Yauheniya Chatsvyartnaya violated Article 9.22 of Administrative Code.
On December 1st, the woman wrote in the VK social network the following: “The Belarusian language is unpleasant to the ear. In general, the Belarusian language is a ridiculous assortment of Russian and Polish”.
The initiator of the “Paperwork in Belarusian!” civil campaign Ihar Sluchak filed a statement with the Rechitsa district executive committee. He explained that this woman had publicly insulted the Belarusian language, thus violating article 9.22 of the Administrative Code. The activist asked to hold Chatsvyartnaya accountable.
Mr Sluchak never received a response from the executive committee, so on February 14th he demanded that the prosecutor’s office of Rechitsa district conduct an inspection and explain why the executive committee did not give timely response to his request.
Prosecutor of the Rechitsa district, Mikalai Belarusau, wrote to Ihar Sluchak that the executive committee had responded to his request, even though Mr Sluchak had not received such a response.
“Yauheniya Chatsvyartnaya received her law degree from the same university as I, she worked as bailiff, so she had to understand that such statements are unacceptable and offensive, and an educated person must not and would not behave this way… I hope this case will be a lesson for those who believe that collecting “likes” in social networks by insulting the national language is a good idea,” wrote the activist on Facebook.
It was the third victory of Ihar Sluchak in the fight against those who insult the Belarusian language.
In January, the activist obtained the punishment for the former police officer Vasil Varushchanka from Homiel. In September 2016, Mazyr resident Dzmitry Shcharbatykh was punished for insulting the Belarusian language.
Last time a person was held administratively responsible for insulting Belarus was in 1999.
