AI and EU speak against execution of persons charged with terrorist attack in Minsk metro
After the verdict of the Supreme Court of
Belarus to Dzmitry Kanavalau and Uladzislau Kavaliou has become known,
Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland has called upon
Belarusian authorities not to carry into execution the judgment of death.
BelaPAN has been informed about that by the press-service of the Council of
Europe.
“I call upon the Belarusian authorities to overturn the death sentence issued
to Dzmitry Kanavalau and Uladzislau Kavaliou today,” said the Secretary General
of the Council of Europe. “The crime they have been found guilty of, was a
barbarian one, but the punishment should not be like this. Belarus is the only country in Europe,
where people are still killed legally. I am urging the authorities to set a
moratorium on capital punishment. Victims and families of those who had been
injured on 11 April, deserve justice, but not revenge.”
Markus Loening, German Federal Government Commissioner for Human Rights Policy
and Humanitarian Aid, has also condemned the death sentences to Dzmitry
Kanavalau and Uladzislau Kavaliou, and demanded to substitute the punishment
with a prison term.
“I feel compassion for the victims of the terrible blast in Minsk metro and to their families. However
the federal government is against death sentences on principle,” Markus Loening
said. According to him, the death penalty is not an adequate method, neither as
a punishment nor as the means to combat crime.
“No one can ever rule out a miscarriage of justice. That is why I am calling
upon the Belarusian government to abolish the death penalty immediately, and as
the first step to set moratorium on execution of the death sentences,” the
Ombudsman said.
“The death sentences are one of the items in the long list of human rights
violations in Belarus.
I am calling upon the Belarusian authorities to respect human rights and civil
rights at last,” Markus Loening stated.
The PACE rapporteur on Belarus and on death penalty issues Andreas Herkel and Renate
Wohlwend are disappointed by the verdict to Dzmitry Kanavalau and Uladzislau
Kavaliou.
“It is incredible, that Belarus
continues to blindly ignore all calls of the international community on setting
a moratorium on death penalty. Such an irreversible, cruel and inhuman type of
punishment is unacceptable in the civilized society, no matter what crime was.
Besides, many human rights activists who followed this case, express doubts in
guilt of the accused,” the statement reads.
The rapporteurs have also expressed regret that the work of the group on death
penalty abolition created in the Chamber of representatives of the National
Assembly of Belarus ended with no results, and “deputies in Belarus do not
dare to make a stand against the death penalty.”
The press-service of the PACE has also informed that Mr Herkel is preparing a
report for the Political Committee of the Assembly, which is to be approved at
the session on December 14 with the further discussion in the framework of the
PACE session in January 2012.
Deputy director of Amnesty International Europe and Central Asian programmes
group John Dalhausen, stated that the trial over Dzmitry Kanavalau and
Uladzislau Kavaliou fell short of international standards of a just court
trial.
Dalhausen has serious misgivings that violence had been used against the
accused, in order to draw confession from them. It is said in the statement
that Belarus is the last
country in Europe and in the post-Soviet space
where death penalty is used.
The AI representative reminded that the death penalty is irreversible and called upon Aliaksandr Lukashenka to set a moratorium on it immediately.
