10/1/20
MINSK -- When a small group of Belarusians took to the streets in late spring during an opposition solidarity rally, they got an early taste of the police violence that would follow the country's contentious August election. For the experience, Uladzislau Yeustsihneyeu and Paval Pyaskou, will spend the next three years in a maximum-security prison after being found guilty on September 29 of using force while resisting police after the two men tried to prevent the detention of a participant in the authorized rally. The fracas that broke out on June 19 in the small city of Maladzechna, 70 kilometers northwest of Minsk, was a precursor to the major crackdown against peaceful protests across the country after Alyaksandr Lukashenka was handed a new term in a deeply disputed presidential election less than two months later. As Pyaskou's wife, Veranika, sees it, her 31-year-old husband was sent away for causing a few scratches, while police and other security forces have yet to face justice for the beatings, abuse, and alleged torture they have inflicted on peaceful demonstrators. "It is strange that for a scratch on the knee they give you three years in prison," she told RFE/RL's Belarus Service following the sentencing. "They beat people up, rape them, and that's all good. But for a scratch, three years."
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