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A Long Ordeal

On November 27, 2003 Frunzenskij District Court of Minsk made a decision to acknowledge the disappeared journalist to be a dead one.

On December 10, 2003 The Prosecutor Body of The Republic of Belarus resumed the investigation of the case of Zavadsky’s disappearance. It is not inconceivable that the resumption of the case was connected with a visit of special reporter of The Parliament Assembly of European Council Christos Purghurides, who wrote a report about disappeared people in Belarus and in November-December of 2003 visited Belarus twice.

March 31, 2004 The Prosecutor Body of The Republic of Belarus suspended the investigation of the case of Dmitry Zavadsky abduction, appealing to the “failure to detect the vanished person”. 

On April 9, 2004 International organisation “The Reporters beyond Limits” and The Social Union “Belarusian Association of Journalists” made a common declaration, where expressed their concern about the suspension of the case of Zavadsky’s abduction.

On July 20, 2004 Lukashenko at his press conference said that he had materials which might turn the case of Zavadsky into “anticase”. What did these words imply and why has not these documents been announced yet – it is still a question.
Literally: (a shorthand report of the press-conference of Aleksander Lukashenko of July 20, 2004):

“And what surprising is: so if the relatives worry so much, so you may come to me. One person came, a woman – you understand the reason why I can’t mention her name. She came to me, I received her, she asked me about a man, again I don’t mention the name. I was impressed by this woman. A fine woman. I had spoken with her for three hours. I showed her some documents. But if I publish them, the case of Zawadsky would turn into “anticase”. This is, by the way, my only pain – Dima Zavadsky. I would have much to offer just to get know what the fate of this man is.”

What was the woman who came to speak with Lukashenko – it is still a question as well. Neither Dmitry’s spouse, nor mother attended Alexander Hrihorjevich. Perhaps, there was not any woman at all, was there?..

On August 4, 2004 mother of Dmitry Zavadsky Olha Zavadskaya appealed to the Prosecutor’s Office to resume the case because of newly emerged conditions: Olha Hrihorjevna claimed to make a prosecutor’s investigation of the information announced by Lukashenko. However the Prosecutor Office expressed no reaction to the appeal.

On October 12, 2004 a judge of Central Minsk District S.V.Honchar refused to consider Zavadskaya’s complaint about actions of The Prosecutor’s Body of Belarus officials because of “lack of jurisdiction” under the affair. Olha Zavadskaya appealed to the court of higher resort.

On November 25, 2004 panel of judges of City Court of Minsk presided by judge Luhina turned down the appeal of the mother of the abducted journalist.

On December 10, 2004 Olha Zavadskaya sent an appeal to the General Prosecutor Petr Miklashevich concerning the rejection of the Prosecutor’s Body to renew the investigation on the grounds of the newly emerged conditions in the case of her son’s abduction.

On April 7, 2005 Olha Hrihorjevna received a letter from the Prosecutor’s Body about “resumption of the preliminary investigation in view of necessity to realize investigation actions.”

On May 4, 2005 “Narodnaja Volia” published an article “The corpse of Dmitry Zavadsky may be found at one of the Belarusian cemeteries”. It was said in the article that  legal expert Harry Pohoniajlo had submitted a petition for the Prosecutor’s Office with an appeal to carry out an exhumation and to examine a number of corpses with the aim to confirm or disapprove that one of the dead bodies was of Dmitrij Zavadskij.

On June 23, 2005 at press-conference at Prosecutor’s Office of The Republic of Belarus Deputy General Prosecutor Boris Terletskij declared that there were some new materials concerning the case of Zavadsky’s murder.

On March 31, 2006 the case was suspended again with the common statement “because of failure to release the vanished person.”

On May 30, 2006 at the press-conference General Prosecutor of Belarus Petr Miklashevich stated: “At present the location of D.Zavadsky has not been ascertained, but Prosecutor’s Body continues search of him. Recently we have also verified a number of episodes of this affair, and they are verified now. The location of D.Zavadsky has not been ascertained until now.”