Brest: Four Youngsters Detained for Posting Stickers
In the midnight of 9 September in Brest the police detained Ihar Dzemidovich, Andrei Sharenda and two under-aged persons, Mikhail Iliin and Dzianis Pradun. The youngsters were posting a sticker with invitation to the ˜Large Jeans Feast’ that is to take place in Banhalor Square in Minsk on 16 September. The detainees were taken to Brest Leninski Borough Board of Internal Affairs.
In their reports the ensign Barodzin and the lance-sergeant Katovich who conducted the detention wrote that the detainees distributed printed production. Neither stickers, nor the badges For Freedom! the youngsters were wearing were confiscated. The lieutenant Ivanou, graduate of a Russian police college, demonstrated an aggressive attitude to all Belarusian. It’s worth mentioning that dozens of tipsy teenagers who were detained were let go quite quickly, whereas ˜the political four’ were kept for quite a time. When the minors’ parents arrived they weren’t let to their children. Iliin and Pradun were put into the register of the commission of minors’ affairs, videoed and fingerprinted.
After numerous consultations with Brest Regional Department of Internal Affairs the police inspector Uladzimir Mazanets composed on the detainees a report for violation of presidential decree #31 of 17 January 2006 Pollution of streets. As a result, the youngsters can be fined from 165 000 to 825 000 rubles.
At about 3 a.m. the minors were ordered to sign the reports and were told they could go, but then were twice returned to the BDIA. The human rights activist Uladzimir Vialichkin, who expressed his indignation with the police lawlessness, wasn’t let in the BDIA. The policemen stated it was prohibited for ˜extraneous persons’ to stay there after 11 p.m.
