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Nyaklyayew set to invite UN rapporteur on torture to Belarus

Former presidential candidate Uladzimir Nyaklyayew is set to invite the UN special rapporteur on torture to Belarus.

In an interview with BelaPAN on Friday, Mr. Nyaklyayew said that former presidential candidates and many other pro-democratic supporters arrested in connection with the December 19, 2010 post-election protest in Minsk had complained of the use of torture in detention.

“In this regard, we are drawing up a complaint to the UN special rapporteur on torture,” he said. “We only work on it, intending to make it well grounded. We cite instances of torture and gather additional information among victims.”

Mr. Nyaklyayew said that the complaint would be sent on June 6.

“With associates of the ‘Tell the Truth!’ movement, I have taken under patronage my alleged accomplices whom the authorities have sentenced to prison sentences that are inconceivable in a civilized society,” he said.

Mr. Nyaklyayew said that the most serious problem was that almost nobody, including relatives, had access to the convicts.

“It is even worse than in the Middle Ages when it was possible to pass a prisoner a loaf of bread through a prison window,” Mr. Nyaklyayew said. “Our prisoners have to deal with worse conditions. They say that they undergo pressure while in detention, but we don’t know who pressures them, what is done to them and what kind of measures are used against them. That’s why we are appealing to the international community. Perhaps, it can do something.”