Will the Public Consultative Council stop militia’s brutal actions?

The Movement for Freedom (the MFF) and the Solidarity political prisoners protection committee appealed to the President’s Administration Public Consultative Council demanding to provide support in ensuring the freedom of peaceful assemblies, and to thoroughly consider the cases of the militia’s violation of the national law and of the international obligations which became rather frequent of late.

The reason for the appeal was the considerable deterioration of the situation concerning the freedom of assemblies – namely, the militia’s behaviour in ensuring the order during peaceful events. Every peaceful event arranged by civil activists or by the representatives of the democratic opposition in February 2010 was rudely interrupted. Many participants were unlawfully detained and beaten, and some were sentenced to the administrative fines.

Having monitored and analyzed the authorities’ reaction to the actions of February 8, February 14, and February 16, human rights advocates declare the presence of numerous violations on the part of the militia personnel of both the national legislation and the international obligations adopted by the Republic of Belarus.

Arbitrary detentions, groundless cruelty, and unjustified use of physical force in relation to peaceful assemblies’ participants – along with complete impunity and non-execution of the basic norms and principles of the administrative process – give rise to serious concern. Moreover, human rights advocates receive the information on numerous other facts of the use of force, brutal behaviour, and abasement of human dignity on the part of the militia personnel during interrogations and other investigation actions as part of criminal process.

The authors of the appeal call on the members of the President’s Administration Civil Advisory Council to take advantage of their prestige and raise the issues of the freedom of peaceful assemblies, of the unlawful arbitrary detentions, and of the militia’s willful behaviour, as well as to consider creating the working group under the aegis of the Civil Advisory Council with the participation of the state agencies representatives and the civil organizations experts.

“The officials of several ministries have already begun holding meetings with the European policy makers with the purpose promoting the dialogue between Belarus and the European Union. We would like to begin the dialogue inside Belarus at the level of the civil society and the authorities. These processes should be interrelated. I think the dialogue of Belarus and the EU is impossible without the national dialogue”, Andrei Suchko, the representative of the Solidarity political prisoners protection committee, says.

The MFF activists and human rights advocates express their readiness to take part in the consideration of this problem, and to cooperate in order to improve the current situation.

All news