Citizen Sentenced to Forced Medical Treatment for Insult of President and Judges

Ali­ak­san­dr Lapit­s­ki had been send­ing lots of let­ters addressed to the pres­i­dent of Belarus, judges and oth­er pub­lic offi­cials.

The court exempt him from serv­ing the penal­ty stat­ing that the 79-year old Min­sk city res­i­dent accom­plished the actions in the state of inad­e­qua­cy. Lapit­s­ki was assigned to psy­chi­atric treat­ment.

The court also made a spe­cial rul­ing to TUT.by demand­ing to delete Ali­ak­san­dr Lapitski’s e‑mail box.

Human rights activist Aleh Volchak, who attend­ed the tri­al, says that the hear­ing took very lit­tle time – the rul­ing was issued in a day. He thinks that the deci­sion was unground­ed.

The human rights cen­ter Vias­na denounced the deci­sion, stat­ing that the cit­i­zen had exer­cised his free­dom of speech. The cen­ter argues that pub­lic offi­cials should not enjoy spe­cial pro­tec­tion against defam­a­to­ry state­ments as com­pared to ordi­nary cit­i­zens; also, that per­son­al lib­er­ty should not be restrict­ed unless there is real threat to pub­lic and indi­vid­ual safe­ty.