Arrest for "Workers Solidarity" bulletin

A resident of Brest was detained and an administrative case was initiated against him for distributing printed materials. However, he wasn't punished judicially.

Slavamir Hryharovich, 56, went to the employment centre in Brest to find a job. He had to leave his last job as a bus driver due to health problems.

As Hryharovich said to a charter97.org correspondent, he had a chat with another visitor of the employment centre. Slavamir, a member of the independent trade union of electronic industry, showed his companion a few copies of bulletins of the trade union titled “Checkpoint” and “Workers Solidarity”. One of the articles was about a free consultation on employment issues that unemployed people can have from a legal expert in the Brest office of the trade union.

An officer of the employment centre appeared, said Slavamir Hryharovich could not distribute newspapers and promised to call the police. The activist said he didn't violate anything. The conflict seemed to have ended, but when Hryharovich was going to leave the centre, a security guard stopped him and ordered to wait for the police.

Policemen arrived and took the “offender” to a room with bars on windows. A  district police officer was called. The man was taken to the Leninski district police department of Brest. He tried to figure out why he had been detained, but no one explained it to him. Hryharovich spent two hours in the police department, said “If you cannot explain why I was detained, I will go home” and left the police department. No one tried to stop him.

Slavamir Hryharovich filed a complaint to a prosecutor's office two days later. He asked to launch a check over the detention. Prosecution officers advised him to lodge his complaint with the Brest inter-district department of the Investigation Committee. He recently received an answer signed by deputy chief of the Leninski district police department Alyaksandr Kuhach.

The reply says that an administrative case over “distributing unestablished printed materials” was initiated, but later closed, after it was revealed the printed materials were not a media outlet. The reply says nothing about the unmotivated detention of Slavamir Hryharovich.

Hryharovich received monthly unemployment benefit of 105,000 rubles, though police officers, who detained him, have salaries not lower than 5 million rubles and holiday pay equal two monthly salaries “for rehabilitation”.