BELARUS. DEATH CONVICT YUZEPCHUK HAS SOME HOPE AGAIN

October 12, 2009: the UN Human Rights Committee registered the individual address of Vasil Yuzepchuk, sentenced to death by Brest oblast court, under number 1906/2009. The appropriate information was received from Geneva office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights by the human rights defender Raman Kisliak.
The Republic of Belarus ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Optional Protocol to it. Thus, Belarus recognized the competence of the UN Human Rights Committee to consider the individual appeals concerning violations of any of the rights enshrined in the Covenant.
In the letter to Kisliak it is also said that similar information was sent on October 12 to the member-country. The Office of the High Commissioner also states the official demand not to implement the death sentence as long as the case is being considered by the Committee was posed to the member-country.
“Yuzepchuk applied to the UN Human Rights Committee on October 2, after the enforcement of the death verdict. It is already the 67th complaint from Belarus, registered by the Committee. We will try to get the Committee recognize violation of the right to life towards Vasil Yuzepchuk. One cannot be sentenced to death if there allegations of tortures and gross violations of the right to a fair trial that have not been investigated properly,” commented Raman Kisliak. (Sources: Human Rights Center 'Viasna', 13/10/2009)