Human rights defender Uladzimir Khilmanovich searched on the border again
In the evening of 7 February the Hrodna
publicist and human rights defender Uladzimir Khilmanovich was
returning to Belarus by the route bus Bialystok-Hrodna.
He was
groundlessly detained by the customs officers and border guards of
the border crossing point "Bruzgi".
At first the
passports were taken away from the few passengers of the route bus by
officers of the customs and the border service. After this nobody
came to the bus for more than an hour. The driver was only told that
somebody had troubles with his passport.
After this, a customs
officer entered the bus and proposed Uladzimir Khilmanovich to come
to the hall of the customs office, where his belongings were
searched. The bus was let go. After the search, Mr. Khilmanovich had
to wait for an hour to be issue with a copy of the search report.
Then he was returned his passport, put on another bus and finally let
in Belarus after 2.5 hours.
"It's difficult to tell the
reasons for such "exacerbation" of the vigilance of the
border guards. I cross the border approximately once a month and
hasn't faced any problems lately. Usually I and many other public
activists are put on the lists of "disloyal persons" during
important political campaigns – elections and the like. Most
probably, the border guards have received some new lists of
"political activists", but they never say anything,
pointing on customs officers. It can also be petty revenge for my
human rights and journalist activities, as far as I often criticize
the Hrodna authorities in my articles, or maybe somebody just wanted
to show that he worked diligently. In any case, they had no legal
reasons to keep me on the border for so much time,"commented Mr.
Khilmanovich.
