Belarussian jailed for quirky anti-cop slogan

An opposition activist in Belarus became a local internet sensation after being filmed holding up a poster reading, “the fuzz” next to a plainclothes cop at a rally, local media said. However, the stint also made Ivan “Redhead” Omelchenko the target of a police hunt and landed him in jail for 15 days, Charter97.org said. A video of the incident on YouTube showed the skinny activist unfold a black cloth with the inscription next to a thuggish-looking man in a suit filming the opposition rally The Chernobyl Road on April 26. The man takes several seconds to realize the exposure and then begins filming Omelchenko, who covers his face with the sign and moves away with an innocent grin to laughs of the crowd. The video had 244,000 views as of Friday evening. Police spent days looking for Omelchenko, who eventually turned himself in, Charter97.org said. He chose an unorthodox line of defense in the courtroom, saying that the sign actually bore the English inscription “My Cop OK,” which looks the same as “The Fuzz” spelled in Cyrillic letters. But the judge still convicted Omelchenko of insulting police and put him under arrest on Wednesday, the report said. Online commentators on Charter97.org said such signs at opposition rallies in the authoritarian Belarus, where police harshly suppressed anti-government protests in 2010, will read “My Cop Okay” in the future to prevent misunderstandings.