of being Irina Halip’s father. Most significantly the Charter97 web site completely destroyed and all computers carried off.

Lukashenko has lost all pretense of moral and political legitimacy and announced a war against the liberal opposition and people of Belarus.
Thank to all of you for great support. We have to be stronger and more united today to force the release of the political prisoners. Obviously, serious sanctions against the Lukashenko regime and a complete travel ban on the officials who directed the equivalent of the declaration of martial law must be put in place by the European Union and the United States. But we must recognize that our goal is to get rid of last dictator in Europe; it is only one way to save people of Belarus and possibility of democracy in this sad part of Europe.

Irina Krasovskaya

President, We Remember Foundation