Man taken to psychiatric hospital for visiting Lukashenka administration

The authorities prefer to explain the desire of citizens to exercise their constitutional rights by “insanity”.

Minsk resident Mikhail Miakhedka went to the Lukashenka administration on August 6 and was taken to a psychiatric hospital from there, Viasna human rights centre reports.

The man wanted the Constitutional Court to check if courts' practice of implementation of legislation on compensation for withdrawal of plots of land and demolition of common residential property co-owned by citizens complies with the Constitution of Belarus. The Lukashenka administration became an obstacle on his way to the constitutional justice. Lawyer Pavel Sapelka says this story was continued.

The struggle for property and searches for the truth led Mikhail Miakhedka to hospital (he had a stroke). Having recovered a little, though he still has walking difficulties, the man decided to go to the president's administration hoping that the recent amendments to the legislation and the president's intervention can help him defend his rights.

“When Miakhedka went to the president's administration on August to discuss his complaint, he was caught by special purpose police officers. They offered his relatives to take him home. When the relatives arrived, they learnt that Miakhedka had been sent to the medical psychiatric centre Navinki for examination. He is held in psychiatric hospital now. We don't have any information from him,” Pavel Sapelka said.

Human rights defenders say persistent complaints of people sometimes end with a conversation with psychiatrists.

“The state uses psychiatric arguments instead of legal ones. It is easier for them to explain this behaviour of citizens not by their desire to exercise their constitutional rights, but by insanity,” Pavel Sapelka notes.