Bialiatski receives letter from all over the world

Solidarity letters arrive to the political prisoner from different ends of the world.

This month Ales Bialatski is trying to respond to congratulations and letters, which came in another wave on Christmas and New Year’s holidays. Among them there are messages from Belarusians living far away, the human rights center Viasna reports.

Last weeks a postcard came to Babrujsk penal colony from Australian Sydney – “the farthest postcard from another part of the globe” as Ales called it in his correspondence with Viasna’s human rights activists.

The postcard came from Jan. He remembers his meeting with the human rights activist, whom he puts in the same line with one of world’s most famous human rights activists Nelson Mandela:

“Dear Ales!

Three years ago I shook your hand in the Square and I am still proud of that.

I want you to repeat Nelson Mandela’s heroic deed.

No, not to spend 27 years in prison, but to become our liberating and uniting president or prime-minister!

I wish you strength and to take care of your health!

It is plus 40 Celsius here now. I wish your inner reactor never go out in your soul…

Long live Belarus!”

It can be noticed that Jan follows Ales Bialiatski’s life in custody, since he knows of Ales’ attempts to learn English, that is why he jokingly offers him to practice in correspondence… About that Jan wrote already in English.

In the meanwhile Dutch Amnesty International office continues the long-term actions in support of the convicted head of Viasna human rights center. For many months the Dutch have been sending Ales Bialiatski postcards with the message “I am thinking of you. I am wishing you well”. The organization’s activists posted such pieces – with the address of the penal colony number 2 in Babrujsk and the political prisoner’s picture instead of the stamp – in media, so as many as possible people could express their solidarity.

We would remind that Ales Bialiatski is serving the punishment term in the penal colony number 2 in Babrujsk. On 24 November 2011 court found him guilty of concealment of profits on an especially large scale and sentenced to four and a half years in high security prison with confiscation of assets. The reason for criminal prosecution of Bialiatski was that he had bank accounts in Lithuania and Poland. The court did not take into account that the money was used for human rights activities.