Polish blunder over Belarusian activist cost two prosecutors' jobs

Aug 16, 2011, 13:19 GMT

Warsaw - Two prosecutors have left their jobs after Poland mistakenly handed a Belarusian activist's banking information to Minsk last week, Prosecutor General Andrzej Seremet said Tuesday.

Prosecutor Krzysztof Karsznicki, director of the International Cooperation Department, had resigned, Seremet said. Anna Wisniewska, deputy head of that department, was dismissed.

'I'm downright sad as a human being,' Seremet said of the blunder, in which prosecutors handed over activist Ales Bialiatski's bank records.

The Foreign Ministry said last week it had advised prosecutors not to answer such requests from the Belarusian regime, as Minsk could use the information to arrest democratic activists.

Seremet said there had been no ill will on the prosecutors' part, only 'reprehensible negligence.'

Bialiatski, the head of the rights center Viasna in Belarus, was arrested on tax-evasion charges on August 4. Commentators said his arrest likely resulted from his work as an activist.

Poland apologised Friday for the diplomatic blunder, while politicians said the move damaged the Belarusian opposition's trust in Poland.

President Alexander Lukashenko has ruled Belarus almost unchallenged since taking control of the country in a 1994 coup.

A wave of arrests has followed his disputed victory in presidential elections held in December.

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