Belsat’s coordinator in Belarus questioned in prosecutor’s office

Eduard Melnikau, member of the direction of the Belarusian Association of Journalists, Belsat TV channel’s coordinator in Belarus, has been summoned today for questioning to the Minsk prosecutor’s office.

The questioning was connected with the “case of cartoons,” which was the ground of searches in journalists’ apartments, including Eduard Melnikau, on 27 and 28 March carried on by the KGB.

The summon, received recently by Melnikau, didn’t say about the cause of a call to the prosecutor’s office. When the journalist phoned to an investigator and asked about the reason for the meeting, the latter surprised: “Don’t you know it?”

On 13 May Melnikau visited the prosecutor’s office with a civil representative – lawyer of the Belarusian Association of Journalists Andrei Bastunets. The questioning, carried on by special investigator Viktar Shaban, lasted for 40 minutes.

“I was asked how I was related to Belsat. I said I dealt with registration of representation of the TV channel in Belarus and my activity is absolutely legal. I do not have any relations to the cartoons, I told to the investigator,” Eduard Melnikau said in the conversation with the BAJ press service.

The prosecution agencies and the KGB have already questioned a number of journalists, who had been searched on 27-28 March. They were questioned as witnesses in the criminal case on libel against president (part 1 of article 367 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus) instigated against A. Minich, P. Marozau and A. Abozau. All of them were asked about the political cartoons by the “Third Way” and about activity of the Belsat TV channel.

In August 2005 the Prosecution office of Minsk instigated a criminal case on spreading via the Internet cartoons “insulting dignity and honour of the president of Belarus” (article 367, part 1). The reason for instigating the case was satirical cartoons. At first, Andrei Abozau, administrator of the site of the civil initiative “The Third Way” and projects’ administrator Pavel Marozau were questioned in the frames of the criminal case. KGB officers searched their apartments and seized computer hardware. Soon after that A. Abozau, P. Marozau and one more suspected Aleh Minich left Belarus.