Mikhail Marynich

Mikhail Afanasievich Marynich (Belarusian: Міхаіл Апана́савіч Марыніч; Russian: Михаил Афанасьевич Маринич, 13 January 1940 — 17 October 2014) was a diplomat, public figure, Belarusian opposition leader from Homiel Voblast . He was a Minsk city mayor, Minister of foreign economic affairs and Ambassador.

In 2001 Mikhail Marynich resigned from his position of Belarus Ambassador to Latvia, made a public statement against the Belarus political regime and ran for Presidency. He was among the first public officials in Belarus to resign and start a political fight against Lukashenko. Such a step required immense courage and dignity given that a number of Lukasheko's opponents disappeared or were killed in the late 1990s.

After the election Marynich established the Business Initiative NGO and became one of the opposition leaders who had immense support and respect from his former colleagues, business community and the political opposition.

In early 2004 Marynich was imprisoned for his political beliefs. He spent 8 months in prison before trial. During all this time the regime was trying to invent a reason for a criminal case. On December 30 2004 Marynich was accused and imprisoned on dubious charges of stealing computers from an NGO, of which he was himself a director. The computers belonged to the US Embassy, and the US Department issued a statement that they didn't have any claims against Marynich. The United States condemned this abuse and earlier abuses of the judicial system by the Lukashenko regime to persecute Belarusian citizens for their political beliefs.

Marynich was given a five-year sentence. In March 2005, in Orsha prison, Marynich suffered a cerebral stroke. The stroke was provoked by the prison administration when Marynich was denied access to his medicines after a very hard transportation in not heated train wagons from Minsk to Orsha. He was asked along with other prisoners to stay on his knees on the train platform. His medicines were not given to him. Even after the stroke Marynich was not released from prison. Amid growing domestic and international pressure he was released from jail one year later, on April 14, 2006, shortly after Alexander Lukashenko started his controversial third term in office.

Amnesty International declared that it considered him a prisoner of conscience.

In 2010, the UN Human Rights Committee found that in Marynich's case, Belarus violated articles 7, 9, 10, paragraph 1, and 14, paragraphs 1 and 2, of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Marynich was the inspirational leader for Zubr, a youth resistance movement.

Marynich died on 17 October 2014.[1]

Marynich has 3 sons Igor, Pavel and Mikhail. Marynich's first wife is called Ludmila. His widow Tatyana Marynich is mother of their son Mikhail.