Journalist Aleh Hruzdzilovich tells about circumstances of his detention

Euroradio: You have covered a number of silent protest actions in Minsk. How do you think, has plainclothes people’s behavior become more adequate or not?

Hruzdzіlovіch: “I have divided the police into policemen wearing their uniform and into plainclothes policemen. They showed up yesterday too. The plainclothes police have been acting unlawfully recently and they continue doing so. Thus, nothing has changed...

As a result, I was detained in the metro, they arrested me ignoring my journalist’s ID and despite the fact that I told them that I was a journalist. There were 10 guys detained for no reason in the police bus. I asked them what they had been detained for. One of them said that he had been waiting for his girl; another guy had been waiting for a friend. They just got attacked. People did not even applaud like they used to and they did not shout – they were just standing there or walking with their backpacks. It turned out that it was a reason for such a brutal detention.

They do not introduce themselves, do not show their IDs and never explain the reason for the detention – and then they draw up reports claiming that you were waving hands while walking and put down the wrong time and place... I saw them drawing up those reports. People disagreed because they had been detained in different places. I think the situation is similar everywhere, it does not happen only in Soviet District Court...”.

Euroradio: How did they explain the reason for your detention?

Hruzdzіlovіch: “They do not explain anything. And then they say that [you are detained] for questioning. They take your ID and go somewhere, phone somewhere and spend a lot of time studying it. There is an alternative to it and it happened to me in Pershamaiski District Police Department. I asked a policeman to let me phone and I phoned Aliaksandr Lastouski, the press secretary of Minsk police. Then I passed the receiver to the policeman and was let off. I suggested doing it quickly yesterday but they refused. I had to go through the whole procedure – fingerprinting and being photographed. It was rather humiliating”.

Euroradio: You saw policemen being detained yesterday, didn’t you?

Hruzdzіlovіch: “I didn’t. I saw two policemen among the detained in the police bus. The people in the bus also thought that they were detainees. They asked them: “What have you been detained for?” And they joked: “Oh! We went out to drink some beer – and we got detained”. They lied to those people. It turned out that they were [policemen when we reached the police office. They are placed in police buses to prevent people from escaping if necessary. They were doing their job”.