Plainclothes police officers beat market vendors from Caucasus

The beaten sellers are from Azerbaijan, Tajikistan and Armenia.

They contacted leader of the small businessmen movement Ales Talstyka and complained about people in civilian clothes who caught, beat and scared them.

Talstyka, a small businessman and representative of the movement For Free Development of Small Business, spoke to Radio Svaboda about the incident at Expobel market that took place between 9 and 10 a.m. on November 8.

”About 40 plainclothes men came in two buses. They said they were police officers, but they didn't show their documents. Two men visited every booth and foreign people – Azerbajanis, Armenians, Tajiks – selling goods on counters in the street. If they didn't have work permit, the men ordered them to get on the bus. They were taken to a forest in Kurapaty area and beaten. The men delivered blows to the kidneys, choked them with hoods, ordered to do squats, intimidated the market vendors and wrote down their phone numbers.”

Talstyka didn't see the incident, but he heard about it from market vendors who don't want to say their names fearing revenge.

Beaten foreign citizens didn't file complaints to the police or a prosecutor's office because they fear revenge and deportation.

About 40 people were beaten, according to Talstyka. They claim they were beaten to scare them and to prevent any repetition of the Biryulyovo incident that happened in Moscow.