Watchdog

The co-workers of a Belarusian journalist and military expert who has been missing for several days say he is in a pretrial detention center in Minsk.

Journalists at the "Belarusians & Market" weekly wrote on December 8 that their colleague Alyaksandr Alesin was arrested on November 25.

Some media reports in Belarus last week said Alesin had been arrested on espionage charges.

Belarusian KGB spokesman Artur Strekh refused on December 5 to comment to RFE/RL on the reports.

The Minsk-based Vyasna (Spring) human rights center and the Association of Belarusian Journalists have urged authorities to give information about Alesin's arrest.

Alesin is a leading military expert whose comments often contradict government positions.

Alesin recently said Belarus should reform its army in light of the crisis in Ukraine.

With reporting by "Belarusians & Market" and spring96.org

A Belarusian military expert and journalist, Alyaksandr Alesin, has been missing for days.

Media reports in Belarus on December 4 said thata that Alesin was arrested in a cafe in downtown Minsk last week on espionage charges.

Belarusian KGB spokesman Artur Strekh refused to comment to RFE/RL on the reports on December 5.

Alesin's colleagues at the newspaper "Belarusians & Market" told RFE/RL that he had been missing for several days, but gave no other details.

Alesin is a leading military expert whose comments often do not coincide with the government's positions in tightly controlled Belarus.

Alesin has said Belarus should reform and modernize its army in light of the situation in neighboring Ukraine, where separatists with Russian support have seized swaths of territory in a conflict that has killed more than 4,300 people.