Leanid Sudalenka: Anyone Could Be Checked “For Extremism” At Belarus Border Now

A human rights activist from Homel has challenged in court actions of border guards and customs officials, who conducted a personal search at the border without a reasonable basis.

As BelaPAN informs, on April 25 the human rights activist Leanid Sudalenka filed an application to the chairman of Homel regional court that he declares a protests against the ruling of the court in the civil case, as the district court dismissed the claim, and the court of cassation upheld the ruling of the first instance. The appellant asks to check legality and reasonableness of court decisions and to issue a procurator’s appeal against them as an act of supervision.

In August 2015 Leanid Sudalenka was on his way back home from the Lithuanian capital on the train Vilnius-Minsk. At Hudahai border crossing point border guards had claims against him, but they didn’t explain their essence, but offered him to leave the train in Maladzechna. He was got off the train by force, and he underwent personal search.

The human rights activist believes that his rights had been violated, and the personal search had been used as “black lists” exist at the border, which is a violation of the law, an arbitrary limitation of constitutional rights. In the materials of the case there is a written order to customs authorities to carry out a personal search of Leanid Sudalenka, with a direction – “presence of data storage devices [should be checked for] extremist information.” During the trial the human rights activist didn’t receive answer to the question, on what grounds an officer of the Border committee had written this task, and on what grounds he had been able to define a concrete task for the customs office.

Before the court the defendants (representatives of the border and customs authorities) explained that “the exceptional measures of customs inspection” had been used, as the passenger was nervous, was crossing the border alone, had minimum of hand luggage and stayed in Lithuania for a short period of time.

“The panel of judges had come to the same conclusion. The judicial authorities were – but have failed to do so – to establish, on the grounds of which legal act the suspicions relating a nervous passenger, crossing the border alone with a minimal hand luggage, and who had stayed abroad for a short period of time, are the grounds for a personal inspection by customs officers,” – the human rights activist stressed.

He added that the documents, presented by customs officers and border guards at the court, show that the personal data of the human rights activist in the automated system of border control had been modified with a concrete instruction, which characterize him as an extremist. But judicial authorities could not give any evaluation to this fact of evidence.

“The denial of the judicial instances to give evaluation to those facts of evidence and arguments has an obviously arbitrary nature, which is viewed by me as a denial of justice. Why a nervous passenger is checked for extremism, and not for carrying drugs or weapons, for example? Who had determined what should be searched in my items? They are writing about some profiles of risks, and it is not found in any laws, it is taken from an instruction, which is a top secret document. Such documents should not be applied to citizens. No one doubts that black lists at borders exist, but they fear to confess” – Leanid Sudalenka commented.