Hundreds attended the funeral of Belarusian media activist Oleg Bebenin in Minsk on Sept. 6.
The co-founder of the opposition Internet portal, Charter97.org, was found hanged at his summer house outside of the capital. Should government officials be implicated in his murder, the implications could be immense. Bebenin is not the first dissident to have died under mysterious circumstances during the reign of President Alexander Lukashenko, now in his 16th year of tyranny as the megalomaniacal rule of Ukraine’s neighbor with 10 million people. Until Lukashenko is ousted from power, Bebenin won’t be the last.
Bebenin was not well known. Andrei Sannikov, a former foreign minister, does not believe Bebenin committed suicide. The 36-year-old father of two children established himself as an editor of the Minsk-based Imya newspaper, a witty and irreverent tabloid known for biting political commentary. The newspaper was forced to close after Lukashenko established a dictatorship.
Bebenin turned to the Internet to publicize the opposition and the plight of the regime’s victims, including prominent Lukashenko critics who went missing in 1999 and 2000. “[Bebenin] helped us to survive, to become stronger and fight for the truth. We have done a lot together, but we have not finished what we have started. We know that the truth will be revealed, and justice will be administered when the current regime falls. Oleg is no longer with us – and now it’s our turn to fight for the truth about his death,” widows of two missing opposition leaders, Irina Krasovskaya and Svetlana Zavadskaya, wrote on Sept. 8.
Kremlin leaders may even have had enough of the ghastly Lukashenko show. Russian state-controlled television stations – silent about the murders of Russian journalists – have reported extensively about Bebenin’s death. The mystery provides an opportunity for everyone to reflect on the evil person who runs Belarus and to start talking about ways to help Belarusians dismantle the last dictatorship in Europe.
