Paval Kuryanovich: «When we all caught cold in cell, we rebelled…»

Democratic activist Paval Kuryanovich was released recently from the special prison facility in Akrestin Street. For spreading the information materials for the European March the oppositionist was sentenced to 10 days of arrest.

Paval Kuryanovich was detained in city district Kuntsevshchina at 11.00 p.m. 10 October for spreading the stickers for the European March. He spent a night in Frunzenski District Internal Affairs Department, and the next day the court of that district sentenced the activist to 10 days of arrest.

The democratic activist was convicted under the article 23.34 – “violation of the rules of organization and holding the mass events”. The witnesses on the trial were the officers of the Frunzenski District Internal Affairs Department Maroz V. V., Haluza, A. V. and Hamza D. A.

18 years old Paval Kuryanovich was in the special prison facility for the first time. “The cell mates were mainly hooligans. But I was lucky as I was in the cell with youth activist Aliaksandr Atroshchankau, then Paval Yuhnevich was put in our cell. If it had not been for them, it would have been much harder. The guys helped me much”, - Kuryanovich said in the interview to Charter’97 press center.

According to the activist, the hardest was the fact they were not allowed to walk outside. “They didn’t let us walk. They said they hadn’t space, a special yard was only in a project. They ostentatiously didn’t let the oppositionist do the community service. The guard called only the “non-political” to work’, - Paval notes.

The attitude of the prison guards to the prisoners was rather good. But there were exceptions. “There was a militiaman, when he entered on night duty, he was walking all the night along the corridor, and when he heard somebody’s cough he opened the opening in a cell and shouted: “Sleep! Taps!”, - the activist says.

But according to him it was impossible not to cough. It was very cold in cells. Especially the “non-political” suffered – many of them didn’t received warm clothes from outside. People got seriously ill.

Once, when they all got cold, the prisoners rebelled and demanded hot tea instead of hardly warm. “We achieved something – the tea became warmer and there even was some sugar sometimes”, - Kuryanovich says.

According to the report of detainment Paval Kuryanovich was to be released late night on Saturday. At 00.10 a.m. sharp – this the time was written down in the report as the time of his detainment. But for an unknown reason the activist was released only 00.00 p.m. the next day. Kuryanovich had to spend behind the bars half a day over.