Amnesty International claims blatant suppression of freedom of speech and peaceful assembly in Belarus; home prison sentence for providing medical help to protesters, beatings in prisons, arrests for the colour of clothes and drawings
7 April 2021 | Voice of Belarus
Source: Photo credit LiveFEED
Blatant suppression of freedom of speech and peaceful assembly – Amnesty International on Belarus
Amnesty International human rights defenders published a report on the human rights situation in the world in 2020, including Belarus.
The report says that the presidential elections in Belarus in August 2020 were the catalyst for “the most blatant suppression of freedom of speech and peaceful assembly in Belarus since the country’s independence”.
UN human rights experts have received 450 testimonies of abuse, including photos, videos, and medical attests. Amnesty International describes this data as a “horrific list of abuses”: detainees were humiliated, severely beaten, raped (including women and members of sexual minorities), and left without food, clean water and medical care.
At least four people were killed by the security forces, and several more died under suspicious circumstances, experts recalled.
You can be fired for everything: for dissent, for participating in a strike, for administrative arrest
Amendments to the Labour Code are being prepared in Belarus. If the Code is approved in the proposed form, Belarusian employers would have the right to dismiss employees who were under administrative arrest for calling to strike and for participating in it.
Yet even without the adoption of changes, dismissals for political reasons continue.
Senior lecturer Viktar Ivanchanka was fired from the Belarusian National Technical University. Since August 2020, Ivanchanka has openly expressed his civic stance, he signed petitions and took part in video appeals. Viktar Ivanchanka also served multiple days’ sentence in a pre-trial detention center.
Ethnographer Uladzimir Lobach with a PhD in Historical Sciences, was fired from Polatsk State University. Lobach was one of those who signed the appeal in defense of the white-red-white flag.
During the protests in Belarus, more than 130 employees of universities and scientists were persecuted for political reasons. More than 50 of those were fired, another 16 left of their own free will. 33 employees served various terms of administrative arrest.
Do Belarusians continue to fight or are they preparing to emigrate?
The Center for New Ideas (ideaby.org) think tank together with the Narodny Opros (National Poll) project conducted a survey between 11–13 March 2021. The aim of the survey was to understand what expectations Belarusians have for the future and how many are ready to emigrate from Belarus. Survey respondents represent an active protest part of the population which primarily consists of Belarusians under the age of 50 with higher education who live in Minsk and have a positive attitude towards the protests. 8,772 answers were studied. Almost 95% of the respondents are concerned about the continuation of persecutions, arrests of activists, and tightening of legislation.
About 80% are worried about the worsening economic situation and integration with Russia imposed by the authorities.
At the same time, the protest remains optimistic. More than 43% believe that Lukashenko will leave by the end of 2021, and around 20% believe that it will happen by 2025.
The majority of the survey respondents contemplated the possibility of leaving the country in one way or another. Emigration is primarily considered by young Belarusians and Belarusians with higher education (including European and American degrees), as well as people with a fairly high income.
Home prison sentences for providing medical help to protesters, beatings in prisons, arrests for the colour of clothes and drawings
Source: TUT.BY
In Minsk, a sentence was passed in the case of Aliaksandra Patrasayeva, who spoke about torture in the detention center on Akrestsina Street in August 2020. She was accused of participating in the mass riots on 10 August 2020. Aliaksandra pleaded not guilty, explaining that she was providing medical help at the time. As a result, Aliaksandra was sentenced to three years of home prison.
Source: Viasna Human Rights Centre
A 68-year-old activist and retired employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs from Homel, Uladzimir Niapomniashchykh, was sentenced to two and a half years in a penal colony for calling the court “an organised criminal group”.
In Brest, a court sentenced 32-year-old Andrei Levaniuk for inscribing a quote from the prayer “But deliver us from the evil one” on the facade of a residential building. The sentence is a month’s detention.
Source: NN.BY
The leader of the Young Front (Malady Front) Belarusian youth movement Dzianis Urbanovich spoke about the conditions of detention and the attitude towards political prisoners after spending 15 days of arrest at the detention centre on Akrestsina Street and in the prison in Zhodzina. The cells were overcrowded, and treated with bleach on the inside which made it hard to breathe and caused burning eyes. All the men were beaten, and some were beaten only for their last names. One prisoner with the last name Tsikhanovich was beaten solely because his surname was consonant with the surname of Tsikhanouski (political prisoner and former potential presidential candidate).
Source: Belaruspartisan
The leader of the United Civic Party (UCP) Mikalai Kazlou was released after 15 days of detention. He was taken from Akrestsina Street to the outskirts of the city and dropped off there.
On Akrestsina Street Kazlou served his sentence in an overcrowded punishment cell. Each day, two buckets of water and bleach solution were poured onto the floor of the cell. The UCP leader refuses to sign a nondisclosure agreement, for which he was punished twice with administrative arrest.
The young women who walked along Perzmozhtsau Avenue in white-red-white clothes were arrested.
58-year-old Alena Bazhanava was arrested in Mahiliou. The woman was taken away directly from her workplace. The alleged reason for the arrest were “drawings on windows”. It remains unknown which drawings were meant.
