Without the right to correspond

Exactly a year ago, communication with many Belarusian political prisoners disappeared. Are they alive and in what condition is unknown

Political prisoners Maria Kolesnikova and Nikolai Statkevich disappeared exactly a year ago (other political prisoners - a little later). It is officially believed that both Kolesnikov and Statkevich are still serving a sentence: she is in the Gomel colony No. 4, he is in the Glubokokoy colony No. 13. But what is happening to them and whether they are really on the lists of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, no one knows.

In the world human rights practice there is a special term - Inkommunocado. This is the complete isolation of the prisoner from the outside world even within the prison or colony, deprivation of the possibility of any contact and correspondence. Human rights activists of the whole world put Incommunicado on a par with violent disappearance as one of the most grave violations of human rights. With such isolation, even the prisoners of the same colonies can not tell anything, because they know nothing.

"Fighting, in a good mood"

The sister of Maria Kolesnikova Tatyana Khomich is now seeking that the UN working group for violent extinction is engaged in the Maria Case. Tatyana lives in Europe and has been knocking on the door of all international instances for three years. In November, with the help of human rights activists from the Respect-Protect-Fulfill organization, she wrote and sent to the UN working group for violent disappearance to take urgent measures and ask the Belarusian authorities to reveal the whereabouts of his sister, and also allow her father to visit Maria (they did not let him in for the law of the law).

The last time the father of Maria, sentenced to 11 years in prison, saw his daughter on December 5, 2022 - on a hospital bed in the medical unit of the colony. At the end of November, Kolesnikov was urgently delivered from the schizo colony to a “civilian” hospital in Gomel. She was diagnosed with a perforated ulcer and operated on. A week later, when the political prisoner was returned to the colony and placed in the medical unit, her father was allowed to do. On the same day, the propaganda telegram channel published a photograph: Maria sits on the bed, holds her father by the hand and laughs. Of course, a comment was attached to the photograph: look, here it is, cheerful, in a good mood and smiles.

After that, the lawyer of Maria was able to see her several times. The last time - February 2 last year. And the last letter came from it on February 12. And that's it. No sound, no call, no letter. Lawyers were not allowed with the usual administration in such cases: there is no application from the concluded about a meeting with a lawyer.

In August 2023, when the news of Kolesnikova has not been six months already, 13 famous cultural figures wrote Lukashenko’s open letter with a demand to provide information about the whereabouts and condition of the Belarusian political prisoners, of which there are no news about many months.

“Mr. Lukashenko, you provide your power only with violence. Complete isolation of prisoners is torture.

However, prisoners are not your property. Does something connect you with the word "humanity"? Where are they? We look at Belarus and do not stop asking: where are these people? " - It is written in the circulation, which was signed, including Salman Rushdi, Elfrid Elinek, Olga Tokarchuk, Gidon Kremer. But dictators never answer the letters of “masters of culture”.

On January 25, the Axel Springer Freedom Freedom, in the framework of the Freedom Address campaign, proposed to name the plot in front of the Belarusian Embassy in Berlin Street Maria Kolesnikova.

"And from our news - the complete absence of news"

Nikolai Statkevich, like Maria Kolesnikova, has no connection with a lawyer and relatives for exactly a year. Arrested at the end of May 2020 and sentenced to 14 years of special regime, Statkevich was transferred to the Deeps colony No. 13 in June 2022. At first, a lawyer was still allowed to be launched to him, and from time to time he came letters to his wife. Thanks to this, it became known that he was placed in a single camera, from which he was periodically sent to a schizo. Of course, the laid programs and dates were immediately deprived of it. The last letter from Nikolai came on February 9 last year. And no more news. And the lawyer never could get to his client, although he went to the colony every week. Every time he was told that "there is no statement from the convict."

In October last year, the wife of Nikolai Statkevich Marina Adamovich wrote on her Facebook: “And from our news - a complete absence of news. Once again I was in a colony. Once again the lawyer was not allowed. Once again, there is no statement. And, of course, nothing means that I, as a representative of attorney, left there (within the framework of the authority granted) on behalf of Nikolai a statement to meet with a lawyer, and also sent a telegram about which I have a notification about the “authorized person”. Well, Nikolai Statkevich does not want to write or meet with a lawyer. ”

This post is now unavailable and quoted on the site of the Viesna human rights center. Because the page of Marina Adamovich on Facebook, where she conducted a terrible and accurate calculation - 200 days without news, 250 days of complete isolation, 300 days of absence of news - remote. It was removed at the same time, when the security forces came for Marina, on January 23.

On that day, a mass raid began to the houses of relatives of political prisoners, former prisoners and those who helped them, paying for the delivery of products to families of those who are sitting under political articles.

In total, according to Vasna, at least 310 people detained on January 23 and 24. Some after searches, interrogations and threats were released, no others. Marina Adamovich was not released.

She was taken to a temporary detention center, and the next day they tried under the administrative article “Small Hooliganism” and sent to prison for 15 days. Small hooliganism - this means that the protocol says that Marina cursed in a public place - such a standard has such a Belarusian security forces. And this also means that while Marina was sitting on “days”, the security forces thought what to do next: to free or send it to a pre -trial detention center in a criminal case. The remote page on Facebook is an extra confirmation of this.

Fortunately, on February 7, Marina Adamovich was nevertheless released after administrative arrest. But, judging by the fact that she never got in touch with anyone, and the page on social networks was still deleted, the warning from the security forces was tough. So, Marina, who lives under a constant threat of arrest, cannot turn to the UN working group for violent disappearance.

"Trash began in February"

In the same way, his family could not demand information about the whereabouts and condition of Viktor Babariko: the wife of the former head of Belgazprombank and the most popular presidential candidate died several years ago, and his son Edward was arrested with his father on June 18, 2020 and sentenced to eight years in prison (a sentence to Viktor Babariko himself - 14 years in prison). Eduard is serving a deadline in the Bobruisk colony No. 2, his father in the Novopolotsk colony No. 3.

Viktor Babariko was isolated from the outside world at the end of April last year, after the ambulance brought him to the "civilian" hospital of Novopolotsk. This was the first to say this was the telegram channel “Rukh”: “From several sources, we received information that on the night of April 24 to 25 from IK-1, Novopolotsk, he was delivered to the Novopolotsky Central City Hospital with multiple bodily injuries Viktor Babariko.” On April 28, a message appeared in the telegram channel of the Babariko headquarters that hospitalization information was confirmed, the prisoner of the hydrotorax-liquid in the lungs. But what exactly became the cause - illness or beating is unknown. And the next day, information about the whereabouts of Viktor Babariko became inaccessible. Further - as in a bad movie. Lawyers went around hospitals, prisons, medical facilities of the Department of Punishment. Everywhere they answered that they did not have a Babarico. Since then - for nine months - no one knows where Viktor Babariko is and what is happening to him.

By the way, in May in the same Novopolotsk city hospital, five doctors were unexpectedly detained . Everyone was given 10-15 days of arrest, and then they fired "for absenteeism." Human rights activists have no doubt that the reason for the dismissal was the same leakage of information about the hospitalization of Babarico.

Recently, one of the prisoners from Novopolotsky’s colony told Radieo Svaboda that since February last year “Trash began” with respect to Babariko: they stopped letting a lawyer, deprived of his dates and programs. And in April, Babariko seemed to be seen in medical part with a bandaged head. The colony said that he was beaten, but the administration claimed that the political prisoner simply had fallen.

There were rumors in the colony that Viktor Babariko was taken to a prison hospital in Kolyadichi - they tried to “bring it to proper appearance” in order to bring as a witness to the court in the case of his son,

But they never brought. And they did not take to court. They simply returned to the colony and put in the PCT.

Unfortunately, all the information that at least somehow, with the prisoners going out, seeps from the colonies-in the genre "rumors go around the zone." Because no one sees the disappeared political prisoners. And no one knows exactly where they are and what's with them. Blogger Igor Losik is serving a term in the same colony as Babarico. We have no news from it since the same time - since February last year. Maxim Sign, lawyer of the headquarters of Babariko, detained on the same day with Maria Kolesnikova, on September 9, 2020, just the same from last February is deprived of correspondence, calls, dates and meetings with a lawyer in colony No. 3 in Vitebsk.

It turns out that exactly a year ago, in February, a certain “go -ahead” was given, after which many political prisoners in different colonies simply turned into ghosts: they say about them, rumors go through the colonies, but no one saw them or heard them. A year behind bars is unbearable in itself, especially since most of the isolated political prisoners have been sitting since 2020, for them a sudden deprivation of any connection with the world is torture. Long, sophisticated, incessant torture. With the full conviction of the executioners that they will not have to be responsible for this.

"Contact at least to the UN!"

And you will have to answer, but not to the UN, of course. The headlines like “The UN working group considers the case of the disappearance of Maria Kolesnikova” sound spectacular and promising, but in reality the UN working group for violent disappearances - this is an intermediary between the complainant (relative or lawyer) and the state. It defines its own role as a communication channel between relatives of the disappeared and interested states.

The mechanism of work at the UN is described as follows: “The group accepts, considers and transfers to the states reports about violent disappearance submitted by relatives of persons missing, or human rights organizations representing their interests; He asks the states to conduct investigations and notify the working group about the results. ” That is, a citizen draws up an appeal in which he writes about the circumstances of the disappearance of his relative or client. The working group studies the appeal and writes its own - to the authorities of the state in which the disappearance occurred. And waiting for an answer. And the state - in any case, such as Belarus - as a rule, does not respond to such requests at all.

Nevertheless, the fact of treatment itself is very important. This will not help Maria Kolesnikova and other political prisoners now. But the fact of the statement of the disappearance will be recorded. And this is important for the future restoration of justice in Belarus. In the same way, tons of complaints to the administration of prisons and colonies are important, to the Department of Punishment, to the Prosecutor's Office - useless, meaningless complaints at first glance that mocking unsubscribes like “The lawyer is not allowed because there was no statement of the prisoner”.

When every relative of the political prisoner, each of the few remaining at large, and especially in the profession of Belarusian lawyers, knows exactly what will be written in the next response from instance, and still writes,

This first always seems like a waste of time, money, effort: nothing will change.

Today it will not change, right. But on each piece of paper, on each semi -literate unsubscription with the logo of the state structure there is always a signature - the head, deputy chief, prosecutor, the third crawling or the second authorized person. All these surnames fall in a large dossier. And each of those whose signature is on such papers will simply be obliged to once get his 15 minutes of fame. And a certain number of years of prison term in addition.