(RSF/IFEX) – RSF and the Belarus Association of Journalists (BAJ) have voiced shock over the decision to close the investigation into the disappearance of journalist Dmitri Zavadski. The decision came despite recent comments by the Council of Europe’s special rapporteur in which he implicated government officials in the journalist’s disappearance and pointed to an attempted […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF and the Belarus Association of Journalists (BAJ) have voiced shock over the decision to close the investigation into the disappearance of journalist Dmitri Zavadski. The decision came despite recent comments by the Council of Europe’s special rapporteur in which he implicated government officials in the journalist’s disappearance and pointed to an attempted coverup.
Zavadski’s wife, Svetlana Zavadskaya, was told of the decision in a letter she received in early April 2004 that said the investigation had been closed because “the missing individual has not been found.”
RSF and BAJ asked Prosecutor-General Viktor Sheyman to write to the Zavadski family explaining why the official in charge of the case, Ivan Branshel, decided it should be closed. The organisations also asked the Prosecutor’s Office to detail the actions that were taken to find Zavadski’s body and explain why certain investigative measures were not carried out.
RSF and BAJ believe that the journalist’s family has a right to information about two members of the Interior Ministry’s Special Services who were convicted of kidnapping Zavadski; in particular, whether they admitted their guilt and provided information about Zavadski’s fate following his abduction and the location of his body.
The family also does not know whether accomplices in the kidnapping, who were mentioned but not identified during the trial, have been identified and whether they have provided information.
RSF and BAJ also deplore the KGB’s failure to respond to the request made by Zavadskaya and the wives of three other disappeared persons (two opposition figures and a businessman) for the launch of legal action against senior officials suspected of being linked to the disappearances.
