Human Rights Center “Viasna” Continues to Register Facts of Tortures of Protest Action Participants

Human Rights Center “Viasna” prepares “Preliminary monitoring on facts of tortures and other inhumane treatment towards citizens of Belarus”, based on the principles of the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (UNCAT).

One of the parts of the monitoring will become “Beating of participants of actions against the falsified results of the election and the referendum of 17 October 2004”. The number of such facts increases with every upcoming day. Today the participant of one of the protest actions stated the following to HRC “Viasna”:

-- I, Zmitser Barodka, was beaten by the special police forces of Minsk after the detention on 20 October 2004. I was thrown into a bus with policemen and several people started to beat me. They kicked me in the face and in kidneys and tore my jacked in several places. In several minutes they calmed down. Then my mobile phone rang and I started talking on it. They burst on me again. They threw me onto the floor, twisted my arms and took the telephone away. Someone stepped on my head. I received several hits on the back. After this they didn’t allow me to rise and sit down. I spent about quarter of an hour on the floor. Then they allowed me to stand up.

-- “Human Rights Center “Viasna” is a member of FIDH (International Federation for Human Rights) -- says “Viasna” lawyer Valiantsin Stefanovich. – Through this Federation we plan to direct the monitoring to the Committee against Tortures for adequate evaluation.

In future Human Rights Center “Viasna” plans to:

 register facts of tortures
 help people to compose complaints to prosecutor’s office
 demand check-ups of the facts of the tortures and finding the persons responsible
 demand bringing of criminal cases against the policemen who took part in tortures
 give publicity to the names of the duty officials who took part in tortures
 pass the collected information to the UN Committee against Tortures.