Activist of Speak Truth! movement detained for trafficking illegal printed materials

A Mahiliou-based activist of the Speak Truth! movement has been charged with the production and distribution of illegal print material after her car was pulled over by road traffic police 10 kilometers away from the city on Saturday afternoon.

Aksana Samuilava was traveling from Kirausk, located 85 kilometers off Mahiliou, with the movement`s material on board.

The police claimed that they suspected her car of being involved in a deadly accident and ordered the woman to follow them to the district police station where she was fined 17,500 rubels for failure to pass a MOT test in good time.

“Officers of the district police station asked me to open the trunk where they saw the print material,” Ms. Samuilava told BelaPAN. “They said that the material was illegal, claiming that it did not have imprint data. But only half of the material missed them. Moreover, we had just recently received it back from the KGB.”

The woman was carrying postcards, copies of Speak Truth! leader Uladzimir Niakliayeu’s letters of gratitude and 5,000 copies of a local newspaper.

Ms. Samuilava was charged under the Administrative Offenses Code and freed pending trial.

In Mahiliou, she was pulled over by traffic police once again. “They approached me with guns and said that they had an APB on my car and that I was suspected of carrying illegal material,” said Ms. Samuilava. “I told them that I had had it seized minutes earlier.”