Human rights activists banned to hold picket on Human Rights Day

The denial was reasoned by the fact that the applicants didn’t pay for services of militia, as well as medical and cleaning services.

The Homel city executive committee denied human rights activists Leanid Sudalenka and Anatol Paplauny holding a picket regarding the Human Rights Day. The activists were going to carry out the picket on December 10.

As BelaPAN learnt from Sudalenka, the denial was motivated by the fact that the applicants didn’t pay for services of militia, medical and cleaning services. “Moreover, we planned to express our attitude towards how the country fulfils the international obligations in the city center, but the authorities defined an open place near Vipra palace of culture for these aims,” the human rights activist explained.

“The decision of the city executive committee, establishing an order of holding peaceful pickets in Homel, concerning defining the only place for street actions in our town with 500,000 inhabitants and laying responsibility for making contracts with law enforcement, medical and public bodies contradicts not only constitutional guarantees on freedom of peaceful assemblies but also international obligations of our country,” Sudalenka thinks. He said a thesis “pay to express your opinion in public” became almost a law in fact.

“In this respect, I think that if the state restricts the right to peaceful assemblies, these restrictions must not threaten the very principle of the right. If the state put allowable restrictions, it should explain why they are necessary to reach one of the aims,” the human rights activist said.

As far as he knows, the Homel authorities have not permitted representatives of the democratic community to hold any of more than a hundred peaceful actions they applied for during the last five years. The activist noted that mass events initiated by the authorities are regularly held in the center of the town and militia, medical and cleaning services perform their duties on a grant basis.