“Reverse Effect”: Record Number Of People Came Out To Protest In Brest

Residents of the city were outraged by the tactics of the officials from the Ministry of Environment.

On December 9, between 250 and 300 people came to the traditional feeding of pigeons at Lenin Square in Brest to protest against the construction of the iPower battery factory near the city, the Brest newspaper reports.

For more than 9 months, that these veiled protests have been held at the square, that was the record number of the participants. There were no detentions during or after feeding the pigeons.

The main topic of the plant opponents gathering was the initiative group’s meeting at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.

“I think people had hope that the meeting with the minister would bring us closer to stopping the construction and banning the operation of this battery plant. Its results disappointed and even made the Brest residents anger. In my opinion, the officials want to “sit out” this protest. But the effect is the opposite: the more time passes, the angrier the Brest residents get because the authorities at all levels do not want to reckon with people,” – human rights activist Raman Kisliak commented to BG on the number of people at the square.

Lada Yarosh, a representative of the initiative group, agreed that the reason for the unprecedented number of people at the feeding was the meeting at the Ministry of Natural Resources on December 5.

“Since they have deceived us regarding the record, which we could listen to and understand what the ministry’s position was, since people came in the hope to meet those who had been there and to listen to their impressions and comments. For such a long time, the people, who are interested in the plant’s issue, have undoubtedly gained confidence in Dziamyan Lepiasevich and Dzmitry Bekaliuk’s comments regarding the events taking place,” – she said.