Man Called One of Most Important Witnesses to Minsk Bombing Contacts Police

A middle-aged man described as one of the most important witnesses to last month's bombing in Minsk has contacted police of his own accord.

The man phoned the Kastrychnitski district police station on August 4, according to the Minsk city police department.

A picture of the man was posted on the Web site of the city police department on August 2. The man has short dark hair and was wearing a white t-shirt, a gray jacket and dark trousers. He was standing at the place of the explosion and had a black plastic bag at his feet.

This photograph was pasted up in Minsk and other Belarusian cities. The Minsk city police department urgently asked the man to phone it and called on people who knew something about the man to report this information.
More than 50 people were reportedly injured by the explosion of a homemade time bomb during an Independence Day concert at about 12:30 a.m. on July 4. No fatalities were reported.

A total of 47 people were hospitalized, including two children, according to the health ministry. Most of them had shrapnel wounds in legs and arms. There were reports that the bomb was contained in a juice carton and stuffed with steel nuts and bolts, that is why doctors mainly had to extract such pieces from bodies.

The free open-air concert, which was attended by Belarusian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka and drew hundreds of thousands of people, was not stopped and lasted until 3 a.m., although, according to Interior Minister Uladzimir Navumaw, an unexploded bomb was found at the scene. Criminal proceedings were instituted in connection with the incident under Part Three of the Criminal Code’s Article 339, which penalizes “especially malicious hooliganism.”

The case is being investigated by the Minsk police department, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the KGB. //BelaPAN