Former prosecutor of Minsk region Mikhail Snyahir arrested

Former prosecutor of Minsk region has been charged with a crime under Article 424 part 3 of the Criminal Code (abuse of power or official misconduct). The official has been taken into custody.

Snyahir has been served charges on back on December 12. Maximal sanction under article 424 of the Criminal Code is 10 years of imprisonment and confiscation of property.

The General prosecutor’s office hasn’t given any comments concerning the former deputy prosecutor general Mikalay Kupryjanau. It is only known that last week he was still in Minsk. Measure of restraint for him hasn’t been chosen yet, BelaPAN informs.

As we have informed, as journalists were told on December 10 by Prosecutor General Ryhor Vasilevich, the fact of construction of a house for a front person for four years “is likely to be confirmed” As said by R. Vasilevich, he was surprised that over such a long period of time this fact hadn’t been detected by law-enforcing agencies and hadn’t been told to Prosecutor General. “Investigation is being proceeding intensively,” R. Vasilevich said. As said by him, the assessed value of the house is 350 mln rubles.

Speaking about the former deputy Prosecutor General M. Kupryjanau, R. Vasilevich noted that the matter concerns the episode of M. Kupryjanau’s participation in hearings in the Economic Court related to the apartment in Minsk to which M. Snyahir laid claims.

Primarily a criminal action was brought up under Article 424 part 2 of the Criminal Code against the both.

As we have informed earlier, on November 13 at consultations on effectiveness of corruption struggle efforts Alyaksandr Lukashenka ordered the Prosecutor General of the country Ryhor Vasilevich to offer the deputy Prosecutor general Mikalay Kupryjanau and Minks region’s prosecutor Mikhail Snyahir to vacate their positions and to initiate a criminal case against them.

In particular, A. Lukashenka stated that in May 2007 M. Snyahir bought from a representative of a commercial firm a 5-room apartment in the centre of Minsk which is more than 200 square metres and has an underground garage. As said by him, “he (Snyahir) bought the apartment from a person who hadn’t a right to represent that firm at that time, and moreover was redundant”. Besides that apartment could not be sold by a legal entity, as a worker of the firm lived there. He has a contract of lease with the firm until 2024.

Lukashenka underlined that the apartment had been bought by Snyahir at a reduced cost, just Br156 million, while its market cost was more than $500,000. In order to put a varnish of legality the operation, Snyahir made a false additional agreement to the purchase/sale agreement with a different price, 535 million Br.