Activist Zmitser Bekaliuk Detained Again In Brest On Easter Eve
- 29.04.2019, 15:38
The place, where the police took him, is unknown.
On Saturday, at about 11.30, Zmitser Bekaliuk, one of the leaders of the initiative group fighting against the battery plant, was detained in Brest. The human rights activist Raman Kisliak reported this to Brestskaya Hazeta.
According to Kisliak, the activist was detained near his house when he was coming back home from the store with his child. Three men in tracksuits approached him and forced him sit in Audi. Bekaliuk managed to send a message saying that the men introduced themselves as officers of the Leninski District Police Department.
It was not known where they took Bekaliuk. The lawyer couldn't find him, his wife called to all the district police departments in the city but she was told that Zmitser Bekaliuk wasn't in any of them.
“This is a forced disappearance. Officers of allegedly the Leninski District Police detained him and are currently concealing the fact of detention and his location. The relatives of the detainee always suffer greatly from such illegal actions,” – Raman Kisliak commented on the situation.
According to preliminary information, he is detained as a person under the administrative process.
This is the fourth detention of Bekaliuk in April. On the evening of April 7, he went to the Leninski District Police Department as a witness in the administrative case of the activist Tatsiana Fesikava. Although Bekaliuk warned the police that, due to family circumstances, he would come 5 hours later than indicated in the summons, a report was drawn up on him for non-appearance and he was sent to the temporary detention facility. He spent almost a day there, and then he was still fined 1 base unit.
The second time he was detained on Lenin Square while feeding pigeons on April 14. He was taken to the police department, but then the ambulance took him to the hospital. A few days later, riot police officers detained him when he was leaving the building of the Leninsky district court, where Bekaliuk was attending the hearing on Siarhei Pitrukhin's case. At the police department, he felt bad and was taken to the hospital.
Zmitser Bekaliuk is one of the leaders of the initiative group, which for more than a year has been talking about numerous violations at different stages of the project for the construction of a battery plant in the Brest region. Starting from March 4 of last year, opponents of the battery plant feed pigeons on Lenin Square in Brest and thereby express their protest. Dozens of people have been detained for it more than once and punished with fines. Authorities say the plant is safe and say that the company will be closed in case of violations.