29 March 2024, Friday, 14:08
Support
the website
Sim Sim,
Charter 97!
Categories

Police is carrying out special operation before CIS summit

37
Police is carrying out special operation before CIS summit

Preventive detentions of opposition activists are taking place in Minsk.

Relatives of the detained and human rights activists call such police actions a provocation, Radio Svaboda reports.

An activist of the European Belarus civic campaign Andrej Mauchan was detained in Minsk at his working place at 2 p.m. According to his sister, he did not even manage to change from his work uniform – the oppositionist works as a general worker for a private firm in Minsk.

“He called me and said that policemen from Minsk Moscow district’s police department came to his work and allegedly wanted to talk. The chief did not want to let him go, but the policemen threatened him and said that they would not arrest him. But they immediately took him to the police station.

I tried to clarify the situation later, why he was taken to the police station. They explained to me that it was done for an alleged identification lineup, because they had received a call about a cell phone theft. Later they composed a protocol at the police station for insubordination to police, because he allegedly refused to take the watch off his wrist and abuse the policemen. However the policemen’s testimonies do not correspond to what actually happened there”,- she said.

Another activist of the European Belarus Aliaksandr Tarnahurski from Dziarzhynsk received a subpoena telling him to show up at the police station. For what charter97.org managed to learn, law enforcers came home as well to other members of oppositional organizations and movements and asked the relatives how they could be found.

The leader of Belarusian national-bolsheviks Jauhien Kontush was also convicted yesterday, and an activist of this movement Dzmitry Palienka was detained.

Among the possible reasons for the preventive detentions the human rights center Viasna names the session of the High Eurasian Economic Council and the Council of CIS heads of states that will take place in Minsk today.

“Activists themselves call these detentions preventive due to the CIS summit. I do not rule out that these are the steps taken by the authorities for these visits to take place in calmer circumstances. The activists did not organize any actions, there were no other reasons. The fact that the administrative protocols were composed for alleged hooliganism indicates that these are exactly preventive measures”, - a human rights activist Nasta Lojka stated.

We would remind that the session of the High Eurasian Economic Council and the Council of CIS heads of states will take place in Minsk on 24-25 October.

Archive photo

Write your comment 37

Follow Charter97.org social media accounts