“People were lying like a live carpet in pools of blood”.
Detained at rallies face massacre in Belarusian prisons.
On the night of the 10th of August, Nikita Telizhenko, the reporter at Znak.com, was arrested in Minsk. It happened before the protest against the presidential election results in Belarus started. He came to the Republic of Belarus on the editor assignment. During the next 24 hours after the detention, editorial staff couldn’t contact Nikita. He was released only yesterday at night. Endless beating, humiliation, and anguish — this is what he describes in his report from the Moskovskoe police office and prison in Zhodino town.
Arrest
I was arrested on August 10, when people in Minsk were gathering for their second night of protests against the results of presidential election in Belarus. The protest was planned to run on Nemiga street. Security forces were already driving combat vehicles and trucks, there were really many soldiers, riot policemen and police at crossings and between the buildings in this area. I was just walking and watching at people preparing for the protest gathering. I saw water cannons and reported this to the office, and literally in a minute the policemen moved near me. They wore regular uniform. They asked to show them the stuff I had in my bag. I did; I had a jacket in the bag. After this they let me go.
Soon after at the bus stop near the Palace of Sports, I saw the riot policemen seizing everyone who got off the bus and shoving people into the police van. I took several pictures of this process on my phone camera and started reporting first detentions of the second day of protests to the office. Then I went toward the Hero City monument; the day before there was a real fight between the protesters and the security forces. I wanted to see how this place looked like after the conflict. However, on a halfway a minivan approached me. At this moment, equipped riot policemen jumped from the van. They ran up to me and asked what I was doing there. As I realized later, they were seeking for the protest coordinator; they knew that on Telegram the protesters were exchanging the information on the riot police moving and reported the ambushes. They probably decided I was one of those coordinators. I told them: “I don’t even have Telegram on my phone, I am just texting. I am a journalist; I report information to the editor office”. They grabbed my phone, read the messages and grabd me in the van. I kept saying I did not violate the law, I did not participate in protests, I was a journalist, but I received the following answer: “You should sit, the command will come and deal with you”.
Soon after the GAZelle van arrived (the van was specifically reequipped for the riot police purposes). There were three sections in this van; two of these sections had blind doors and a tiny window. They disabled me and put me in the section. I asked for my phone to report to the office that I was arrested.
— You are not arrested, — said one of the riot policemen.
— But I am locked behind the bars, — I noticed.
— You sit quietly, — he replied.
Then they took my passport and saw I was the citizen of Russia.
— So what the … (f-word, — Znak.com notes) you are doing here?
— I am a journalist, — I answered.
At this point, the conversation with the riot police was over. So, I was sitting in the van and waiting till they fill it completely with the same ‘not arrested’ people as I was. This took half an hour. They placed a man, a 62-year old pensioner, in the same section where I was. His name was Nikolay Arkadievich. He told me, they detained him when he went shopping and saw the police was seizing a teenage boy. “I stood up for him, tried to take him back. I kept saying: He is just a kid, what are you doing?” — Nikolay Arkadievich shared his story. In the end, the kid managed to run away, and the police detained the old man.
Nikolay Arkadievich said, they stroke his liver badly. He asked to call an ambulance, but no one responded.
16 Hours of Hell in the Moskovskoe Police Office
So, they were driving us somewhere. Back then, I could not know the destination. As I found out later, it was the Moskovskoe police office; 16 hours we spent there turned out to be hell for all of us. The road took about 20–30 minutes.
As soon as we stopped, we heard the yell of the policemen who were standing in the street and wearing body armors: “Faces down the ground!!!”
Several policemen rushed into the van; they twisted our arms behind our backs so that we could hardly move.
They intentionally stroke the guy in front of me against the door post at the police office entrance. He shouted in pain. In response to his shout they started to hit him in the head yelling: “Shut up you, bastard!” It was when they forced me out the van when they hit me for the first time; I didn’t bend down enough and got a punch in the head and then a kick in my face with a knee.
In the police office building, they first took us to a room on the fourth floor.
People there were lying like a live carpet and we had to walk just over them. I was really confused since I stepped on someone’s hand, but I was unable to see where to step because my head was bent so much down. “Down the ground, faces down!”, — they were yelling. And I realized there was no space to lie down; there were people lying around in pools of blood.
I was lucky to find a spot to lie near people but not over them, as a second layer. We were allowed to lie only on stomach, face to the ground. Again, I was lucky I had a medical face mask; the mask saved me from touching the dirty floor with bare skin. The guy near me was trying to make himself a little bit more comfortable; he accidentally turned his head aside and the policemen immediately kicked him in the face with a combat boot.
Meanwhile, the cruelest extermination was going on all around; I could hear strokes, shouts, and yells. It seemed to me some detained people had arm, leg, or vertebral fractures because any tiny movement caused shouting in pain.
Newly detained people had to lie down on top of the first ‘layer’. However, after a while they probably realized it was a bad idea, and someone ordered to bring the benches. I was one of those who was allowed to sit on the bench. We could sit only with our heads bent down and our arms locked behind the back of the neck. It was only then when I could see where we were; this was the assembly hall of the Moskovskoe police office. I got a chance to have a look around and saw that on the opposite wall there were the photo portraits of the policemen who distinguished themselves on service. It seemed a bit irony to me; I was just wondering if they rate the merits of those people who were beating us that day as a distinguished service?
This was how we spent 16 hours.
To ask for a leave to visit a restroom, we had to hold up a hand. Some of those people who were on guard, gave their permission and convoyed us to the restrooms. Others said: “Wet your pants”.
My arms and legs were stiff, my neck was aching. Occasionally they shuffled us around. Sometimes new police staff members were coming, and they re-collected our personal data like our last names and detention time again.
About 2 a.m., they brought newly detained people to the police office. And this was when fierce staff started. The policemen forced the detained to pray and recite the Lord’s Prayer; they were beating those who refused using any item at hand. Siting in the assembly hall, we could hear them beating people on the levels below and above. It felt like they literally trampled people down the concrete floor.
At this time, we could hear stun grenades blow-outs outside; windows and even doors were shaking in the assembly hall. That mean, the fight took place just outside the police office. With every hour, with every new lot of detained people, the policemen were seething and getting mad even more. They were truly shocked with the protesters’ energy. I could hear them discussing over the walkie-talkie that reserve police departments were engaged to crackdown the protests. They were infuriated because people did not leave streets despite beating, cruel beating, people were not scared, they erected barricades and maintained resistance.
‘You bastard, who are you building the barricades for, are you going to fight with me? You want to fight?’ — one of the policemen shouted while beating a detained person. One thing that shocked, drove me into despair and crushed me was that all this beating was taking place in front of two women, the police office staff who registered the detained people and listed their belongings. In their presence, the policemen were beating 15–16-year old teenagers, they still were kids! Beating these kids was like beating girls! But these women never minded…
To be fair I have to say that not all police office staff members were enjoyed the punchfest and sadism. There was one commander who visited us and asked if we wanted water or needed to visit a restroom. However, he did not respond to what his young colleagues were doing to the detained in the passage.
With every new shift, the policemen asked each of us who we were, where we were from and where the detention happened. By the way, after they could see my Russian passport, they did not beat me that hard in comparison to those hits I had gotten when they thought I was Belarusian.
None of us was able to make a single call; I am pretty sure that the family members of those people who were with me that night still do not know where their nearest and dearest are.
About 7–8 p.m. the command came; it was obvious they came not from their homes but right from Minsk streets where there was a fight.
They started to make a list of detained and it turned out that two of them got lost. Staff started scurrying about; they tried to find out where were those two. They failed. When I was lying on the floor, I could see out of the corner of my eye how they carried someone (a man or a woman, I am not sure) on stretchers. The person on the stretchers did not move and I don’t know if they were alive.
After that they took us on the ground floor and accommodated in the police cells. These cells were designed for two prisoners, but they jammed inside about 30. The process was accompanied by revoltingly gross Russian swearing and beating; they shouted: “You pack tighter!” There were older pensioners and young people among my cellmates. There I met Nikolay Arkadievich again. He spent about half an hour with us, and then they forced him out and took to the next-door empty cell.
In one hour, the walls and the ceiling of the cell were covered with condensate. Someone who was tired standing, tried to sit down the floor, but there was nothing to breathe there and they fainted away. Those, who continued to stay, were dying of heat. This was how we spent two or three hours waiting for a transfer. We did not know where they were going to transfer us to…
The doors opened. “Face the wall”, — we were shouted at, and then the policemen rushed in. They twisted our hands behind our backs and pulled us across the police office floor. In the van, they piled us again like a live carpet. They yelled: “Prison is your home!” Those who were lying on the floor were struggling to breathe; there were three ‘layers’ of people above.
The Road of Pain and Blood
In the police van, they continued beating people; they especially hated those with tattoos or long hair. “You fag, they are going to cornhole you one after another in prison”, — they shouted.
Those people who were lying on stairs asked for permission to change the position, but they were hit in the head with baton.
This was how we spent an hour in the van. I thought it took so long because they didn’t know what to do with us since there were so many detained and all temporary detention facilities and detention centers were full.
Finally, we heard the policeman yelling an order, “Spread out and down on your haunches.” The arms had to be locked on the back of the neck. It was prohibited to lean against the seats or to stretch. They brutally beat those who did not obey this order. Occasionally, they allowed to change the legs position; to ask for permission to do this, you had to hold up your hand, tell your full name, where you were from and where they detained you.
If the guard (at that moment I thought this was riot police that convoyed us; it was in the end of the trip when I found out it was Belarusian special police) did not like someone’s last name, tattoo, or personal appearance, they prohibited to change the legs position. They beat for repeated request. They also added that attempt to change the position would be treated like attempt to flee which leaded to summary execution.
Any requests to stop to visit a restroom were ignored. They just suggested us to wet the pants. Some people couldn’t cope all this, and even did number two. So, we were riding with faces squelching in the pants. When the guards were bored, they made us sing songs, mainly the Belarusian national anthem; they recorded this on their phone cameras. If they didn’t like the singing, they beat us again. If someone failed singing, they forced to sing again and scored the singing. “If you think you are hurt, you are not yet. It will hurt in prison, your family will never see you again”, — the guards were saying.
— You … (swear word that means a complete fool, Znak.com notes) are sitting here now and your Tikhanovskaya (Svetlana Tikhanovskaya is an opponent of the current president of the Republic of Belarus Aleksander Lukashenko during the elections; yesterday she left the country under the pressure of the government, Znak.com notes) … (swear word that means left, Znak.com notes) the country, and you will not live your life anymore, — one of the guards was saying.
The trip took two and a half hours. These were hours of pain and blood.
While we were riding, I managed to get one of the guards to talk to me (this was when I found out they were from the special police). Obviously, I was served badly for this, but I do not complain. At least, the guard let me change my position. I asked him why they detained me, why they beat me in the neck with a shield, why they hit me in the kidney. “We are just waiting when you start to burn something in the streets”, — he was telling me. — “Then we start shooting you; we have an order. There was a great country, the Soviet Union, and it was ruined because of the fags like you. Because no one put you in your place. If you (he meant the Russian Federation, Znak.com notes) think you brought your Tikhanovskaya here, and she filled your heads with nonsense, you should know you will not get one more Ukraine. We will not let Belarus to become part of Russia.”
— What the … (swear word, Znak.com notes) you came here for? — he asked me. — I am a journalist, I came to get information on what’s going on here… — So you bastard collected your information? You remember this in the long run.
— Stop torturing us, just bring us out and shoot, — shouted a young guy who couldn’t stand the tension anymore because of the beating and pain.
— No the… (f-word, Znak.com notes) way, you will not get off that easy, — one of the guards answered.
During this long hellish road I realized that among special police staff that convoyed us, there were both true sadists and committed policemen who were absolutely sure they were saving their Motherland from the enemies from within or without. In my opinion, it is possible to conduct a dialogue with the latter ones.
Prison
All the way we had no idea where they were driving us to. Would it be a temporary detention facility, a detention center, a prison, or maybe just the nearest forest where they beat us senseless or just kill? The last option was not an exaggeration; it felt like anything was possible.
When we reached the final destination (I will call it so because I still did not understand where we were), we had to wait for an hour and a half or for two hours, because seven police vans arrived at the same time and there was a line there. When there was an order to leave the vans, they forced us out on fours and brought in a cellar full of people and prison dogs.
The fear for the future became even stronger, but in the end, it turned out to be less awful in comparison to the Moskovskoe police office.
They were convoying us along the corridors for a long while, and finally brought us in a prison yard. In the movies, they show the prisoners walking in such yards. For us it looked like a paradise.
For the first time in 24 hours, we were able to put our hands down, straighten ourselves up, and lay down. And most importantly, no one was beating us. One guy had a spinal injury; in the Moskovskoe police office the policemen jumped on him. Also, his knee was broken; it was literally hanging loosely and sticking out. This guy reached the yard and just fell.
For the first time, we were treated like people. They brought us a bucket to go to the toilet (some of us did not ease ourselves full day) and one and a half liter water bottle. Of course it was not enough for 25 people, but still…
— Will they beat us again today? — one of the detained asked the staff member who brought the bucket and the water.
— No, — the staff member answered in surprise. — You will go to the cells now, and that’s it.
For the first time in 24 hours we were able to talk to each other. In my cell, there were entrepreneurs, IT specialists, technicians, two engineers, one constructor, and also ex-prisoners. By the way, one of them said it was not a temporary detention facility or a detention center but a prison in Zhodino town. He knew it because he had been jailed here before. Soon the staff brought my friend Nikolay Arkadievich in.
A man in a uniform stepped on a catwalk above the prison yard. “Telizhenko?! Is there Nikita Telizhenko here?” — he shouted. I replied. The man in the military uniform talked to a policeman near him and then shouted: “Nikita, go to the doors, people will come after you”.
My cellmates were very happy about me. “Well, they finally came to take you back”, — said Nikolay Arkadievich before I left.
Way Back Home
The man in the uniform turned out to be Mr. Ilyushkevich, the colonel at the Department of Corrections of Belarus. He said that people were coming to take me and another Russian guy (this guy was a reporter at the Russian state news agency). I didn’t know who those people were. “It might be KGB or the Embassy guys”, — I thought. They returned me my stuff and we left the prison.
There were very many people outside: family members who were seeking for their relatives missing after the detentions, human rights activists. One woman met us; she introduced herself as a Migration Agency of Belarus staff member and brought us to the migration office in Zhodino. We were ten-printed there and were given a deportation act. According to this act, me and the Russian state news agency reporter had to leave the country on the same day, by midnight. At that moment, it was 10:30 p.m.
According to that woman, the court hearing should have been the next day; she wasn’t able to explain what I was charged with (I didn’t see any documents on administrative or criminal prosecution), however, she said they could jail me for a term of 15 days and up to half a year.
Then a Russian Embassy affiliate in Belarus arrived. He said that the Russian consul personally called the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus to find us. We get in the affiliate’s car and he brought us to Smolensk.
In an hour and a half, we managed to cross the border with the Russian Federation; we arrived to Smolensk at 2:30 a.m. The consul bought a burger for each of us since me and my mate had no Russian money, brought us to a hotel and left.
Now I go to Moscow to fly back home, to Yekaterinburg.
