To be human

The most awful thing is that after 17 years of dictatorship political prisoners have turned just into newsmakers or bargaining chips, but ceased to be human beings for us.

Strangely, but only Zmitser Dashkevich, who had been kept inhuman conditions of prison for more than a year, who is subjected to torture himself, could found moral strength to understand definitely what had happened to Andrei Sannikov.

“By signing the petition for clemency, Sannikov has done the only correct and possible deed in his situation. With all due respect to Uss and other courageous people who had suffered from persecution for “elections – 2010”, they have not experienced even one tenth of the violence, physical and moral abuse Andrei Sannikov had. In addition, there is a real threat to life and health of his family. Under such conditions anyone would be obliged to defend his family by absolutely every means you could think of.

If someone came to me and started uttering threats to my loved ones, directly or by hints, I would sign anything at all, including the information about a bucket with rats and a carriage of armature. There is not a single politician in Belarus who had come through the things Sannikov has come through, and therefore no one has at least a minimal right to blame him, Zmitser Dashkevich writes from Hlybokae colony.

It’s true, in the first days after the press-conference of Iryna Khalip most people supported Sannikov. But a few fools or maximalists (according to the diagnosis of psychiatrist Shchyhelski) have been found, who despite their prison experience did not even had enough fantasy to imagine the humiliating treatment their colleagues had been subjected to. And independent mass media, rubbing their hands cheerfully, started to offer them informational opportunities, organize on-line press-conferences, for them to practice shallow and inappropriate moralizing. And today we are seeing titles like: “Dashkevich vindicates Sannikov”.

To whom does he explains Sannikov away? Is it done for those who are responsible for Sannikov, Bandarenka, Byalyatski, Dashkevich, Statkevich and Lobau’s remaining in prisons? Is it done for us, those who are sitting in front of our computers in warm homes and offices and reading these lines drinking coffee

It’s true, it’s hard for us to walk a mile in the shoes of a person who was transferred from one prison to another seven times, accompanied by barking dogs and clicks of guards’ guns, who for more than a year is living in inhuman conditions, undergoing psychological and physical torture, who was first beaten in the KGB remand prison, then bullied in “pressure-cells” by prisoners patronized by the prison administration, and then held in a solitary confinement for more than three months, when he could not receive a word from his family, not knowing whether the loved ones are alive. And then people in mufti kept coming to him explaining very convincingly that the life of his wife and son are in his hands. It is easy to believe as it is true, his wife is a convict herself and those people in mufti come to their house, where she stays alone with her little son, every day.

I do not know what it is: heartlessness, short memory, tiredness after 18 years of stagnation, or morbid cynicism. But a few weeks have passed, and we are reading “highbrow” statements of political analysts, “analyzing” new superficial promises, some premonitions and dim sensations of another European negotiator, who had a conversation with some bag-carrier from the Interior Ministry, and has made a conclusion that the authorities are going to release someone soon. And we are certainly reading that “it will be Sannikov and Bandarenka, as they have written petitions for clemency.” Not a word is said about the pressure and tortures after which it had been done, and at what a heavy cost.

And we are not clanging bells, though Zmitser Dashkevich and Mikola Statkevich have confirmed that even they, who had come through awful things, have not come through the things Sannikov had to. And we are not worried for some reason, why Sannikov cannot phone from the colony still, why there are no letters from him and he still cannot tell the lawyer what is going on with him in reality.

Instead of that, we are arranging discussions: was it right to write a petition for Sannikov? Why don’t these people organize a discussion on the topic: why a person is tortured in prison in modern Belarus, his wife and son’s health and lives menaced? It seems to me this question formulation is more correct. But people do not need such a discussion; they have become used to that already. They need sensational headlines and scandalous facts.

That is why we are reading that there are no grounds for imposing international sanctions against Belarus. Some people and suspicious structures suddenly decide that they have a right to order destinies of political prisoners, and are trying to sell them to the West in exchange for indulgencies for criminals who had seized power and trample upon the human and divine laws. And those who are trying to call them to order and stop from repeating the same mistakes which had resulted in the long years of dictatorship, could be taken to court. I offer to address Lukashenka’s court at once, it is sure to deliver a judgment in your favour.

I really want all political prisoners to be relapsed as soon as possible, for Gunnar Wiegand with his intuitions not to become another Bulgarian Foreign Minister, reassuring the West that Lukashenka is going to show clemency and release everyone “in a little while”. But it is important to understand that while we are waiting, discussing, moralizing, trading, refuse to use effective sanctions, the political prisoners continue to rot in prisons.

We should not get used to the nightmare our life has turned into. Living with monsters, we can turn into monsters easily and gradually. And our aim is not just to survive and hold ground at any cost, but to remain human as well. Not just journalists, politicals and political analysts, but humans.

Natallya Radzina, charter97.org editor-in-chief