No News Of Mikalai Statkevich For 111 Days

Today is the third anniversary of the detention of the opposition leader.

The Belarusian opposition leader Mikalai Statkevich, sentenced by the regime to 14 years, has not been heard from for almost four months.

Contact with the politician, serving a sentence in Hlubokaye prison, suspended in mid-February.

Mikalai Statkevich was in solitary confinement for six months and then probably in the penal colony:

"Today, [post 15 May - ed.] I received a reply from the colony to my enquiries. ... Anyone who knows nothing about their relatives will understand me. 36 penalties, 14 of them - solitary confinement (5 in the last three months, the term is not reported). He may now in the solitary confinement cell as well, or has just been released. Once again, he was punished by spending six months in the solitary confinement cell. (The last six months stretched out to nine months). This means that, if he was not in the solitary confinement, then 24 hours a day in a stone sack with a walk in the same stone sack for half an hour a day. He was deprived of everything: the only parcel and visits. Phone calls are out of the question. I do not get any letters," his wife Maryna Adamovich wrote in the middle of May.

Today, 31 May, it will be exactly three years since Statkevich was detained on his way to a picket in Minsk.

In December 2021, Statkevich was sentenced to 14 years of maximum security penal colony.

What Statkevich is known for

In 1991, Statkevich announced the establishment of the Belarusian Military Association, which aimed to "create a Belarusian army, protect the country's independence and promote historical and patriotic education of the society".

In 1999, Mikalai was one of the organisers of the Freedom March against the so-called "union state" and the policies of Aliaksandr Lukashenka. The Freedom March showed to the whole world that there are people in Belarus who prefer the European democratic way of development to the medieval dictatorship and barbarism.

In 2005, Statkevich was sentenced to 3 years of imprisonment for organising a peaceful demonstration against the falsified referendum of 2004.

Mikalai was one of the presidential candidates in the 2010 elections. He was arrested after a mass protest against falsified presidential elections on 19 December 2010. Statkevich spent nearly five years behind bars and was only released on 22 August 2015. After his release, Statkevich continued his fight against Lukashenka's regime and took an active part in all protests.

On 31 May 2020, Statkevich was detained on his way to a picket, and in December 2021, he was sentenced to 14 years in a maximum security penal colony.

It should be recalled that Statkevich spent more than 10 years in prison for his unprecedented courage in resistance to the regime. The politician has been thrice recognized by Amnesty International as a prisoner of conscience. In the end of his detention, Statkevich still remains a symbol of fortitude for Belarusians.