In Belarus the use of the police force has a long history. In 1996 there took place the first violent beatings and detentions of opposition activists during Lukashenka´s rule. Since that time many thousand of people went through beatings, fines and imprisonments. Human rights organizations of Belarus always try to register such facts. The protest action of 19 October is one of the examples.
According to the testimony of the detained participation of the protest action of 19 October Yaraslaw Navumenka, in the police busses protestors were “thrown down on the floor and beaten”. He said it at the trial, but the judge of Minsk Leninski Court Tserashkova paid no attention to the fact of tortures and sentenced him to 3 days of arrest. Another detainee, student of one of Minsk higher educational establishments, stated at trial that in the bus they were thrown on the floor and “walked on”. This fact didn’t interest the judges either. The lawyer of the Human Rights Center “Viasna”, who attended the trials as the representative of the detainees, emphasizes that the judges refused to call witnesses of the defendants:
— We will register the facts of tortures, — says Valiantsin Stefanovich. – We will try to help people in writing complaints to prosecutor’s offices and will demand check-ups of these facts, identification of the persons who dealt with it and bringing of criminal cases against them. Besides, the names of these persons will be given wide publicity and transferred to the UN Committee Against Torture.
It´s also worth mentioning that as a result of the violent beating by unknown persons on 17 October the journalist of the Russian TV channel NTV Pavel Sheremet has brain concussion. The head of the United Civil Party Aliaksandr Liabedzka, beaten on 19 October, has broken ribs, cranial injury and kidney haematoma as a result of the police violence.
