Human rights activist visits Ales Byalyatski in prison

• 6.06.2012, 12:23

Viktar Sidarenka, a member of the board of the Mahilou Human Rights Centre, visited Ales Byalyatski in penal colony No. 2 in Babruisk.

Viktar Sidarenka received an opportunity to visit the jailed human rights activists because he a chairman of the public observation commission for detention facilities monitoring at the main justice department of the Mahilou region executive committee, Viasna human rights reports.

A ground for the meeting was a claim from human rights activist Anastasia Loika, who complained Ales Byalyatski does not receive mail. The justice department ordered the commission to check if this information was true.

Viktar Sidarenka says the meeting lasted 30 minutes in presence of prison guards.

“Ales Byalyatski said he is fine, food is not bad. He still works as a packer in a sewing room. We were not allowed a private meeting, though we could have it under law. Perhaps, he would have told me something interesting if we had met in a separate room,” Viktar Sidarenka says.

Viktar Sidarenka says penal colony No. 2 has a correspondence book for Ales Byalyatski to log incoming and outgoing letters. Ales Byalyatski usually receives 4-5 letters a week and has over 10 letters some weeks.

The public commission will send a report on the visit to the Corrections Department and human rights activist Anastasia Loika.

We remind famous Belarusian human rights activist Ales Byalyatski was sentenced to 4.5 years in prison and confiscation of property. Judge Syarhei Bandarenka from the Pershamaiski district court found the human rights defender guilty of tax fraud on an especially large scale.