Oppositionist, beaten in militia department, accused of resistance to militia

Aleh Surhan, an activist from Vitsebsk, can be charged with resistance to a militia officer in the nearest time.

As charter97.org reported earlier, three national white-red-white flags had been hung out in Vitsebsk on September 3. Opposition activist Aleh Surhan was detained by militia at a bus stop near the place where a white-red-white flag had been hung out. He was guarded to a militia department and beaten.

“I was handcuffed and pulled into a car,” Aleh Surhan said. “I was lying on the floor and militiamen were kicking me. In the department, militiamen twisted my arms. Handcuffed, they hung me up on my belt on the bars. I had to stand on toes, me arms gone dead. Then they beat me head against the toilet bowl, jump on my head. There were four men beating me. They watch me suffocating and laughed.”

Surhan was taken to regional hospital of Vitsebsk. Medical officers recorded the beating, injures of head and arms. After an hour, the opposition activist was guarded to the militia department again, where he spent the night.

However, a criminal case may be instigated against the activist three months after the brutal beating. Alyakseenka, the chief investigator of the Kastrychnitski district prosecutor’s office of Vitsebsk, issued a decree on instigation of a criminal case against Aleh Surhan. The oppositionist is accused of intentional committing a criminal offence under article 364 of the Criminal Code of Belarus – violence or threat of violence against a militia officer. As “Belorusski Partizan” reports, maximum punishment under the article is six years of imprisonment.

A ground for instigation of the criminal case was explanation of Dudkevich, the commander of riot militia squad of the Vitsebsk region executive committee, who said Aleh Surhan had been using obscene language and kicking the driver’s seat in the car, then ... “began to beat his head against the car door”. The militia report says he “got several strikes against the door”, and then bit Dudkevich’s finger.

The prosecutor’s office is going to bring an official accusation against Aleh Surhan.

We remind that it is a common practice of law enforcement agencies in Belarus to charge oppositionists, who were beaten by militia, with unlawful actions against militiamen. For example, human rights activist Yana Palyakova from Salihorsk, who had sued militia officers for beating, was sentenced to 2.5 years of restraint of liberty allegedly for libel. Yana Palyakova committed suicide shortly afterwards.