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Lukashenka: Belarus will abandon criminalizing slander against president if West offers something in return

Belarus will abolish the Criminal Code article that penalizes slander against the president if the European Union and the United States offer something in return, Alyaksandr Lukashenka said in an interview with Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Monday, BelaPAN said.

"If the European Union and the Americans want this so much and are ready to offer us something, then... we'll cancel the slander article," AFP quotes the Belarusian leader as saying.

"I'm pretty bored of this question about so-called political prisoners,” Mr. Lukashenka said, according to AFP. “There are no political crimes and there can therefore be no political prisoners. They're common criminals. You wanted us to release them? We released them.... But if you think these political prisoners are going to be released and are going to completely change life here, you're wrong. They're complete has-beens."

“In a mocking tone, the Belarusian leader also said that the scores of young activists arrested at demonstrations against his rule were ‘unconscious and drunk’ and needed their sentences of 10 or 15 days in prison to recover,” AFP reports.

Article 367 of the Criminal Code currently in force, which was adopted in 1999, criminalizes slander against the President and carries a maximum sentence of up to four years in prison. Several opponents of the government, including journalists Mikalay Markevich, Pavel Mazheyka and Viktar Ivashkevich, have been convicted under this article. Prominent opposition politicians Anatol Lyabedzka and Andrey Klimaw were also prosecuted under the article, but those cases were eventually dropped.

Messrs. Markevich and Pavel Mazheyka were convicted of slander against the President after, in the run-up to a presidential election in 2001, the Hrodna-based private newspaper Pahonya carried an article wondering whether Mr. Lukashenka could run for reelection while being widely suspected of involvement in the disappearances of his opponents. In June 2002, the chief editor, former lawmaker Markevich, and the author of the article, Mr. Mazheyka, were sentenced to 2 1/2 and 2 years of "restricted freedom" and corrective labor. Their sentences were later shortened by one year under an amnesty.

In 2003, the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) petitioned the Constitutional Court to examine the constitutionality of Article 367, as well as Article 368, which penalizes a public insult against the President, and Article 369, which criminalizes the defamation of other government officials. The Constitutional Court then rejected the petition but recommended the National Assembly to clarify the articles, suggesting adding a clause whereby criticism that does not slander, defame or dishonor officials or involve the use of abusive language should not be viewed as a criminal offense. The legislature ignored the recommendation and nothing has changed since then.