Homieĺ human rights defender complains to UN

Human rights activist Leanid Sudalenka has sent a complaint to the UN Human Rights Committee in a case against Ašmiany customs officers who confiscated his laptop during a search at the Lithuanian border on 24 May 2015. The activist has exhausted all domestic remedies, including the Supreme Court and the Prosecutor General.

Leanid Sudalenka was detained while returning from a forum on non-profit law in Vilnius. As a result, customs officers searched his car and luggage. They later took his laptop and legal literature. The human rights activist complained against the confiscation to the Ašmiany District Court, as he thought the incident was a restriction of his right to freedom to receive, store and disseminate information. The laptop and the books were returned after an examination, which failed to find signs of extremist in them.

“The confiscation of a laptop is nothing but barbarism. That's what I told the customs officers, I offered to take my cell phone as well, as it performs the same functions,” says the rights activist. “At this point, the UN Human Rights Committee has registered a sufficient number of Belarusian cases of violation of the rights to the storage and dissemination of information. Commenting on the complaints, the Belarusian government keeps repeating the same thing – they argue that the complainants had not appealed to the Prosecutor. In my case, I decided to beat off the last argument from the Foreign Ministry, although it is not mandatory. Let's see then what they can come up with this time.”

Source: gomelspring.org