Christos Pourgourides: You Must Be a Very Brave Man Or Woman to Be a Journalist in Belarus Today, Working for Independent Media…

31.03.2004.

On 30 March International Human Rights League web-site belarusupdate.org published an exclusive interview with Christos Pourgourides, Council of Europe parliamentarian and author of the report on his investigation into the cases of disappeared opposition leaders in Belarus. According to Mr. Pourgourides, the biggest obstacle encountered in his investigation was the inability to meet and interview all those involved. The parliamentarian is sure, "if we were able to meet and interview those convicted for the abduction of Dzmitry Zavadski we would have been able to get from them some very important answers".
Analyzing the general situation of the Belarusian mass media, Mr. Pourgourides pointed out: '' You must be a very brave man or woman to be a journalist in Belarus today, working for independent media… So long as the international community is watching carefully what goes on in Belarus I don't think that it is possible for the regime to repeat what it did to Zavadski. But car accidents………or heart attacks ………..cannot be ruled out''.
In the end of the interview Christos Pourgourides advocated sanctions against the Belarusian regime and stated his firm belief that the report would receive backing by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

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