BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

21/01/2008

Police break up large protest by entrepreneurs in Belarus, several detained

MINSK, Belarus (AP) - Riot police on Monday broke up the second big protest this month by Belarusian entrepreneurs angry over a new law they regard as burdensome, with the Interior Minister personally grabbing some of the demonstrators. About 20 people were detained.

Some 2,000 small-business owners marched down the main avenue in the capital,

Minsk, but were stopped and pushed from a central square by riot police and other security forces.

They were protesting legislation that forbids business operators registered as individual entrepreneurs from hiring employees who are not relatives. The law forces them to reregister as private companies _ doubling their tax burden _ if they want to hire outside the family.

About 20 protesters were seized by police who bundled them into buses. Interior Minister Sergei Sidorsky, the ex-Soviet republic's top police official, led the police action and grabbed some of the protesters himself. The detainees were taken to a police precinct, the human rights group Vyasna said.

"The authorities are trying to ruin my family financially, and there's nothing I can do but protest,> said demonstrator Dmitry Kochuro, 36, who held a white-and-red flag symbolic of Belarus' beleaguered political opposition.

President Alexander Lukashenko has ruled Belarus with an iron fist since 1994, quashing dissent and opposition groups and resisting free-market reforms.

The legislation took effect Jan. 1, and a similar protest on Jan. 10 was also broken up by police, who detained several people.

Source:

http://www.pr-inside.com/police-break-up-large-protest-by-r396991.htm