Mikalai Statkevich held incommunicado

There are no letters from a political prisoner.

Former political prisoner Zmitser Dashekvich filed a request to the Corrections Department for the Mahilou region asking to carry out a check in prison No. 4 in Mahilou and explain why letters from Mikalai Statkevich are not delivered, the press service of Young Front reports.

“Maryna Adamovich, Mikalai's wife, told me she received a letter from her husband on October 21. He sends his best wishes to me and writes he sent me three letters recently,” Young Front co-head Zmitser Dashkevich thinks. “I received just one postcard a month ago. Unfortunately, it's not the first time when the authorities of the Mahilou prison block mail of political prisoners Mikalai Statkevich and Yauheny Vaskovich. It works in both directions. I filed a request to the Corrections Department for carrying out a check.”

Zmitser Dashkevich notes he has no illusions that the Department can find the “lost” letters of Mikalai Statkevich. But he thinks the more attention is given to lawlessness in the penitentiary system, the less prison officers will violate the law.

We remind that Mikalai Statkevich was reported some days ago to have been tortured with sleep deprivation. He wasn't allowed to sleep for several days in a row.

Mikalai Statkevich was a candidate in the 2010 presidential election. He was arrested after a protest rally against the electoral fraud.

Minsk's Partyzanski district court sentenced the politician to 6 years in a medium security correctional colony on May 26, 2011.

On January 12, 2012, confinement conditions were strengthened on a court decision and Statkevich was transferred from correctional colony No.17 in Shklou to prison No.4 in Mahilou.

Statkeivch is often thrown into a punishment cell. He has restrictions regarding parcels and visits of his relatives. Prison officers organise provocations against him on the order from above.