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Legendary Miner Yury Korzun: Protest Still in Hearts of People. We’ll See It Soon

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Legendary Miner Yury Korzun: Protest Still in Hearts of People. We’ll See It Soon
Yury Korzun
PHOTO: tut.by

Spring will put everything in its place.

Many people remember the protest action of the 42-year-old miner who handcuffed himself in the mine in September. He demanded Lukashenka's resignation, the cessation of the massacre of peaceful protesters and the release of arrested members of the strike committee of Belaruskali. At least a dozen strong men were lifting Yury Korzun to the ground from the depth of 305 meters. They cut the chain with a gasoline-powered tool.

Yury does not regret his deed. He says he would do it again today, but he would do it much better.

- No one could have taken me out of the mine until the general director descended and started talking to me. I would have ensured the release of the strike members arrested back in August," Yury says in an interview with Salidarnasts.

Yury has spent 60 days in custody since September. The last arrest ended on 26 February. The miner served his sentence in Lyuban, Salihorsk and Baranavichy.

- The conditions are bad everywhere - it's a prison, he says.

- I do not even call the last 15 days administrative detention. They captured me before the "All-Belarusian" Assembly. They did not want me to perform. At 7 a.m, they took me out of the car, twisted my arms, made me face the snow, and took me to the police station.

The men in plain clothes first offered Yury to go to the police station, saying they needed to talk. He offered to send him a summons.

- They told me not to clown around and pulled me out of the car, Yury told Salidarnasts.

- The wild 90s are back, only in a legalized form. There is nothing new. We've been observing it in Belarus since August.

Yury was told to take off his belt and shoelaces and step into "the police cell".

- The protocol says I took part in an unauthorized mass event. The guys from the strike committee and I participated in a marathon of solidarity with the repressed athletes. It was a run of more than two kilometres through the woods. The policeman told the court that after watching the video, he thought it was against the authorities.

YURY KORZUN
PHOTO: GAZETABY.COM

Yuri was outraged and wrote a statement about refusing to eat. For seven days, he was on a hunger strike.

- Then I started to feel bad. People were smoking non-stop in the cell. I was with people arrested for domestic scandals, drunkards. It was very hard to serve when there was constant smokescreen. On the eighth day, I started to get out of the hunger strike not to risk my health.

Speaking about the cellmates in Lyuban, Yury notes:

- They are only interested in one thing: where to drink, with whom, and for what? These citizens earn 300 rubles a month. It is unclear why they go to this job. They receive their wages in instalments of 50 rubles 5-6 times a month.

I asked them why did they go there? They say there's no more job to go to. People drink themselves to death out of despair. They are apolitical.

Besides Yury, three more members of the strike committee of Belaruskali were detained for the marathon of solidarity with the repressed athletes. Two of them got 15 days of arrest, another one - 25.

- My protest against the existing system began not after the elections, but in April, when Lukashenka said that children didn't have to go to school in masks. He jeopardized our future. How can one risk children? Such a man can't and shouldn't be president.

During the presidential campaign, Y

ury Korzun was a member of the initiative group of Viktar Babaryka.

In Yury's opinion, despite the repressive machine, the protest could not be stifled.

- It remained in people's hearts. I am sure that we will see it all in the spring.

He classifies the law enforcers Yury met into two categories:

- Some are fanatics and have it in their heads that they are saving the country from occupation by Europe and NATO. That's the position, for example, of the police officer who supervises all political detentions in the city. More often, some consider themselves hostages of circumstances.

Yury is not going to leave Belarus.

- I love my country. They want me to leave. Law enforcers arrest people on purpose for them to leave. When it happens, they start writing that they were protesting to get abroad.

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