BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
27/02/2008
Hundreds Join Belarus Opposition Leader For Wife's Burial
MINSK, Belarus (AFP)--About 1,000 Belarussians defiantly joined opposition leader Alexander Kozulin at his wife's funeral Wednesday after the ex-Soviet republic's authoritarian government briefly released him from prison following strong U.S. pressure.
Mournful violin music played under overcast skies as hundreds joined a haggard Kozulin, temporarily freed from a five-and-a-half year prison term imposed in 2006 for demonstrating against President Alexander Lukashenko.
U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary State David Kramer was cleared to fly into Belarus for the burial at the Tarasova Cemetery outside the capital Minsk, the ex-Soviet republic's foreign ministry said.
Overnight, thousands came to offer support and farewells as Kozulin's wife Irina was laid out at a vigil in a Minsk Catholic church. She died of cancer on Saturday, aged 48.
The French, Romanian and Swedish ambassadors, as well as representatives of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, also attended.
Kozulin, 53, was released overnight between Monday and Tuesday and must go back to prison late Thursday, but said at the church: "I hope I will stay with you."
He was jailed in 2006 after leading a protest against the controversial election victory of Lukashenko, dubbed by Washington "Europe's last dictator."
He was released in time for the funeral only after starting a hunger strike and receiving high-level E.U. and U.S. support.
Ambassadors from several European Union countries met with Kozulin on Tuesday.
A U.S. State Department spokesman on Wednesday welcomed Kozulin's temporary release, but urged that his "release be made permanent."
If all internationally recognized political prisoners in Belarus are released, "we would be prepared to begin a dialogue with Belarus on further steps to improve bilateral relations," the spokesman said.
Opposition gatherings in Belarus are rare and the police regularly use violence to disperse even small street protests.
At the overnight ceremony in Minsk, however, Belarussians were able to express themselves openly.
"Many people here had not known Irina personally, but they came to offer their respect to this fragile and courageous woman they learned about when her husband met with disaster," politician Valentina Svyatskaya told AFP.
"She courageously fought for her husband and was always uncompromising with the regime, though she knew of her fatal illness," she said.
Kozulin accused Lukashenko of inhumanity for keeping him in prison after he had already served a third of his term.
"Anyone else would have freed me with an amnesty," he said. "There would have been no problem freeing me and saving face, especially knowing the condition my wife was in.
"As you can understand, Irina above all needed her husband near her. That would have been humane, but (Lukashenko) did everything to humiliate me more."
Earlier, before his release, Kozulin said: "Lukashenko killed my wife, he is a murderer, my wife's death is on his conscience."
Source:
Archive
