On Wednesday, August 4 letters were sent to Ministers of foreign affairs of permanent members of UN Security Council –China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, and United States.<\/p>\n
\u00abTo date, the human rights community in Belarus, the lawyers for the families and the relatives of the disappeared have exhausted all available local remedies, and have also exhausted regional and international human rights remedies to no avail. Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who remains in power since the time of the disappearances, has not created conditions for a national credible and impartial investigation of these cases and has blocked all international efforts to find the truth about their fates,\u00bb — says the appeal.<\/p>\n
Authors of the appeal link to UN resolutions which mention kidnappings in Belarus and about human right violations in this country as well as to fact-finding report of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly by Cypriot parliamentarian Christos Pourgourides which found that senior Belarus officials may have been involved in the disappearances of the four men during 1999 and 2000. The report stated that steps were taken at the highest level of the Belarusian sate to cover up the true background of the disappearances.
\nThe appeal mentions case of creating UN-appointed international commission which investigated the killing of former Lebanese prime-minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005 and other politically motivated assassinations in Lebanon.<\/p>\n
\u00abWe urge you to take up the issue of the disappeared public figures of Belarus at the level of the UN Security Council and to use your good offices to ensure that an international investigation is mandated into the fate of the disappeared,\u00bb says the appeal.
\nThe appeal was signed by former head of Belarus Stanislau Shushkevich, former ministers, members of Belarusian Parliament (Supreme Soviet) of 12th and 13th convocations, leaders of political parties and civil society, human right activists and other well-known Belarusians.<\/p>\n
See full text:<\/b><\/p>\n
Your Ex\u0441ellency<\/p>\n
We are writing to you about the disappearances of high-level public figures in Belarus which remain uninvestigated for long time.<\/p>\n
To date, the human rights community in Belarus, the lawyers for the families and the relatives of the disappeared have exhausted all available local remedies, and have also exhausted regional and international human rights remedies to no avail. Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who remains in power since the time of the disappearances, has not created conditions for a national credible and impartial investigation of these cases and has blocked all international efforts to find the truth about their fates. <\/p>\n
The cases of the disappeared men are:<\/p>\n
1.\tFormer Belarus Interior Minister Yuri Zakharenko<\/b>, May 1999
\n2.\tFormer Vice-Premier, former Chairman of the Central Election Committee Victor Gonchar<\/b>, September 1999
\n3.\tBusinessman and public figure Anatoly Krasovski<\/b>, September 1999
\n4.\tRussian TV (ORT) cameraman Dmitri Zavadski<\/b>, July 2000.<\/p>\n
In Belarus, independent civil society investigations of these cases have found some evidence of complicity of the Lukashenka government\u2019s high officials in the disappearances. Two Belarusian prosecutors who found evidence of an official cover-up and published their allegations in the independent Belarusian and foreign media were forced to flee abroad in 2001 and have obtained political asylum and remain in hiding.<\/p>\n
In 2000, the UN Committee Against Torture reviewed the periodic report of Belarus, and noted ongoing concerns about disappearances, and called on the state party to \u201cconsider establishing an independent and impartial governmental and non-governmental national human rights commission with effective powers to, inter alia, promote human rights and investigate all complaints of human rights violations, in particular those pertaining to the implementation of the Convention.\u201d (A\/56\/44, paras.40-46) In February 2004, a fact-finding report was published of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly which found that senior Belarus officials may have been involved in the disappearances of the four men during 1999 and 2000. The report stated that steps were taken at the highest level of the Belarusian sate to cover up the true background of the disappearances. The report, prepared by Cypriot parliamentarian Christos Pourgourides, was approved unanimously by the Assembly’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights meeting during the Assembly’s 2004 winter plenary session in Strasbourg. (Doc.100624, February2004) (http:\/\/assembly.coe.int\/Main.asp?link=\/Documents\/WorkingDocs\/doc04\/EDOC10062.htm<\/a>)<\/p>\n In 2006 and again in 2007, Adrian Severin, the UN Special Rapporteur on Belarus, reported to the UN Human Rights Council that the human rights situation in Belarus was intolerable, and noted continued inaction on investigation and prosecution of the disappearances.(E\/CN.4\/2006\/36) (http:\/\/www.un.org\/Docs\/journal\/asp\/ws.asp?m=E\/CN.4\/2006\/36<\/a>). <\/p>\n In July 2010 Russian mass media revealed new information on the disappearances of the opposition leaders and public figures in Belarus and the complicity of high government officials in the disappearances. There was no official reaction to that information.<\/p>\n Due to mass violation of human rights Belarus is not a member of the Council of Europe, so it is not possible to bring a suit regarding the disappearances to the European Court of Human Rights.<\/p>\n Accordingly, mindful of more than 10 years of work attempting to bring justice in the cases of the disappearances of these four prominent Belarusian figures in political life and media, we turn to you as Minister of Foreign Affairs of the permanent member of the UN Security Council to consider taking up this matter and approving a Commission of Inquiry by the UN Security Council into the disappearances of public figures in Belarus in 1999 and 2000.<\/p>\n We make this request mindful of the UN-appointed international commission which investigated the killing of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005 and other politically motivated assassinations in Lebanon (S\/RES\/1595\/2005) (http:\/\/daccess-dds-ny.un.org\/doc\/UNDOC\/GEN\/N05\/299\/98\/PDF\/N0529998.pdf?OpenElement<\/a>) as well as the tribunal to try those responsible for the Hariri killing, established by the UN Security Council in June 2007.<\/p>\n We urge you to take up the issue of the disappeared public figures of Belarus at the level of the UN Security Council and to use your good offices to ensure that an international investigation is mandated into the fate of the disappeared.<\/p>\n Respectfully,<\/p>\n (signed by)<\/p>\n Stanislau Shushkevich<\/b> Andrei Sannikov<\/b> Ales Byalatski<\/b> Anatol Lyabedzka<\/b> Mechyslau Hryb<\/b> Sergei Kalyakin<\/b> Alyaksandr Dabravolski<\/b> Alyaksandr Sasnou<\/b> Oleg Volchek<\/b> Valery Frolov<\/b> Alyaksei Yanukevich<\/b> Ryhor Kostuseu<\/b> Viktar Ivashkevich<\/b> Mikhail Marynich<\/b> Pyotr Sadouski<\/b> Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu<\/b> Elena Skrigan<\/b> Yaroslav Romanchuk<\/b> Leaders of opposition, civil society, human right activists and other well-known Belarusians appealed to UN Security Council with demand to carry out international investigation of kidnappings in Belarus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":215748,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201658"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201658\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/europeanbelarus.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n(http:\/\/www.unhchr.ch\/tbs\/doc.nsf\/%28Symbol%29\/A.56.44,paras.40-46.En?Opendocument<\/a>).
\nThis was never done, and no reply was provided to the UN CAT. The government of Belarus has never responded to repeated queries submitted on these cases from the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Disappearances for many years. <\/p>\n
\nChairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th convocation,
\nChairman of the Central Council of the party Belarusian Social Democratic Hramada <\/p>\n
\nDeputy Foreign Minister of Belarus (1995-1996),
\nCoordinator of the civil campaign \u201cEuropean Belarus\u201d <\/p>\n
\nVice President of the International Federation for Human Rights,
\nChairman of Viasna Human Rights Centre<\/p>\n
\nChairman of the United Civil Party,
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th and 13th convocations<\/p>\n
\nChairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus (1994-1996),
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th and 13th convocations,
\nSecretary General of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party (Hramada)<\/p>\n
\nChairman of the Party \u201cFair World\u201d
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th and 13th convocations<\/p>\n
\nMember of the Political Council of the United Civil Party,
\nPeople\u2019s Deputy of the Soviet Union (1989-1991),
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 13th convocation<\/p>\n
\nFormer Minister of Labour of Belarus,
\nMember of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th convocation<\/p>\n
\nChairman of the human rights centre \u201cLegal Assistance to the Population\u201d<\/p>\n
\nDeputy of the Chamber of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus of the 2nd convocation,
\nMajor General<\/p>\n
\nChairman of the Belarusian Popular Front Party<\/p>\n
\nDeputy Chairman of the Belarusian Popular Front Party<\/p>\n
\nChairman of Minsk branch of the Belarusian Popular Front Party<\/p>\n
\nEx-Minister of Foreign Economic Relations of Belarus,
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th convocation,
\nAmbassador<\/p>\n
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 12th convocation,
\nAmbassador to the Federal Republic of Germany (1992-1994)<\/p>\n
\nCoordinator of \u201cTell the Truth\u201d civil campaign<\/p>\n
\nDeputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus of the 13th convocation<\/p>\n
\nDeputy Chairman of the United Civil Party<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"