SBIO at ‘Solidarity with Belarus 2013’ concert | Warsaw, April 21

Solidarity with Belarus Information Office (SBIO) took part in this year’s ‘Solidarity with Belarus’ concert, held in Warsaw’s city centre on the evening of April 21^st 2013. Hosting a stand near the main stage, we met a diverse range of people – Poles, Belarusians, Poles with Belarusian roots, young, old…all who care about the situation in Belarus and wanted to find out more.

The ‘Solidarity with Belarus’ concert, organized by the ‘Free Belarus’ Initiative, has taken place every year since 2006. With the aim of supporting civil society in Belarus, it brings together musicians from Poland and Belarus, as well as politicians, civil and cultural actors from both countries. This year, Belarusian groups Dzetsiuki, Lyavon Volski, and Krambambulya played alongside Polish groups Izrael and Stracy na Lachy. Special guests included wives of Belarusian political prisoners – Nastya Dashkevich, wife of Zmitser Dashkevich, Marina Adamovich, wife of Mikolai Statkevich, and Natalya Pinchuk, wife of Ales Bialiatski, as well as MEP Pawel Zalewski, Henryka Krzywonos, a legendary activist from Poland’s ‘Solidarity’ movement in the 1980s, and others.

The concert was co-led by Polskie Radio journalist Justyna Dżbik and Belarusian rapper Vinsent, whose music first appeared in the film ‘Belarusian Dream’ (2011), and who recently made his acting debut in the Polish-Belarusian film ‘Viva Belarus!’.