More than ten passengers were injured and two hospitalized as a result of the collision of a public bus with a trolley in Brest on April 23.
The road police blame the 24-year-old bus driver for running a red light. Both drivers tested negative for alcohol.
The bus and trolley operators are conducting their own inquiry into the accident.
The city and regional organizations of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party "Narodnaya Hramada" have filed applications with the Brest City Executive Committee for permission to stage a May-Day march on May 1, which is observed in Belarus as Labor Day.
Each of the organizations intends to delegate 100 people to the demonstration. The Social Democrats want the city government to allow them to march in a procession along Lenin Street, the city's central street, and to hold a rally on Lenin Square.
One more application for a similar march along the same itinerary may be filed within the next few days by the Brest regional organization of the Belarusian Free Trade Union. One hundred people are expected to take part in the march.
The Supreme Court of Belarus has vacated the sentences that the court of Brest's Leninsky district imposed on two persons who participated in an unauthorized demonstration in Brest last year.
About 30 persons formed a "Chain of Concerned People" in central Brest on December 9 to remind the public and authorities about missing opposition leaders and other prominent individuals who they believed were victims of the Aleksandr Lukashenko regime.
On January 5, the Leninsky District Court tried administrative cases against ten demonstrators. Two of them, Vladimir Malei and Gennady Samoilenko, were found guilty of acting in violation of street demonstration regulations and sentenced to 15 days in jail. Each of the
others were fined 200,000 rubels. The Supreme Court has upheld the sentence imposed on Mr. Samoilenko but vacated the judgments regarding Vasily Barbolin and Raisa Antonyuk. The Court has said that by standing on the street and displaying images of missing people, the two "did not reflect socio-political, group or personal interests or a
protest, but pointed to the fact of disappearance of the people depicted on the portraits." The other seven demonstrators also contested their
sentences to the Supreme Court, but the Court so far has not notified them of its decision, the Vyasna human rights center told BelaPAN.
Officers of the Brest regional police office's Organized Crime and Corruption Department have arrested two customs officers on abuse of power and corruption charges.
An employee of the customs checkpoint "Zadvortsy" in Brest was arrested on April 8. The police say that he allowed 30 truck tires to be smuggled into the country in 2000, failing to collect 4 million rubels in customs duties. An officer of the Mokhro checkpoint on the border with
Ukraine was arrested on April 9. The police accuse him of accepting a bribe of $200 in exchange for allowing a businessman to cross the border without paying a duty on two tons of fabric.
Two special-purpose police (OMON) officers were arrested in Brest on April 3 on suspicion of extortion. The Brest regional prosecutor issued the arrest warrant on receiving a complaint from a victim. The officers are held in custody pending trial. Prosecutors consider brining abuse of power charges against them.
Aleksandr Shpilevsky, chairman of Belarus' State Customs Committee, warned customs officers in Brest on April 9 about the committee's new efforts to root out corruption in their ranks. He said that all customs checkpoints will be equipped with surveillance cameras to prevent officers from taking bribes.
"I met with the president recently and showed him the houses of some customs officers, including from Brest. I know the owners of these luxury houses by names. It is impossible to earn so much money. I have evidence of some officers' links with criminals. Treachery will be harshly dealt with," Mr. Shpilevsky said, noting that "all honest
and decent officers can rely on" his support. He promised that that honest officers will have their employment contracts extended by five years, not one. Mr. Shpilevsky promised to raise customs officers' salaries in May and supply $800,000 worth of office equipment and 24
new vehicles to customs services this year. He said that the State Customs Committee plans to merge customs services to reduce their total number from 18 to 13. No cuts are planned in the customs personnel, Mr. Shpilevsky said.
A police officer in Beryoza, Brest region, is suspected of the murder of his own daughter. On March 29, the 44-year-old officer left his duty to have dinner at home while still carrying his standard Makarov pistol. At 7:15 p.m., his 20-year-old daughter was murdered with the same gun.
The Beryoza District Prosecutor's Office said that the loss of life had occurred through negligent handling of firearms, but gave no further details, citing secrecy restrictions.
A criminal case has been instituted under Chapter 144 of the Criminal Code, which provides for punishment for "gross negligence manslaughter." If convicted, the accused man will face up to 2 years of corrective labor or up to 3 years in prison. No formal charges so far have been brought against the officer.
At an April 3-4 meeting in Brest in southwestern Belarus, Belarusian and Russian border chiefs named illegal migration and drug traffic as the main border-related problems of the Belarusian-Russian union.
The problem of deporting illegal migrants must be dealt with at the UN level, said Konstantin Totsky, director of Russia's Federal Border Service. "They are barred from returning home, but Russia and Belarus lack the resources to support them," General Totsky stressed.
The chiefs also reviewed progress in drafting Belarusian-Russian border security instruments for the next two years, discussed a bill "On the State Border of the Union State," and approved a plan to cooperate on troop morale issues.
"We agreed on some issues for our next meeting, which will take place in Russia this year. We are deepening the level of documents that will regulate our work," said Aleksandr Pavlovsky, chairman of Belarus' State Border Troops Committee. If the Presidents approve the union budget for 2002 at their April 12 meeting, "it will become clear how much
money will be spent on equipping the borders of the Union," General Pavlovsky said. According to him, the European Union is also allocating funds to help equip the border with Lithuania.
The delegations of Belarus and Russia to a regular meeting of the Union State's Border Control Committee, which will be held in Brest on April 4, visited Tuesday a border outpost in the Kamenets district, Brest region. The delegations attended the ceremony of unveiling a plaque to the memory of Colonel Ivan Barsukov, Hero of the Soviet Union who was in command of the Brest Border Unit in the 1980s through the early '90s. The outpost had been named after the hero by Belarusian ruler Aleksandr Lukashenko's presidential edict.
Then the delegations, led by General Aleksandr Pavlovsky, chairman of the Belarusian State Border Troops Committee, and General Konstantin Totsky, director of the Russian Federal Border Service, left for Brest where they saw a special concert by the Belarusian Border Troops' brass band. At its meeting, the Belarusian-Russian Union State Border
Control Committee is expected to discuss work on the unification of the countries' border control regulations in 2002-2003, draft laws that would govern the guarding of the Union State's border, a draft "program of ensuring border security" for the period until 2015, and regulations of the
organization and maintenance of cooperation between Belarus' Border Troops and Russia's Federal Border Service, the press center of the Belarusian State Border Troops Committee told BelaPAN.
The two delegations also will discuss the development of common training and methodological materials for the Union State's border control agencies.
Three people were killed in the Brest region in late March as a result of the careless operation of tractors during crop sowing, the Brest regional police office said.
On March 29, a 42-year-old tractor operator died under the wheels of his huge T-150K tractor after he set it in motion with the help of the starting motor. On March 30, a five-year-old boy, who was riding a tractor
together with his father, dropped out of the cab and was run over by the tractor's rear wheels. The accident took place in the Kamenets district.
On March 31, a 45-year-old farmer died in the Pinsk district after he dropped out of his moving tractor and got under the scarifier.
25 April 2002