Mikalai Statkevich has “correctional conversations” every month

The prison authorities think the political prisoner is “inclined to violence and escape”.

“I forget to tell you every time: I am still considered to be 'inclined to violence and escape'. So, I have correctional conversations every week,” political prisoner Mikalai Statkevich, a former candidate at the 2010 presidential election, wrote his wife, statkevich.org reports.

“We learnt after Mikalai's transfer from a correctional facility to a prison in January 2012, that he was classified as a persistent violator of prison rules, 'who has no intentions to improve and plans to continue his criminal activity after the release' (this status was the ground for stricter confinement conditions) and that he was given the status of an inmate 'inclined to violence and escape'. It brings additional restrictions to the prisoner, because he is put under additional supervision.

Two years passed and I asked myself if the additional restrictions had been removed. The next day, I received the answer saying that Mikalai is still 'inclined to violence and escape' and that he has 'correctional conversations' every month. It allows prison officers to impose additional control measures in the cell, through the viewing window in the door and by other means. He jokes he 'promises not to attack anyone here'. That's the news from him that doesn't tell anything new,” the political prisoner's wife said.

Maryna Adamovich also noted that Mikalai Statkevich, like Mikalai Dziadok, who serves his term in the same prison, wrote about hot temperatures in the cell. “As I know from his letters, the windows of his cell face the north. They see the sun only in spring and summer, but it's stuffy there when it's hot outside. Mikalai worries for those whose windows face the south and notes it is a serious price for the opportunity to see the sun in autumn and winter,” Maryna Adamovich says.

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

On May 25, 2011, the politician was sentenced by Minsk's Partyzanski district court to 6 years in a medium security correctional facility.

On January 12, 2012, the court imposed stricter confinement conditions, and the politician was transferred from correctional facility No. 17 in Shklou to prison No. 4 in Mahilou.