The Belarus regime is cracking down on webcomics:
Dear Dr. R. Russell:
I live in Grodno, Belarus. My name is Oleg Minich. I’m a cartoonist and I have created 28 short cartoons about contemporary life in Belarus.
On 16.08.2005 five KGB officers burst into my flat, conducted a search, took away my computer, all CDs, and all floppy disks. I’m accused under the article 368 Criminal Code Republic of Belarus “Insulting of the President of Belarus.” I can be imprisoned for 5 years.
That would be a GIANT hint to get the fuck outta that country! Geez!
KGB? I thought those guys went bankrupt or something.
Sorta. The Soviet KGB was dissolved in 1991, and immediately replaced with the FSB, which serves pretty much the same purpose.
But Belarus split off from the USSR some time ago, and still has a KGB of its own.
No, I didn’t know any of this until the story broke.
Belarus is a really interesting place to write about and one suck-ass place to live. They seem to have decided Stalin more or less had it right. And as if that’s not enough, Chernobyl was only about seven miles from their borders and the wind was not kind. It’s kinda cool that anyone could see the funny side to life in that country.
Props to Tom Spurgeon for pointing this one out to me.
Well I can tell ya, there’s one country whose President is just itchin’ to be drawn in the amourous embrace of some serious tentacled lovin’.
But DJ, what if they can’t afford to leave the country? What if they don’t want too? It is their home after all. Besides, their passports were taken away right off, so they can’t.