Medicines not given to jailed Polish activist Andrzej Poczobut after alleged refusal to leave country

Last week Andrzej asked to hand med­i­cines over to him, wife Aksana Poc­zobut said. On May 27, the defence lawyer brought them to the pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­tre in Zhodz­i­na. How­ev­er, on May 31, he resub­mit­ted his request, which means that he hard­ly received them. Aksana is wor­ried about Andrzej because he has heart issues: the car­diac rhythm was wrong, so the med­i­cines are vital.

Andrzej Poc­zobut is one of five arrest­ed lead­ers of the Pol­ish minor­i­ty; the Belaru­sian secu­ri­ty ser­vices appre­hend­ed them as part of the so-called Pol­ish case. Today Poland’s Min­istry of For­eign Affairs has stat­ed that three Pol­ish minor­i­ty activists from Belarus – Ire­na Bier­nac­ka, Maria Tiszkows­ka and Anna Panisze­wa – arrived in Poland on May 25 ‘as a result of efforts by Pol­ish diplo­mat­ic and con­sular ser­vices’. Accord­ing to our infor­ma­tion, the Belaru­sian author­i­ties made the three women’s return to the coun­try impos­si­ble by impos­ing trav­el restric­tions on them before tak­ing the arrestees to the Belaru­sian-Pol­ish bor­der.

Ear­li­er, Bel­sat TV Direc­tor Agniesz­ka Romaszews­ka-Guzy got infor­ma­tion that Andrzej Poc­zobut was offered to be deport­ed from the coun­try, but he flat­ly refused. In the let­ters to his wife, the jour­nal­ist says that he will come through every­thing that the future holds for him.

This spring, the Belaru­sian Pros­e­cu­tor General’s Office ini­ti­at­ed a crim­i­nal case against Andże­li­ka Borys, Chair­per­son of the Union of Poles in Belarus, and oth­er mem­bers of the organ­i­sa­tion.

They are charged under Art. 130–3 of the Crim­i­nal Code (‘delib­er­ate actions aimed at incit­ing nation­al and reli­gious hatred accord­ing to nation­al, reli­gious, lan­guage, oth­er social affil­i­a­tion, as well as through jus­ti­fy­ing Nazism, which were com­mit­ted by a group of per­sons’). Accord­ing to them, the Pol­ish activists’ recent aсtiv­i­ty, i.e. hold­ing some events, is rel­e­vant to ‘the reha­bil­i­ta­tion of Nazism and jus­ti­fy­ing the geno­cide of the Belaru­sian peo­ple’.

On March 25, homes of some mem­bers of the Union of Poles in Belarus were raid­ed as part of the crim­i­nal case. Belaru­sian secu­ri­ty offi­cers made unex­pect­ed vis­its to Hrod­na-based jour­nal­ist Andrzej Poc­zobut (he was lat­er arrest­ed and tak­en to Min­sk for inter­ro­ga­tion); Maria Tiszkows­ka, the direc­tor of the UPB pub­lic school in Vaukavysk; Ire­na Bier­nac­ka, the head of the Lida branch of the Union. The police also came to the Pol­ish pub­lic school and the head­quar­ters of the Union of Poles in Hrod­na. The search of the office last­ed eight hours, from 9 am to 5 pm. Poc­zobut, Bier­nac­ka, Tiszkows­ka, Borys were tak­en into cus­tody.

On March 12, Anna Panisze­wa, the direc­tor of Pol­ish School, was arrest­ed on her way to Belarus from Poland. Short­ly before the deten­tion, Pan­isha­va post­ed an appeal to the pub­lic; she believes that the author­i­ties fab­ri­cate the charges, aim­ing at the liq­ui­da­tion of the school.

The Belaru­sian human rights com­mu­ni­ty recog­nised Borys, Poc­zobut, Tiszkowsz­ka, Bier­nac­ka, Panisze­wa as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers. Poland’s Pres­i­dent Andrzej Duda is seek­ing inter­na­tion­al sup­port to pro­tect the per­se­cut­ed Poles in Belarus.