CW: police violence and torture
Mikalai Dziadok story, handed over to Radio Svaboda.
On November 12, the Ministry of Internal Affairs reported on the arrest of anarchist blogger Mikalai Dziadok. Then the press service of the department claimed that the detainee “actively cooperates with the investigating authorities and gives confessions.” At the same time, on the record, published together with the police press release, it is clear that Dedok was severely beaten. Now he is accused of organizing actions that grossly violate public order (Article 342 of the Criminal Code). From the person with whom Dedok managed to talk in the detention centre on Okrestina Street, “Mediazona” learned the details of the anarchist’s detention.
The source, who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons, told “Mediazona” that, according to Mikalai Dziadok, the security forces came to his rented apartment in the Sosnovy town at about 11:00 pm on November 11. “They smashed the windows and seven people from a special police squad and OMON (riot police) men burst in,” recalls the source of the anarchist’s story.
“At the beginning they started to beat [him] to get a password to enter the laptop system etc, then they began to choke him with a pillow. When [he] began to suffocate, he gave the password. Then [he] was beaten for a long time until he remembered the password for the social network “Telegram” the source says.
Then Mikalai was lying on the floor for some time – the law enforcement officers did not let him raise his head, but the blogger remembered that they were walking around the apartment. Soon they brought witnesses, and searched the apartment. “[He] was immediately told not to say a word in front of the witnesses,” the interlocutor of “Mediazona” reports.
“During the search three bottles were taken out of the niche with the tools that [were not in the apartment], and they smelled very strong gasoline. But the bottles were wrapped in a towel, which he used in the kitchen,” remembered Mikalai talking to the source. Later Belarusian mass media said the Molotov cocktails were founded in Mikalai apartment.
The lawyer Natalia Matskevich told that Mikalai Dziadok was beaten during his arrest. The defence counsel requested a forensic medical examination.
“I can say that I had several clients who fled Chechnya after they were tortured and were detained in Belarus for expulsion. But I never thought I would hear such stories happening in our country,” Matskevich said, without specifying the details of the arrest of her client.
After the search, the law enforcers told Mikalai Dziadok that they would now record a video. They pushed him into a pantry and put tear gas in it. “Then they took him outside and poured pepper gas in his face, right in his eyes. They said that if he did not speak on video, they would not let him wash his face. They put him in the house, and until the video was shot, they wouldn’t let him wash his face,” the source of “Mediazona” recounts the words of the anarchist.
On the record distributed by the press service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Mikalai Dziadoks eyes are visibly watering. Source: Spring96.org
“All the time they threatened to rape him, piss on him, and said they would bring him to the Gestapo or the forest,” the source continues.
Around 1.30 am, Dedok was put in a minibus and taken to Minsk, to the main office of the GUBOPiK (Main Directorate for Combating Organised Crime and Corruption). The blogger told “Mediazona” source that he was put face to the floor there and spent four hours in this position.
“[He] was required to provide a password from VeraCrypt, from his hard drive, and was required to say who the channel administrators, especially anarchist as “Pramen” and “ABC-Belarus” (anarchist black cross). When he was silent, they beat him in the back and legs with truncheons”, – says the source of the Mikalais story.
He was threatened with rape with a truncheon, beaten on the hands, and on the heels with a stun gun; when he raised his head, they step on it – this continued until 5 am.
“They took bottles that they supposedly found in the apartment, stuffed necks in his mouth, made him spit on them, and then rubbed them. They were given to him to sign some papers,” said Dziadok to the interlocutor of “Mediazona”.
After the police officers demanded that the arrested anarchist again uttered on camera the text they had written – “they said that if he says something wrong, they will beat him. If he says anything else about cops or about someone from the GUBOPiK (Main Directorate for Combating Organised Crime and Corruption), they will take him from the detention centre and beat him again, and even harder.
According to the source, Mikalai Dziadoks doesn´t know who mocked him – the participants in the arrest and search did not introduce themselves and were wearing masks. They “promised” that the anarchist would receive “seven or nine years”, and if he says something about “them”, “he will be placed into a “cockpit”( the special russian type of cell where prisoners may rape a new one. The wardens can use this cell as a panishment) and killed over there”.
Mikalai Dziadoks was taken to the detained centre in Okrestina on November 12 around 5 a.m. Now he is in pre-trial detention centre #1.
25. November 2020