Zhodzina: Authorities may take away adopted kid from mother accused of ‘participating in unauthorised mass event’


Ina Chyzhonak is still having a tough time after being detained in a sauna in the town of Zhodzina a few weeks ago.

On April 24, the police sieged a private bathhouse, grabbed 20 persons who gathered there, and took them to the police department, where protocols were drawn up under Article 24.23 of the Code of Administrative Offences. The detainees were accused of ‘staging an unauthorised mass event with the use of protest symbols’.

This week, employees of the local education department visited the Chyzhonak family and demanded they sign a document on the termination of the adopting agreement, Rebenok.by reports. Ina and her husband Syarhei are raising 12-year-old son Ruslan; the couple took him from an orphanage and adopted when the boy was three.

In an attempt to shield their family from the authorities’ pressure, Ina and Syarhei urge all unindifferent Belarusians to sign a corresponding petition. Ruslan is aware of the grave situation; he warns that ‘he will escape from anywhere’ if he is taken away from his family.

On May 6, Ina Chyzhonak is to appear brfore court for allegedly participating in an illegal rally. According to Ina, she was just meeting with acquaintances on that day. It was the policemen who unfurled a white-red-white flag in the bathhouse in order to prove that they had a reason to apprehend the persons present.

In December, the woman was detained by security forces and tried under above-mentioned Art. 23.34.

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