Ivan Shyla gets charged with libel for complaint in connection with a strange days at a police station
Civil activist Ivan Shyla (photo by nn.by)
As it was written in the Internet, in the beginning
of July a young Salihorsk resident was put in the pre-trial prison of the
Salihorsk District Police Department for disorderly conduct. Afterwards he was
taken to the resuscitation department with a cranial trauma and died
unconscious on 4 August.
The law machinery hurried to state its innocence and stated about the existence
of a video recording at which the man can be seen falling on the floor and
hitting his head against the toilet sink.
The local “Young Front” activist Ivan Shyla who has repeatedly served arrest in
this prison as a result of his civil and political activities, filed a special
address to the Minister of Internal Affairs concerning the obscure death of A.
Trafimovichm charging the head of the police department of the Salihorsk
District Executive Committee A. Astreika of this tragedy. According to Ivan
Shyla, the real reason for the death of the man was the terrible conditions in
which the prisoners are kept. In order to solve this issue, the youngster
demanded from the minister to hold public demonstration of the video recording
of the incident, to inform public activists and mass media about the
incarceration conditions in the Salihorsk pre-trial prison, to punish the head
of the prison and the head of the Salihorsk police for the undue performance of
the office duties and to bring the pre-trial prison in line with the legal
norms of incarceration.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs charged the head of the Salihorsk police A.
Astreika to answer Shyla's appeal. The official wrote that a check-up concerning
Trafimovich's death was being conducted by the Salihorsk district department of
the Investigation Committee of the Republic
of Belarus. The demands
of public demonstration of the video with Trafimovich and admission of the
public and mass media to the pre-trial prison were simply ignored.
Moreover, the Salihorsk police allegedly found traits of an offense according
to Article 9.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses (libel) in Ivan Shyla's
appeal. The Salihorsk District Police Department even held a check-up, but allegedly
didn't find any corpus delicti, after which the charges against Shyla were
dropped.
As we see, the state authorities often forward people's appeals to the
officials whose actions are appealed (which is a strong evidence of corruption).
Moreover, Ivan Shyla got a veiled threat in the answer given to him by the
Salihorsk police.
