Government adopts mysterious decree on African swine fever

On August 29, the Council of Ministers adopted a new decree on the African swine fever. Although the document has come into force on September 2, it is not available for the ordinary Belarusian citizens, say the representatives of the National Legal Portal.

Euroradio: Good afternoon. I would like to see the Decree of the Council of Ministers No. 758 dated August 29 "On additional measures of liquidation and prevention of distribution of the African swine fever and other dangerous animal diseases". Is it possibly? I cannot browse it for some reason.

National Legal Portal: This document is under elaboration yet. You can only see its registration card (it includes the full name of the document, the date of adoption and the date of coming into force - Euroradio).

Euroradio: Yes, I saw it. When can I expect publication of the whole document? As far as I understand, it has already come into force.

National Legal Portal: The official publication will be either in the end of this week, on Saturday, or in the beginning of the next week. There are 190 pages in the document, and it came for elaboration just yesterday...

The document has not been published on the website of the Council of Ministers either. The Council's decree no. 758 is missing, although the later documents are published as full texts. The Ministry of Agriculture's hotline also keeps silence about the mysterious decree - I called there and introduced myself as a farmer. They said they heard about the document but know nothing. A minute later, they gave me a phone number of the Department of Veterinary and Food Control. Deputy Director Mikhail Areshka says that the new decree has already been sent to the authorities of different levels:

"It has been sent. The people will read it when it's published. They has been sent to regional and district executive committees, they are working with it."

The official refused to comment on the document or to even tell what Belarusians should expect this time. Therefore, I tried to find out the details locally. The Committee on Agriculture of Homel regional executive committee found out about the new decree...from me!

"We know that this document has been under preparation, but we had no information that it had already been inked..." 

The Administrations for Agriculture of several district executive committees say more or less the same. Probably, their employees will spend several days browsing the National Legal Portal. Who knows what the 190 pages of the rules for struggle with the African swine fever could bring to the country.