Natalia Kaliada is co-founder of the Belarus Free Theatre. The group, formed in 2005, performs provocative political works in a country where it can be lethal to criticise the dictator Alexander Lukashenko. Natalia was forced into exile after the brutal crackdown on Belarus’s opposition after the rigged 2010 presidential elections. Here she speaks to Nigel Warburton about the difficulty of creating art in Europe’s last dictatorship
Belarusian opposition activist Andrei Sannikov has been released from detention and pardoned by president Alexander Lukashenko, Index on Censorship has learned. (more…)
Please join Index on Censorship’s Mike Harris in conversation with Natalia Koliada, artistic director of the Belarus Free Theatre and spokesperson for Free Belarus Now.
After a performance in the House of Commons in support of Belarus’s imprisoned opposition activists and journalists, Denis MacShane warns the leaders of Europe’s last dictatorship that justice plays a long game (more…)
Belarusian people are living under “an iron fist in an iron glove,” said Sir Tom Stoppard on the Radio 4 Today programme, after presenting a special commendation to prisoners of conscience in Belarus at the Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression Awards 2011
The families of political prisoners detained in Belarus after the 19 December election have instructed a London law firm to launch civil proceedings against the country’s president, Alexander Lukashenko.
This is the first time that a serving president has faced a private prosecution for torture in a UK Court.
If the case is successful, any financial assets held by Lukashenko in Britain, or abroad, may be frozen to provide compensation.
London firm H20 Law will represent Free Belarus Now, a coalition of friends, families and supporters, of the victims of political repression in Belarus.
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Influential US and British actors and musicians including Oscar winners Kevin Spacey and Kelvin Kline, the Pet Shop Boys, Jude Law, Sienna Miller, Sir Ian McKellen, Sir Tom Stoppard and Samuel West, have been put on a “blacklist” of artists banned in Belarus.
A list apparently drawn up by the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus has been leaked to leading opposition figures including website Charter97. Sources inside State TV have not denied the blacklist is in force.
Jude Law, Sienna Miller, Sir Ian McKellen and Samuel West have all been added to the list after they performed at an Index on Censorship event at the Young Vic with dissident theatre group the Belarus Free Theatre on 5 December last year. Kevin Kline and Kevin Spacey took part in a benefit for the company in New York, and recorded YouTube messages in support of free expression in Belarus (http://www.youtube.com/user/belarusfreetheatre#p/u).
Sir Tom Stoppard has supported the Belarus Free Theatre for many years and has been a vocal opponent of President Lukashenko’s authoritarian rule. Currently, the secret police (KGB) has an arrest warrant out for Belarus Free Theatre co-founder Nikolai Khalezin.
The official government position is that such a list does not exist. The head of the internet media department of the Belarusian Information Ministry, Vladimir Yadrintsev, told RIA Novosti that reports of the blacklist were “a clear provocation.” He added: “The Information Ministry did not initiate this”.
Nikolai Khalezin in hiding after the KGB issue arrest warrant for the co-founder of the Belarus Free Theatre. Mike Harris reports