Yuras Ivaniukovichs Case Consideration Rescheduled For August

21.07.2006.

The case of Yuras Ivaniukovich, who had written Long live Belarus! and Belarusian TV lies! on a board of the Belarusian Embassy in Moscow, has been rescheduled for August 17.

The trial has been postponed for August 17 in connection with absence of an interpreter. The court could not find an official interpreter from Belarusian. You see, Russia has problems with interpreters from the language of the neighbouring country. It is a precedent case. As far as I know, for the first time in Russia the court has admitted that a Belarusian interpreter is needed. Earlier there was an opinion that there is no such language, and an interpreter is not needed. The question is, how he was tried, how an investigation was taking place without an interpreter. There were lots of mistakes, even in the text of indictment. They have translated the slogan Long live Belarus! as Belarus is living. It is not clear where and how Belarus lives. Thus, the question whether the building of the Belarusian Embassy belonging to a sovereign state, Belarus, was damaged, has been solved without inviting representatives of the Embassy, as if it was a building of a Russian institution. IN general, one could note that the Belarusian language was recognized as a foreign one, and as an official one, for which an interpreter is needed, lawyer Stanislau Markelau said to the European Radio.
Source: www.charter97.org