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Maksim Viniarski: When We Are Ready, There Will Be No One To protect Lukashenka

Maksim Viniarski: When We Are Ready, There Will Be No One To protect Lukashenka
MAKSIM VINIARSKI
PHOTO: RADIO SVABODA

This is already evident from the behavior of the security forces.

Video blogger Mikalai Maslouski met with coordinator of the European Belarus civil campaign Maksim Viniarski. The topic of conversation was information on the extension of the arrest of a public activist from Vorsha Dzmitry Kazlou, the press-center of the European Belarus reports.

Maksim Viniarski recalled how the video blogger was met after the first 15 days of his arrest:

- We learned about the second arrest when we came to meet him on January 9. The police in Vorsha behaved very strangely, they closed the police department, and turned off the light in the detention center. We had to look almost from below the fence, and saw that there was someone there. They did not want to contact us all this time, although we knew that it is impossible that there were no police officers in the temporary detention center while someone was serving a sentence. The same thing in the police department. The department was closed, they tried to tell us through the doors that they were not working, that their working hours were over.

Dzmitry Kazlou didn’t come out, we had to formally call the front office, and after that they opened the doors, let me in to the police department alone. I had to write an official statement, and only after that they informally told me that he was given another arrest and that he was there.

- And what is going on in Vorsha? What kind of region is this economically? How would you characterize it? Why did it happen that the Vorsha residents actively supported Dzmitry Kazlou in the “election”?

- You know, this is just very terrible. We all know how officials, led by Lukashenka, are robbing our country, but what is happening in Vorsha is just awful. The people we talked to there - they don’t have a job or they have to work in very harsh conditions, or go to Russia. People leave, leaving their families, leaving their homes, because to earn something in Vorsha and nearby is impossible. And this is in Vorsha, sorry, this is a large railway junction, the transshipment center of the country, and it is impossible to earn money there! This was evident both during the “parliamentary campaign” and now. We actually spent a day there while we were waiting for the Gray Cat to be released. We talked there with people and realized that everyone is cross, people don’t like this power, everyone understands that this fish is rotten from the head, and that nothing can be done. This fish will soon rot completely. This is very annoying for people, many are very aggressive, because the authorities do not hear them - neither central nor local. The people, because they are unheard, are ready for anything.

- Will the fridge lead people to the streets?

- The stomach is already starting to control the mind and defeat it. When you start talking with a person, and they see that you came from Minsk, and started talking politics with them, this person immediately gets angry, not even figuring out where you came from and what you represent. When they realize that you, too, are against this power, that you did not represent it, their attitude immediately changes. This region is in deep depression and horror. And this is a city where there should be a lot of work. But even in comparison with today's Minsk - it’s just awful.

- Dzmitry Kazlou has no relatives. I even wrote to the head of the police department that I know that this person has no relatives, but, excuse me, if he has no relatives, then here I am - a citizen of the Republic of Belarus, and I'm interested in him. And by the way, please post the address of the Vorsha temporary detention center. Write letters, write telegrams.

- I, as a person who was also serving an administrative arrest, will say - write, even if they don’t pass the letters. When policemen see letters coming to a person, they are afraid of doing something bad to that person. If you don’t write anything personal, then just take a photo of this letter and post it on Facebook, because even if they don’t give this letter to the person after the arrest, he will come out and realize that you had enough time and desire to support him, that you remembered him, and dedicated your time. Such support is worth a lot, I know it myself.

- Maksim, look, there is Article 23.34. Part 1. Here is the Constitution, freedom of expression, freedom of information, and all this does not work. Political activists, politicians, people who just care about the fate and life of their country, who think not only about their refrigerator and pocket, who think about the future of their and other people's children. People who think about the future have have retired or will retire, people who think about the economy of the Republic of Belarus are subjected to such periodic and constant administrative fines, arrests. What makes people go and prove their position, knowing that they will receive 400 or more dollars in fines, that they can get 15 days of arrest? What is the strength of mind, the strength of the heart of the activists who now uphold the independence of the Republic of Belarus, and earlier fought in Kurapaty? What makes us go and step on the “rake” of our justice, our perverted laws?

- We still have the Constitution, we have an international pact on civil and political rights, which our country has ratified and these documents give us rights. Another question is if three, five, thirty people enjoy these rights - these thirty people can be arrested, jailed, fined. I will tell you honestly, if three thousand, five thousand, ten thousand, fifty thousand or more go out to the rally, it’s impossible to arrest everyone.

I know what is happening with Seviaarynets, Tsikhanouski, Kazlou and yet it is very, very precise, because there are no repressions against the majority of protesters. The authorities know that they will not be able to chew this piece - it is very large. If people went out and supported in an even greater degree, they would not have done this. I’m saying that Vorsha is standing on ears because one “Gray cat” is in jail, and they are already closing the police department and hiding when 15 people come to them. What can we talk about?! These 15 people would not break any doors, would not do anything. But, they are afraid of them.

The only way to influence something is to go out to protest and express your thoughts. People come out because they cannot help but do this. I understand that it seems to everyone that 15 days is a very big loss when you waste them, but, for example, yesterday, today, in Iran, students took to the streets demanding the resignation of the dictator. They are protesting against a downed plane. Iran has already admitted having downed it, and people go to face police bullets, under the batons, because they need their rights, they cannot live without it. And when we are ready, they will not protect him. Nobody wants to protect him. Already the police who speak about it honestly and openly, they say that this is simply impossible. For him, there may be some military unit #3214, and it still remains a question whether they will fight for him. There, turntails already give interviews, so the dictatorship must be finished, and then these problems will not exist.

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