Main Choice Today Is To Be Free Or 'Obedient'

The lessons from celebrating the BPR's 100th anniversary.

One of the leaders of the Belarusian National Congress Maxim Viniarski commented on mass arrests ahead and during the Freedom Day on March 25 for Charter97.org:

"My detention on March 21 was an attempt to prevent my participation in the rally on March 25. The way my arrest was carried out clearly demonstrated what the authorities were afraid of.

Six riot police in an ambush instead of summons to the court. It seems likely they will call it a "special operation", and award the policemen. No matter what the dictator says in his interviews, he is afraid of street actions beyond his control the most.

This can be seen from the behavior of the law enforcers in the Yakub Kolas Square on March 25 and from the detentions in the regions.

For me, everything is simple: the citizens' constitutional rights exist only when they are being fought for. The goal of the authorities is that all citizens behave like "prisoners", stick out only on command, and so that they themselves persecute those who do not agree to the conditions of the regime.

The authorities want to manage the country as a correctional colony, with all the following attributes: the show-off, the active, incited on the dissenters by a nod of the leaders, "punishment cells" for those who want to remain free in such conditions. Whether they will succeed or not - this depends on each of us. Today this is the main choice - to be free or obedient.

And about the "release" on March 25, of me and my associates, I can say the following: they jail;ed us illegally, and released us also illegally. This clearly shows what exactly all their "clowns in black mantles" and their "pieces of paper" are worth. What kind of "law" can we talk about in such a situation? Puppets, all of them, from the first to the last. The reason for such a hasty "liberation" lies most likely in the international pressure. But if here, in the country, the regime is not pressured from within by the civil society, then lawlessness will only increase.