Aleh Vouchak: New amendments to Criminal Code could be used against opposition

Anyone could be detained in the street for allegedly “dilated pupils”.

Yesterday “anti-drug” amendments to the Criminal Code of Belarus were put in force. According to them the minimal age of age of responsibility for illicit trafficking in drugs is lowered to 14 years, and a maximum punishment is 25 years of restriction of freedom. In addition, opportunity to manufacture analogues which could be distributed legally (as it happened with spices), are considerably limited now. Anti-smuggling amendments in the framework of the Customs Union have been imposed as well. Besides, now owners of flats were drugs are taken, face a prison term up to 5 years, and policemen have a right to take literally any person suspected of being under the influence of drugs in any place at any time into a police department. A former investigator of the prosecutor’s office, a human rights activist Aleh Vouchak believes that these amendments give the law-enforcing agencies an opportunity to detain undesirable dissenting civil activists not for “foul speech”, but for alleged being under the influence of drugs.

- In our country even a good initiative related to war on drugs is turned into absurd as usual. To start with, don’t you think that is too much to put behind the bars children starting from the age of 14?

- I agree with you. As a former investigator, I had this question in my head immediately. To reduce the age limit to 14 years… Proceeding from my experience and communication with people of this age, while I was at work, I would like to say that in this age people haven’t seen life and do not understand many life situations. It is not right to throw them into prison at an early age. And the total approach is wrong as well. Measures of prevention could be discussed here. We should be thinking of how to create a better system. Otherwise it would mean we are raising a spoiled generation. Imagine that: to fling into prison in the age of 14, and to sentence to 15 years’ term. That’s the end! How this person could be established in life? Without education and after a maximum security institution, promised by Lukashenka… This person would be lost for the society. I think it is not an adequate measure.

- Who are targeted by these “anti-drug” amendments in the first place?

- These amendments are mostly concerning drug addicts and stooges, who small-time drug dealers. I the entire campaign would be based upon that, I must say it’s a road to nowhere. All the new measures are not well-reasoned, if we would analyze them. Such a harsh prohibition could lead to an even greater outbreak of crime. The authorities are approaching this issue from the wrong side. The cause, not the effect should be dealt with. Now drug addicts and occasional drug users are victims of drug dealers, wholesale dealers, who are laundering money and gain fortune at their expense. In particular, on December 4 last year a gang was detained. Its dealers were also officers of the Interior Affairs Ministry and the KGB. More than 20 persons were caught.

- How the situation with illicit drugs in Belarus could be saved now?

- Today a normal methodical work with young people is needed. Not the one carried out by the Belarusian Republican Youth Union (BRYU - BRSM). There should be a preventive work at a very high professional level, with the use of TV, civil society, mass media. This problem should be explained to the young in layman’s terms, as I am mostly concerned with children and the young people in the light of the present amendments. They are already “lost” over the 20 years without freedom of expression and freedom of association. There are no interest groups like in my young years. What could they do? Either become the BRYU members or become drug addicts. I would say it is an unlucky generation. It’s awful that such a way of living is spreading quickly. When I talk to Minsk school children, nobody says that directly certainly, but everyone “had tried that once, certainly.” It’s a problem. The state should do something so that to take drugs would cease to be fashionable.

Until there is no massive anti-drug propaganda in mass media, nothing will improve. Until there are no educational seminars and films launched in schools, nothing will change. When I watch some films myself, I am greatly surprised, as the danger of drugs for the youth is really so high. But they do not see that at all. And in general, there should be a full-scale fight, not only with drugs. A fight against alcohol and smoking should be conducted as well. These are health risks as well. Such things should be sold to persons over 21, as in many other countries.

And the responsibility should be increased, but it should be increased for drug lords. How all these drugs get through the border of Belarus? Who is providing a cover?

- And by the way, who is doing that? Rumours are that the authorities are involved in providing a cover for at least “poppy” scheme…

- It should be looked into, who is lobbying and had been lobbying these schemes in reality. It’s true, some of the amendments are normal, I am not saying all of them are bad. In particular, a law which would allow defining quickly, whether a substance is an illicit drug or not, to ban it. Spices were legal three years ago, it could be modified and distributed. The question arises: who was against this law in the parliament? All these facts should be studied. Why these amendments were not adopted earlier? And providing a crime-sponsored cover could be proved very easily: through a chain one can learn contact details of intermediate sellers, and go up this chain, to very high circles. Could the Investigative Committee do that today? Then I would say they are doing a real work. And for today, I see that these amendments are targeting ordinary consumers. How could a drug addict who is using drugs at home and never going out be imprisoned at all? Our lawmakers have gone too far.

- You have already mentioned that drug addiction in Belarus is just an effect. And what could be called a cause then?

- Over the previous period the Interior Affairs Ministry was to be engaged in preventive work, and they have neglected that, as they have been fighting opposition all this time. A good chance is wasted and the process is lost. Belarus cannot be filed with smuggled spices and poppy over a year. It accumulated gradually: structures, streamlets were created, they were mastered and practiced. Wasn’t that visible before? It is clear that it is not too late to examine that, and to free Belarus of drugs, even today. We are a transit country, this situation should be watched closely. Something goes from the West, something goes from Russia, there are different streams…

And again, fines for consumption and being in intoxicated state in public spots: they are really huge in the first place, and secondly I am afraid that it would become a soft spot and people would be pressurized by that. Earlier people were detained for using foul speech, and now it would be possible to detain them as they are suspected of taking drugs. It is clear that it is not for sure that anything would be proved, but you cannot counteract them, and you would not have a right to resist. You are told you have enlarged pupils, well, welcome to the police department.

- That is, oppositionists could be also detained for “dilated pupils” now?

- Any person at all could be detained in the street and at the working place as well. A director could be told that his employee is detained for a drug check, and that’s all, your labour contract will not be extended. The problem is, general public didn’t realize this problem and didn’t accept it. In our country drug addicts should not be imprisoned, they should be given an alternative.

- What kind of alternative? Can you give an example?

- I was in the US and studied the practice of Indian reservations. If you use drugs, you are convicted for two years, but you are offered an option: either to go to prison, or to be treated under medical supervision. I was at a trial, when a person underwent rehabilitation for two years. He said he didn’t want to be a part of the drug scene any more. In fact, he had served his time for the crime, but he was not in a detention facility, but in a specialized institution. We should do the same in Belarus. We should find methods for drug addicts. Where can they find money for fined?

- Well, they will go and steal.

- Exactly, and statistics proves that. We have already talked about that earlier. Recently I have heard on the radio that a thief was detained in Frunzenski district, he was unscrewing car mirrors. Such amendments are to have the same result.

Photo: charter97.org