Car with Russian registration plate hits Kurapaty defenders

Activists picketing the restaurant “Poedem, Poedim” built next to the place of mass executions in Kurapaty not far from Minsk were involved in a serious conflict on the evening of June 13. A Mazda with a Russian registration plate hit two activists, protesters reported. One of the victims, Yauhen Batura, described the incident:

"A car hit two people, I am one of them. It had a Russian registration plate. I have small bruises. When people started expressing their indignation (there were 10 witnesses and two driving inspectors), he started swearing, stepped on the gas and dragged one of us (Vasil) on the bonnet for about a metre. Even the policemen were shocked.”

The driver and the passenger got out of the car after the incident and Yauhen started streaming it on Facebook. There are xenophobic statements in the video. Please do not watch it if you do not want to hear them:

The people in Mazda were Belarus-3 presenter Stella Chirkova and her husband Ivan Yermakov. Chirkova described the incident on Facebook later thus confirming her participation in the conflict:

Stela Chirkova moved to Minsk from Moscow at the end of 2012. She used to work for the publishing house Vneshtorgizdat (VD “Panorama”) until 2008. She has been a presenter at Belarus-3 (Diablog. Literature) since 2013. She also became the director of the Belarusian affiliate of the Dutch logistics company Mammoet.

Ivan Yermakou has already visited “Poedem, Poedim” before, Kurapaty defenders said. However, he limited himself to an argument back then. Here’s the reason he believes is enough to convince everyone that a restaurant overlooking crosses reminding about the mass shooting of the 1930s is a normal thing:

"How can you kill and bury over 200 thousand people in 4 years without any negative consequences for the economy, society and defense? How is it logistically possible to organize the killing of every 10th citizen by a few hundred NKVD members?”