Detentions Of Psychologists And Psychotherapists: What Is Known

The mass arrests may be connected with the Machulishchy explosion.

In recent days, psychotherapists and psychiatrists have been massively detained in Belarus. Nasha Niva found out some details.

According to the White Coats telegram channel, at least 20 specialists were detained. Some of them were released after interrogation, while others remain in custody. During interrogations, specialists are required to provide information about “unreliable” patients who came to them.

As far as journalists know, the detentions began last week. Detentions mainly concern specialists who use Gestalt therapy methods in their work. This community also included Yauhenia Tachytskaya, a psychiatrist-narcologist and psychotherapist, who is linked by the state media and the KGB with Mikalai Shvets, who is accused of “organizing sabotage” at the airfield in Machulishchy.

Propaganda claims that Yauhenia, who now lives in Poland, helped Shvets hide in a cottage, as he had been allegedly taken there by the psychoteurapeut’s friend.

According to journalists, they are also detaining specialists who are friends with Tachytskaya on Facebook. At least some of the detainees are held in the KGB pre-trial detention center.

Among the detainees is a psychologist, body therapist Yulia Bakun. They came to her on March 9.

Meanwhile, the community of Belarusian mental health professionals outside the country issued a statement in connection with the persecution of colleagues. Specialists refuse to comment on these events.

Earlier, amendments to the law “On psychological assistance” came into force. Now it is even easier for the security forces to obtain information constituting a professional secret.

The community of psychologists and psychotherapists says that these changes violate the basic principle of the confidentiality of psychotherapy: “It is important to indicate the inadmissibility of certain provisions of the current version of the law. Moreover, we believe that in this way the authorities discredit our profession in itself. Confidentiality is the basis for the development of a trusting relationship between a specialist and a client, its violation leads to detrimental and harmful consequences for the mental health of an individual and society as a whole: an increase in anxiety, aggressiveness, conflict and mistrust, a worsening criminogenic situation, for example, more domestic crimes, as well as suicide."