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Sannikaw removed from detention center in Mahilyow

 

Former presidential candidate Andrey Sannikaw has been removed from a detention center in Mahilyow to be driven to Correctional Institution No. Two in Babruysk.

An officer of Prison No. Four at the premises of which the detention center is located told BelaPAN that Mr. Sannikaw had not been there “as of 8:00 a.m. on September 30."

The officer said that the politician had been taken to the prison in Babruysk, Mahilyow region.

Mr. Sannikaw was held in the detention center following his removal from a prison in Navapolatsk

At a meeting with his lawyer on Wednesday, Mr. Sannikaw said that he feared his placement in the Babruysk prison after receiving death threats at a transfer center in Vitsyebsk.

While talking to reporters in Minsk later on Wednesday, Ms. Khalip said that authorities might carry out “serious provocations” against her husband.

An inmate in the Vitsyebsk transfer center told Mr. Sannikaw that he had been warned by “two officers in plain clothes” that he should be careful as the politician might be killed or beaten up either in the detention center or on his way to the correctional institution in the Mahilyow region, said Ms. Khalip.

According to the woman, Mr. Sannikaw initially shared the cell in the facility with two inmates convicted of serious crimes who themselves expressed surprise that the politician had been placed together with them in one cell.

They also reportedly warned Mr. Sannikaw that his safety was under threat.

She said that Mr. Sannikaw had been placed in solitary confinement at the request of his lawyer afterward. “By doing so, the administration of the facility confirmed that Mr. Sannikaw is under threat,” she noted. // BelaPAN