Hrodna: Police Detain People Going to Minsk

According to the local human rights activist Viktar Sazonau, on 14 January Hrodna the police detained a micro-bus with six passengers driving out of the city. The detainees explained to the police they were going to Minsk for a rock concert. However, while checking the passports the policemen saw that the passengers were activists of previous election campaign and ordered the driver to drive to Hrodna Kastrychnitski borough police department. There the police once again checked their documents, shot them with a video camera and took fingerprints. The driver was separated from the rest and taken in a different room. The rest were detained for three hours and then released. The police didn’t explain how the activists could take their belongings from the micro-bus.

Aliaksandra Buiko, one of the detainees, thinks that on the Election Day Hrodna law machinery organized total persecutions of activists of election campaign. Their main aim was to hinder every step of the activists and prevent their coming to the capital.