Trial Starts for 5 Accused in Cameraman’s Death

Five men went on trial in a Minsk court, charged in the slaying of a Belarussian cameraman with Russia’s ORT state-controlled television.

Dmitry Zavadsky went missing July 7, 2000, after he left for the Minsk airport to meet a Russian colleague. He was one of several well-known people who have disappeared in Belarus in recent years.

The government says Zavadsky was kidnapped by a group led by a former officer of an elite police force, Valery Ignatovich, who was angered by his reports. However, opposition groups suspect government involvement, saying those who disappeared were targeted because they ran afoul of authoritarian President Alexander G. Lukashenko.