На беларускай мове:
Два гады таму быў затрыманы Мікола Статкевіч
Mikola Statkevich was detained two years ago. This happened on May 31, 2020, when Mikola was going to Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya’s election picket near the Kamarouka market in Minsk. The next day he was sentenced to 15 days of arrest, and in December last year — to 14 years in prison.
Even behind bars, the politician keeps his mind firm and is interested in the latest news, talks about politics, the war, and the fate of the Belarusians. The publication Nasha Niva has collected a whole list of striking quotes from his last letters to his wife. In one of them, the politician reflected on the nobility of Belarusians, which is especially evident in the fact that we do not ‘knock out’ «benefits» for ourselves in places where people pay with their lives — in the war.
«Now there is a constant campaign of honoring veterans, who mostly have never been at the front line. In this regard, I thought what distinctive people Belarusians are. Your grandmother, who hid a Jewish girl among her children right in front of a German commandant, could not even think of a demand to join the «Righteous Among the Nations.» Like my grandmother – to be registered as the widow of an underground fighter. Although grandfather Pavel and my father (old and small) rode horses at night to cut German communication lines. They were shot at. And grandfather Pavel was killed so terribly: in his own house in front of his wife and daughters. For communication with partisans.
I’m not even talking about my father, who, not being old enough, volunteered for the army upon his release. But he did not get to the front line, as he was sent to a military school. And then, when all these benefits began, he refused on principle to be registered as a veteran, although he had the right to do so. After all, all his friends were left untrained after the mobilization and thrown at German machine guns in Prussia as «unreliable.» Everyone died there.
Belarusians have some kind of internal nobility, which restrains them from «knocking out» benefits in places where people paid with their lives,» Mikola Statkevich wrote on May 5, 2022.
