Anton Surapin: There is much I can’t tell

The journalist gave an interview to charter97.org several hours after his release.

Unfortunately, there is much Anton Surapin cannot tell; he has just been released on his recognizance and cannot disclose investigation materials. Moreover, since Anton Surapin is registered in his parents’ apartment in Slutsk, he needs a KGB permission to leave the town to come to Minsk. Nevertheless, the journalist is “optimistic”.

“I’ve spent one month and four days in prison. The conditions were OK. There was a place to sleep in my cell, but no toilet; they took me to a WC twice a day. But I have no complaints.”

Anton says he doesn’t know if he will be tried in court. “I wasn’t told anything about it,” he says. According to Surapin, he met with his lawyer in prison, without the investigator.

Antont doesn’t know the real estate agent Siargey Basharymau who also was released from the KGB prison on his own recognizance. “I heard about him on the TV. I have no idea who Basharymau is,” the journalist said.

Anton Surapin didn’t want to comment on his arrest, which is understandable since he has just been released. “I only uploaded a photograph of the teddy bears that the Swedish pilots dropped down. Those were not my photographs. I don’t know those Swedes. There is nothing more I can tell,” the journalist said.

Right now he looks forward to going online to read news, visit his website and social media accounts. But he didn’t get back his equipment withdrawn during the search. “I only have an old nearly dead computer, maybe I can use it,” the journalist said.

In the end of our conversation, when we asked Anton to say anything to the people who fought for him all this time, he said firmly: “Love live independent Belarusian journalism!”