At least 380 persons were detained during the protest rallies held in a dozen cities across Belarus on September 27, human rights centre Viasna reports.
According to human rights defenders, more than 250 people were detained in Minsk. There were detentions in Mahiliou, Hrodna, Vitsebsk, Brest, Salihorsk, Maladzechna, Zhodzina, Orsha, Baranavichy and others. It should be noted that some of them were released on the same day; the rest are awaiting trials in detention centres.
As reported earlier, marches known as ‘People’s Inauguration of Our Real President Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya’ were held in Minsk and other Belarusian cities and towns on Sunday. Such form of protest was the nation’s response to Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s secret inauguration that took place on September, 23. In Homiel, the second biggest city of Belarus, security forces were extremely brutal, teargasing the demonstrators and firing in the air.
Over the past weeks, Minsk has been facing the most large-scale rallies and pickets in its history. Lots of its residents leave their homes in bedroom communities and march to the centre of the city. They are often accompanied by violence, and during the first days of 9 to 12 August detainees testified to various forms of torture.
