BAJ Demands to Find and Punish Attackers of Siarhei Chaly

State­ment of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists on the vio­lent assault of Siarhei Chaly

In the ear­ly hours of 19 May strangers attacked and beat Siarhei Chaly, inde­pen­dent eco­nom­ic ana­lyst and author of the TUT.BY’s «Econ­o­my for Dum­mies». The attack occurred in the cen­ter of Min­sk down­town, full of numer­ous sur­veil­lance cam­eras and police patrols.

After the inci­dent Siarhei Chaly was tak­en to hos­pi­tal with a bat­tered face, a bro­ken nose and a brain injury. Accord­ing to the doc­tors, he will need a month to recov­er.

Cha­ly’s col­leagues do not rule out the pos­si­bil­i­ty that the attack is con­nect­ed to his jour­nal­is­tic activ­i­ty. This fact makes the crime inves­ti­ga­tion even more impor­tant.

In accor­dance with the Unit­ed Nations approach for­mu­lat­ed by the office of the High Com­mis­sion­er for Human Rights, «to effec­tive­ly com­bat impuni­ty for vio­lence against jour­nal­ists. States must ensure effec­tive, prompt, thor­ough, inde­pen­dent and impar­tial inves­ti­ga­tion of all cas­es of threats and attacks. Until actu­al and poten­tial per­pe­tra­tors do not know that any threat or attack against a media rep­re­sen­ta­tive will entail legal con­se­quences, the pro­tec­tion of jour­nal­ists would remain a seri­ous prob­lem.

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists appeals to the Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al, the Chair­man of the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee and the Inte­ri­or Min­is­ter and demands:

1. To per­son­al­ly over­see inves­ti­ga­tion of the attack against Siarhei Chaly to ensure an effec­tive, prompt, and impar­tial inves­ti­ga­tion.
2. To find the per­pe­tra­tors and bring them to account as pre­scribed by law.

Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists