Participant of “Process of Fourteen” arrested and placed to remand prison

Today the last participant of the Process of Fourteen, an activist of the civil campaign “European Belarus” Alyaksandr Barazenka has been placed under arrest to a remind prison in Valadarski Street. The young activist took part in protest rallies of market vendors in January this year.

During the court trials over other opposition activists who are accused of organizing and active participation in the rally of market vendors on January 10, 2008, Alyaksandr Barazenka was studying in Poland. As he told to the website jeans-by.com, he hadn’t received summons or any information about accusation. He found out that he is considered to be involved in that criminal case from the web and his friends.

Today Alyaksandr Barazenka and lawyer Paval Sapelka went to the Investigation Department of preliminary investigation of the main directorate of Minsk City executive committee to an investigator of this process P. Mikhalkevich. The policeman said that Barazenka evaded a visit to investigator, and on May 12, 2008 a decision was adopted to place him under arrest, and he was placed on the list of wanted persons. Barazenka was detained today because of that, and placed to the remand prison in Valadarski Street in Minsk before the measure of retrain chained for him or his case considered by the court.

“The request to change the measure of restraint for Barazenka is to be sent to the prosecutor’s office by me. Let’s see what the prosecutor will answer. I believe that there are no grounds for the activist’s staying under arrest,” lawyer Paval Sapelka said to the Charter’97 press-centre.

10 activists of opposition – Alyaksei Bondar, Artsyom Dubski, Mikhail Kryvau, Mikhail Pashkevich, Alyaksandr Straltsou, Alyaksandr Charnyshou, Tatsyana Tsishkevich, Mikhail Subach and Paval Vinahradau – were sentenced to restraint of freedom for 2 years without sending them to special institutions. Maxim Dashuk as an underage was sentenced to a year and a half of restraint of freedom.