Maria Kolesnikova, jailed since 2020, underwent surgical procedure and is in grave however secure situation, her father says.
A distinguished member of the Belarusian opposition serving an 11-year jail sentence for serving to organise anti-government protests has been taken to a hospital emergency division and underwent surgical procedure, her father has mentioned.
Alexander Kolesnikov mentioned his daughter, Maria Kolesnikova, was in a grave however secure situation. The docs didn't share her analysis or every other particulars with him in regards to the surgical procedure, Kolesnikov mentioned on Tuesday.
He famous that his daughter appeared energetic and cheerful when he final visited her in jail within the southern metropolis of Homiel a few month in the past.
The 40-year-old has been in custody since her arrest in September 2020, when she tore up her passport on the border to stop her compelled expulsion from Belarus amid large protests difficult the re-election of the nation’s authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko.
She was convicted in September 2021 on fees of conspiring to grab energy, making a hardline organisation and calling for motion that threatened the safety of the state.
Her lawyer, Vladimir Pylchenko, mentioned Kolesnikova had been positioned in a penitentiary cell earlier than she was taken to the hospital. He didn't elaborate on her situation.
Pylchenko mentioned that authorities had repeatedly rejected his requests to see Kolesnikova on the jail in Homiel.
Freedom ‘value preventing for’
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the primary opposition candidate within the August 2020 election that resulted in Lukashenko being awarded a sixth time period, demanded that the authorities launch details about Kolesnikova’s situation.
“Don’t let the regime preserve the lid of silence over Maria Kolesnikova’s well being,” Tsikhanouskaya wrote on her messaging app channel.
Belarus was shaken by months of protests after the disputed election, which the opposition and the West denounced as a sham. Lukashenko responded to the demonstrations with a major crackdown that noticed greater than 35,000 folks arrested and hundreds overwhelmed by police. Tsikhanouskaya was compelled to depart the nation.
Kolesnikova was a part of a trio of girls — with Veronika Tsepkalo and Tsikhanouskaya — who led the historic demonstrations. She helped coordinate opposition protests and resisted authorities’ makes an attempt to power her to depart the nation. When officers of the Belarusian safety company drove her to the border with Ukraine in September 2020 to forcibly expel her, she ripped up her passport and walked again into Belarus to face arrest.
Simply earlier than the beginning of her trial, Kolesnikova mentioned in a be aware from jail that authorities supplied to launch her from custody if she requested for a pardon and gave a repentant interview to state media. She insisted that she was harmless and rejected the provide.
“Freedom is value preventing for. Don't be afraid to be free,” she wrote from jail. “I don't remorse something and would do the identical once more.”
Shortly after her conviction, she was given one in every of Europe’s prime human rights awards, the Vaclav Havel Prize, with the Council of Europe praising her braveness.
Post a Comment