Activist forcibly held by police without charge

A civil rights activist, Tamara Siarhei, says she was forcibly taken to a police station without being charged in order to prevent her from attending a protest rally in Minsk, RFE/RL said.

Siarhei told RFE/RL by telephone while in police custody on June 23 that several plainclothes police detained her in the morning near her home as she tried to travel to a pensioners' rally against "lawlessness in Belarus courts."

Siarhei said the men forced her into a police car and brought her to a police station.

She said they explained that she was detained as a result of a lawsuit she filed in May against the chief of the Minsk City Police, Aliaksandr Barsukou.

Siarhei was still being held by police hours after being detained.

She said her detention was illegal because it violated her right to free movement.