Maxim Vinyarski continues hunger strike in prison for 11th day

The coordinator of the “European Belarus” is visited by doctors every day.

Maxim Vinyarski, a “European Belarus” coordinator, who had been subject to a preventive arrest for 12 days in the run-up to Chernobyl Way protest demonstration, is to be released from prison in Akrestsin Street on May 4.

For the first 9 days Maxim Vinyarski was on a waterless hunger strike, and then he started to drink water, however he still refuses to eat.

The lawyer told Radio Svaboda about the state of health of the prisoner.

“His state of health is normal, doctor visits him every day – was the answer of the officer on duty in the detention centre to me. He stays in the same cell about which he had complaint that there was no light bulb there on the ceiling, and it was too dark to read. They wanted to screw in another bulb, but the bulb socket was broken. The radio is not working well there too. But he didn’t ask me to insist on changing the cell any more, he said he would stay there. Nobody knows who might sit in another cell, it could be even harder, there are all kinds of prisoners there. He decided to stay in the same cell,” the lawyer said.

In addition to complaints about the conditions in the cell, Maxim Vinyarski is going to challenge the verdict of judge Liudmila Lappo from the court of Zavadski district of Minsk.

The time when Maxim Vinyarski is supposed to be released from the detention centre in Akrestsin Street is May 4, 11.15 a.m.

We remind that the coordinator of the civil campaign “European Belarus” was detained by policemen on May 22 in Minsk while he left the shopping mall “Korona”. The activist was told that he allegedly looked like a person who is on the wanted list. And in the police department he was accused for “insubordination to legal demands of policemen,” and a report was drawn up on administrative charges. On the same day the judge of Frunzenski district court of Minsk Liudmila Lappo found Vinyarski guilty and sentenced him to 12 days in custody.

During the trial Vinyarski was taken bad. He was suffering from tonsillitis at that moment. An ambulance was called in, and doctors stated he needed hospitalization, however, policemen said he was to be taken to prison. In response Vinyarski went on a waterless hunger strike.

The activist said his detention was related to the authorities’ desire to prevent his participation in the Chernobyl Way (Charnobylski Shliakh) march, a traditional rally of the opposition. There is a real threat that the authorities would not be satisfied by this punishment, and as it happened before, would find a way to prolong his stay in prison to prevent his presence in Minsk during the Ice Hockey World Championship. That is why his waterless hunger strike was announced.

Recently Maxim Vinyarski has spent 300 days in custody, which considerably undermined his state of health. During the latest detention policemen demanded him to leave Minsk for the duration of the Ice Hockey World Championship.