Political prisoner Parfiankou spends 23 days in punishment cell

The authorities of correctional facility No. 9 in Horki refused to give a cross necklace to Vasily Parfiankou.

Charter97.org has learnt it from activist Volha Mikalaichyk.

“I received a letter from Vasily Parfiankou. I was shocked, to put it mildly. I bought and sent him a small orthodox cross, as he asked, but prison officers refused to give it to him, as well as Belarusian and world maps. They gave him only magazines and newspapers. Vasily has been in Horki for 37 days, 23 of which he spent in a punishment cell. He was deprived of all visits and parcels for the remaining eight months. The meal is terrible. He is always hungry. He writes he is under constant control, but adds he will survive,” the activist said.

On December 5, 2013, Minsk's Pershamaiski district court sentenced Parfiankou to one year in a strict security correctional facility for “violating the rules of preventive supervision”.

Vasily Parfiankou was sentenced to 4 years of imprisonment in 2011 for taking part in a rally on December 19, 2010. He was pardoned some months later. The activist was put under preventive supervision in early 2012 after arrests during pickets of solidarity with political prisoners.