KGB finds extremism in Belarus Press Photo album
- 5.04.2013, 11:51
“Fabrications about life activities of the people of Belarus” were found in Belarus Press Photo albums.
Yulia Darashkevich, a co-organiser of the contest, wrote it on her Facebook account.
“The country of unfrightened idiots: Extremism was in the end found in old Belarus Press Photo albums (41 copies seized on the border in November). The KGB summons us to court. Read and cry from the middle of the text,” Yulia writes.
The KGB letter (a scanned copy can be seen below) says the photo album “contains intentionally distorted and false fabrications about the life activities of the Republic of Belarus in the political, economic, social and other spheres that denigrate the notational honour and dignity of citizens of the Republic of Belarus.”
“The selection of pictures in the photo album as a whole covers only negative aspects of life activities of the people of Belarus combined with the author's concoction and conclusions that denigrate the national honour and dignity of citizens of the Republic of Belarus, downgrade the reputation of the state authority and undermine the confidence of foreign states, foreign and international organisations in governmental bodies,” the letter says.
The KGB thinks the photo album is extremist.
“I am going to see a lawyer next week,” Yulia Darashkevich said to charter97.org about the KGB letter. “We are holding the fourth contest. Pictures have been accepted. The jury are working now. That album, the second one, was legally brought in the country at the beginning of 2012. All custom duties were paid. All copies were sold out. You won't find it anywhere. We had those 41 copies in the car, when we were returning from an exhibition in Poland. We had a series of exhibitions in Europe and we travelled with our albums everywhere.”
Forty one copies of Belarus Press Photo album were seized at Kamenny Loh border checkpoint from Belarusian photographs Alyaksandr Vasyukevich and Yulia Darashkevich on November 12, 2012.
Belarus Press Photo is the first independent open contest for Belarusian photojournalists. The contest is held for the fourth time this year. The “extremist” pictures from the 2011 contest are available here.
