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TV report accuses US embassy of funding opposition

Belarus’ First National Channel, also known as BT, on Thursday aired a report accusing the US embassy of funding Belarusian opposition forces.

In its prime-time news show, the channel said that the diplomatic mission provided funding to opposition politicians under its small grant program.

The segment included video footage showing the interrogation of Dzmitry Shymanski, leader of the Belarusian Popular Front’s Brest city chapter, and an opposition newspaper editor who allegedly confessed to receiving money from the US embassy.

The channel also broadcast a hidden camera footage that showed Alyaksandr Melnikaw, head of the small grant department at the US embassy, allegedly confirming the report.

The report claimed that US embassy officers told money recipients to sign non-disclosure statements and even intimidated some of them.

The channel said that the case was investigated by Belarusian law-enforcement agencies.

When reached by BelaPAN on Friday, Mr. Shymanski denied the report. He acknowledged that officers of the State Control Committee’s Financial Investigation Department had seized $1,700 in cash from him during a brief detention earlier this month. “They attempted to make me provide explanations about the source of the money. I refused to, this is written in the interrogation transcript,” he said.

The man was released hours after the arrest but ordered to present an income statement within 10 days.

Mr. Shymanski denied that the money had been given by the US embassy. “This is my own money. They took it away to check whether it is not fake. As for Belarusian television’s report, I will confer with lawyers and likely file a slander suit against Belarusian television’s First Channel,” he said.

The US embassy declined to comment on the report on Friday.

In his annual address to the Belarusian people and the National Assembly in April, Alyaksandr Lukashenka ordered the State Control Committee to look into income sources of “professional oppositionists.”