‘Protesters had pepper-balls, knives, knuckles’: Belarus police justify violent arrests


The Minsk police seized pepper-balls, knives and knuckles from a number of persons who were arrested after the rally on march 15, chief of Public Security Police Ivan Kubrakou told state-run TV channel ONT.

According to him, plainclothes policemen resorted to forcein the light of the situation’.

The law enforcers’ actions were aimed to prevent offenders from doing physical harm to ordinary citizens who were in the trolley bus. We say what things were seized – knives, knuckles, masks,” Kubrakou states.

On March 15, Constitution Day, the authorized march of non-parasites took place in Minsk . According to people who protesting the so-called ‘parasite’ law, Lukashenka’s Decree Nr 3 is unconstitutional.

About 30 activists were detained by men without uniform on Kharuzhai street after the march. The detentions were brutal. The representatives of the Belarusian anarchist movement managed to catch the trolley bus number 37, but at the next stop it got blocked by four minivans. Plainclothes policemen rushed into the trolley and began arresting activists. Belsat.eu journalist Lyubou Luniova witnessed the arrest. She said that the girls from the trolleybus were grabbed by the hair, dragged on the pavement, on the curbs. Not only activists, but ordinary passers-by were grabbed and thrown into MPVs.

On March 16, trials of participants in Wednesday’s peaceful protests took place. In most cases, the detainees were sentenced to 10-12 days in jail. They were accused of violating the order of holding mass events and disobedience to police officers’ demands, but neither knives nor knuckles appeared as material evidence.

belsat.eu

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