In 2017, Alan Paul Smith got a two-year prison term for assisting in organising illegal migration across the Belarus-Poland border. The man has already served half of his term, but as he adamantly refuses to admit his guilt, he cannot bargain for parole.
The British citizen of Kurdish origin ran a consulting company which helped Iraqis to be legalized in the territory of Belarus. Smith claims that after he bought Brest-Terespol train tickets for Iraqi citizens, he was accused of organising an illegal migration channel. The Belarusian court charged him with a two-year prison sentence. He was arrested on September 30, 2017. Smith has spent 10 months in prison Nr 2 in Vitsebsk, and is currently serving his sentence in penal colony Vitsba-3 (Vitsebsk region).
The man regularly describes his everyday life in letters to his wife; Belsat.eu is making public some self-explanatory fragments. He also shows the Belarusian prison reality in pictures:
This prison meant to keep only 800 prisoners. But now it has 1,800 and it is too crowded. There are 35 persons in every cell, they provided extra beds, and we sleep on them in two. 10 toilets and 10 wash sinks are for 200 prisoners. There are three doctors; two of them are vets. Once a week we had a chance to take a shower, and three persons have to use one and the same shower-unit. Disaster!
Today the chief deputy ordered to make a paper on me. I was wearing winter trousers, because it was very cold. I was forced to take then off. But there is no rule that one cannot wear them. Many prisoners have the same troubles.
This place should not be called a ‘correctional facility’ – there is no work, no education, no one talk to you. People don’t know what to do after the release – at liberty many have no work, no family, no help. An average term of imprisonment is 5-8 years, but two persons are serving a 20-year term.
This place is nothing but hell. No human rights are observed here. When I was in a prison hospital, two people died there, and one committed an attempted suicide. Everyone but me is very intimidated. Many people need help and ask me for help. They wrote their stories for me, and I will publish them… Many prison officers are racists; they put people into punishment cells for no reason.
I have just come back from the parole board sitting, I have been denied parole. The deputy head of the colony did not even know when my prison term would expire. He said he did not know me. I asked him how much time it would take him to know… The head of the colonydoes not control anything. My case is controlled by someone in Minsk, but I do not know by whom.
The director of the detention center where I was kept in informed the colony of my multiple breaches of their rules. In fact, I just wrote a letter to the authorities and told them about lawlessness and torture.
Alan Smith is expected to be released on September, 29. According to his wife, Alan is going to appeal to the Supreme Court.
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Belsat.eu
