Rydel (real name Uladzimir Katkouski) died on May 26, 2007. See Deceased Wikipedians for further information. His user page is preserved here.

Pass away

I'm sad to announce that Rydel (real name Uladzimir Katkouski) passed away today.. [1] [2]

Great thanks to him for all his great work in Wikipedia... --Monk 08:25, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Barnstar

		The Barnstar of National Merit
		Awarded to Rydel for contributions to articles about his country, Belarus. Your work has not gone unnoticed. Жыве Беларусь! Amir E. Aharoni

home page: http://www.rydel.net/
online blog: http://blog.rydel.net/

White-Red-White and Pahonia

Several years ago when I've started occasionally contributing to English Wikipedia, the images of national Belarusian flag (white-red-white) and the national coat of arms Pahonia, banned by the authoritarian pro-Russian, pro-Soviet leader Alexander Lukashenka, were present both in the main encyclopedia article on Belarus and in the article History of Belarus. Since then they disappeared from both articles, in spite of being of central importance. And, I must confess, a lot of text disappeared from those articles as well. A lot of factual information was removed, censored, re-written or twisted by Soviet propagandists such as User:Kuban kazak and User:Ghirlandajo. --rydel 22:36, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Rahnieda and Usiaslau

Bye-bye, Rahnieda and Usiaslau. A Russian imperial contributor to Wikipedia improved the two articles to such a degree that there's no more mention of any Belarus-related things there, although these are the two most important historical figures in the history of Belarus. Hats off to Russian Empire and its editors. --rydel 12:46, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Vorsha as a Wonderful Example of Russian Contribution to Wikipedia

I urge my fellow Wikipedians to check out edit history of Vorsha. Initially, for one and a half years it has been but an empty one-sentence stub. In January 2006 I considerably extended the article, adding factual information on history and development of the city, based on the data from the Belarusan encyclopedias.

Immediately, imperial Russian POV-pushers ran to the scene like hungry hyienas and started "improving" the article. Nothing new actually, it's just another glaring example of how in Wikipedia stubborn idiots manage to delete correct and truthful information, if they are stubborn enough with their edits and POV-pushing.

Somebody does the actual work, others come and "improve" it. --rydel 11:45, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

be

Беларуская мова — родная мова гэтага ўдзельніка ці гэтай удзельніцы.

en-3

This user can contribute with an advanced level of English.

de-2

Dieser Benutzer hat fortgeschrittene Deutschkenntnisse.

bg-2

Този потребител има познания на средно ниво по български език.

ru-2

Этот участник неплохо знает русский язык.

pl-1