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As many as 1,316 people reported to have already been released under amnesty law

The press office of the Belarusian interior ministry reported on Monday that as many as 1,316 people had been released from prison by August 24 under this year’s amnesty program.

According to the interior ministry, a total of 14,927 prisoners were eligible for amnesty under the amnesty law enacted last month on the occasion of Independence Day (July 3).

The press office said that applying the amnesty had already been considered with regard to a total of 7,230 convicts, with 3,177 being denied amnesty. Out of them, 1,711 had not fully paid compensation for the damage caused by their crimes and 1,466 were persistent violators of prison rules.

A total of 2,737 people had their prison sentences reduced by one year.

Also eligible for amnesty were more than 8,000 people serving non-custodial sentences. The press office reported that as of August 15, 1,589 of them had been exempted from their sentences and 551 had had their sentences shortened by one year.

The amnesty law stipulates that no amnesty may be granted to people convicted on charges of, among other, organizing and participating in mass disorder, organizing and preparing actions that are in gross violation of public order or active participation in them, defaming the head of state and violating regulations governing “mass events.” That means that Alyaksandr Lukashenka`s political opponents are unlikely to be freed under the law.

This has been the 10th amnesty campaign in the country since 1994. The previous amnesty campaign was conducted in 2010, on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in the 1941-45 Great Patriotic War. As many as 3,300 people were then released from correctional institutions and almost 9,000 people had their prison sentences reduced by one year, according to the interior ministry. The ministry says that up to 10 percent of the people released under an amnesty relapse into crime. //BelaPAN