Baranavichy police reject early vote rigging allegations after two months of “investigation”
Human rights defender Siarhei Housha (Baranavichy)
On November
19, human rights defender Siarhei Housha received a response from the
Department of the Interior of Baranavichy city executive committee signed by its
deputy chief Colonel Aliaksandr Trafimau. The
police official succinctly summarizes that no trustworthy data on forcing the students
of Baranavichy State University to early voting in the parliamentary elections
has been received during the consideration of Siarhei Housha’s statement.
Activists
of the "Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections" observation campaign
reported back on September 19 that the students were forced to vote early under
a threat of expulsion from University. Therefore,
Siarhei Housha wrote a complaint to the CEC about violations of election laws,
citing specific names and places of violations. The
CEC did not consider the charges, but forwarded the complaint to the Prosecutor
General’s Office, and later to the police department of Brest regional
executive committee. As
a result, the regional police officials redirected the appeal to their subordinates
in Baranavichy, who carried out an “investigation” of the facts.
The
human rights activist says that his statement was not considered at all and the
facts stated in it have not been checked, as he had mentioned the specific
polling stations, names of curators of student groups who forced the students
to vote early on September 19.
“I
have a recording of such a conversation with the students. None
of these people has been questioned, no one has sought my assistance in the
case, either. For
two months, the officials just passed my complaint from room to room, and
eventually issued the traditional runaround reply and advised me today, in case
of my disagreement, to appeal the decision at the Department of Internal
Affairs of Brest regional executive committee,” said Siarhei Housha.
