MINSK. May 20 (Interfax) - A Minsk court has sentenced former Belarusian presidential candidates Vladimir Neklyayev and Vitaly Rymashevsky to two years in prison each, at the same time granting a stay of execution of the sentence for two years.
The Frunzensky District Court in Minsk found Neklyayev and Rymashevsky guilty of organizing group actions violating public order or actively participating in them, a crime described in Article 342 of the Belarusian Criminal Code.
The court judgment means that Neklyayev and Rymashevsky will not actually be imprisoned now, but have to refrain from new offences within a two-year period and will stand trial again upon its expiration. The court will have to decide then whether the two deserve pardon or have to be imprisoned for a longer period, considering the two years it handed down upon them today.