Interpol considers it impossible to use its channels to search for the ex-presidential candidate Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, said the head of the National Central Bureau of Interpol in Belarus, Dmitri Medvedev, on November 2, on-air of TV channel “Belarus 1,” reports “Interfax.
“After reviewing the materials, a special working group which is a structural unit of the General Secretariat of Interpol, decided on the impossibility of using Interpol channels to search for this citizen,” said Medvedev.
At the same time, he stressed that Interpol had never questioned the legality of criminal cases in Belarus, while the decision on Tsikhanouskaya was the result of compliance with the rules and regulations that exist in Interpol.
In late October, Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya’s office and the ByPol initiative sent an official letter to Interpol. They cited evidence of how the regime requests information about Belarusians in other countries to persecute them politically. The democratic forces of Belarus insisted that the cooperation of Interpol with the regime be stopped.
The question of the need to verify requests to Interpol from Belarus was also raised by Poland after the incident with Makar Malakhouski. In November, the Secretary-General of Interpol is to fly to Poland to discuss the issue of preventing Belarus and Russia from using Interpol to persecute political opponents of the authorities.
