On August 23, Minsk /BelTA correspondent/. Closing arguments in the case of former Deputy Chairman of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee Leonid Kovalev and citizen Gunnar Kool were heard today in the Minsk City Court, the Minsk Prosecutor's Office informed a BelTA correspondent. As explained by the capital's prosecutor's office, the sentencing is planned for this month. The Minsk Prosecutor's Office also reported that the state prosecutor requested the court to sentence the accused Kovalev to seven years of imprisonment in a penal colony with an enhanced regime, with confiscation of property and deprivation of the right to hold positions related to the performance of organizational, managerial, and administrative-economic duties for five years. This defendant was charged under Part 3 of Article 430 (receiving a bribe on a particularly large scale) of the Criminal Code of Belarus. His accomplice, Estonian citizen Gunnar Kool, was charged under Part 6 of Article 16 (complicity in a crime) and Part 3 of Article 430 of the Criminal Code. The state prosecutor requested that this defendant, who is currently under house arrest and attended today's hearing, be sentenced to five years of imprisonment in a penal colony with an enhanced regime, with confiscation of property and deprivation of the right to hold certain positions for three years. -0-

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