25-03-2006: Violence in Minsk

The post election activities continues in Minsk. After a week of “camping” in the middle of October Square, the main anti Lukashenko activists were violently dissipated or arrested yesterday night. More then 400 people ended up in the local prisons.

Today, on the independance day of the first sovereign Belarusian state, the demonstrations had been planded to continue in the October square. The demonstrators started to gather around the square at 11 o’clock. The authorities, who had placed military vehicles and chains of riot police around the square, did not willingly let any persons into the square.

More than 5 thousand people had gathered around the square at 12 o’clock, when the police violently forced the demonstrators to go out of the city center. However, the demonstrators continued their meeting in the Janki Kypala park. Alexander Milinkevich, the presidential cndidate of the United Democratic Forces of Belarus, gave a speach in the park, in which he the, by creating the Belarusian National Liberation Movement, called for a unification of all democratic forces. Alexander Kosulin, the former head of the Belarusian State University and a presidential candidate, supported the initiative.

At 8 c’clock there were more than 10 thousand people demonstrating in Janki Kypala park, but after this the demonstrations spread troughout the city, where they were met with gas bombs and police force. In the evening Alexander Kosulin were jailed.