Policemen were breaking into flat of Belarusian journalist

Policemen with attesting witnesses were trying to break into the flat of a Belarusian journalist Yuliya Darashkevich on March 15 in the evening.

The photo journalist of “Nasha Niva” newspaper Yuliya Darashkevich and her husband, an activist of the civil campaign “European Belarus” Paval Yukhnevich refused to open the door. Policemen were ringing the door and tapping on the door for a long time, but finally left saying that the journalist should come to the police department of Central district of Minsk at 11 a.m. to inspector Andrei Saladun.

Earlier policemen rang the journalist on the phone and demanded to come to the police department, however the journalist received no official summons. As the website charter97.org was told by Paval Yukhnevich, a few days ago policemen visited his parents and asked about his and his wife’s whereabouts. They even showed a composite photograph of the journalist.

The journalist herself connects the persecution of police with the rally of solidarity on February 16 on October Square in Minsk, when she was detained with participants of the rally.

The journalisy was held in the police department of Central district for 3 hours. There were attempts to charge her with inflicting bodily harm to a policeman. In the police department Yuliya Darashkevich was asked to give explnatations, her personal things were seized and a list of them made.

The photo journalist told that some person in mufti was hindering her to make pictures on the square all the time; he was seizing her camera, and then stated that she hit her. Darashkevich says she hadn’t touched the policeman. “I asked them a logical question: can a girl holding a camera with both her hands hit a policeman?”

During the disband of the rally on February 16 many people in mufti were sent to the square. They acted according to the old scheme and prevented journalists from covering the events, and it was done in a harsh way, by seizing cameras and lenses.