Sviatlana Haldadze, who served as the chair of the Homel City Council and Executive Committee during Gorbachev's Perestroika in the USSR, has died in Homel. In her position, she promoted the development of democratic and national forces in the city.
Sviatlana Haldadze. Photo: "Green Portal"
"Fate determined that I worked under her leadership as deputy for three years. We were chosen in a difficult time, when socio-economic cataclysms occurred almost daily. One day tobacco would suddenly disappear, then sugar, then everything at once. The old nomenclature, which, in my opinion, never truly accepted Sviatlana Kanstantsinauna as their equal, poured oil on the fire.
But the city council, the only representative body of power in Belarus where anti-communist forces held a majority, provided support," wrote Viktar Karneyenka, one of the leaders of the democratic movement in Homel at that time and a deputy of the Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR, on Facebook.
Sviatlana Haldadze continued to participate in the struggle for a democratic Belarus even after her resignation from her high position, when Aliaksandr Lukashenka came to power in the country. She actively cooperated with human rights organizations, including filing complaints about violations of citizens' rights with international bodies.
And here's the question: is it normal for a Belarusian politician to give their first interviews not to Belarusians, but to Germans and a Russian? 8989
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