Zmitser Bandarenka: “Today Internet hinders Belarusian authorities a lot”

“European Belarus” civil campaign coordinator Zmitser Bandarenka has been interrogated by police today.

“Today morning I was interrogated in the police department of Leninski district of Minsk. The day before, inviting me for interrogation, an interrogating officer Alyaksandr Viktaravich Chuy said it would concern a well-known “hunters’ case”. But formally the criminal case is dedicated to “defense of honour and dignity of KGB officer Korzh, who was insulted by slanderous materials distributed on the web”. Secrecy of investigation exists, and I cannot reveal details of my interrogation as a witness. But my version of the events is the following: under a disguise of infighting between the Interior Affairs Ministry and the KGB the authorities are trying to put an end to freedom of expression in the Internet,” Zmitser Bandarenka said in an interview to “European Belarus” website.

The politician notes that “in the run-up to decisive events Lukashenka always carries out an informational mopping-up operation”.

“It started before the referendum in 1996, when allegedly because of disturbances which hindered special communication of the KGB and the Interior Ministry, the independent radio station FM Radio 101.2 where I worked then was closed. Over the years of the dictatorship hundreds of independent newspapers, regional TV and radio stations, TV programs and radio programs at central channel were closed. Today Internet is hindering the authorities a lot.

When Lukashenka’s mass media are pouring flows of lies and defamation on oppositionists, the KGB never defend honour and dignity of hundreds of belied and defamed citizens. That is why I am convinced that I was not interrogated in the case of “generals and hunters”, but in the case “Prosecutor’s office vs. Internet,” Bandarenka said.

Earlier “European Belarus” leader Andrei Sannikov and his wife, a popular journalist Iryna Khalip, where interrogated in the same case.