Watchdog

Two human rights activists were detained by police in the western Belarusian town of Berastse on May 7, RFE/RL's Belarus Service reports.

Police arrested Roman Kislyak and Andrey Sharenda as they distributed texts of the "International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance" not far from the local prosecutor's office in Berastse.

The action by the rights defenders was to mark the 11th anniversary of the disappearance of former Belarusian Interior Minister Yury Zaharanka.

Several prominent individuals disappeared in Belarus in 1999 and 2000, including former Deputy Parliament Speaker Viktar Hanchar, businessman Anatol Krasousky, journalist Dzmitry Zavadzsky, and Zaharanka.

All of them are presumed dead. Their relatives believe the Belarusian secret services are behind the abductions and possible killings.

Sharenda has been arrested and jailed in recent years for such things as taking part in unsanctioned gatherings and putting the opposition's national flag on a
university building.

Three skinheads have been found guilty of murder by a court in the western Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.

The three young men from the town of Balakhna were found guilty on May 7 of killing an Uzbek citizen last year. A court official told RFE/RL that the jury classified the murder as a hate crime. The three are to be sentenced in the coming weeks.

Last year a group of skinheads were arrested in Nizhny Novgorod for throwing Molotov cocktails inside the windows of a local police station. They later confessed that the action was to commemorate a Russian neo-Nazi group leader, Maksim Bazylev, also known as "Adolf."

Bazylev was found dead in his cell in a Moscow detention center last year. Police officials said he committed suicide.