TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — For nearly three years, a harsh crackdown on dissent in Belarus by its authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko has filled the country’s penal camps with thousands of political prisoners, with new arrests reported daily.
At the same time, a government campaign has gotten rid of many independent lawyers, making it increasingly difficult for detainees to mount any kind of legal defense.
Siarhej Zikratski is among the lawyers forced to leave Belarus under threat of arrest. More than 500 of his colleagues have been disbarred and left the profession since 2020, with many moving abroad after facing reprisals at home . Some even ended up in prison.
Zikratski says Belarus has run out of independent lawyers to represent the country’s many political prisoners of 9.5 million people, a situation he calls “catastrophic.”
Lawyers are reluctant to take on “politically motivated cases, and even those who have already signed contracts with clients are no longer willing to provide legal services to them,” Zikratski told The Associated Press by phone from a country western “The chances of finding a lawyer for a political prisoner in Belarus are now almost zero.”
Demand for lawyers is outstripping supply, with the crackdown escalating and the number of political prisoners increasing, he said, “but there is no one to defend them.”
The global crackdown began after Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus with an iron fist for 29 years, won re-election in August 2020 in a presidential election widely seen at home and in the West as fraudulent.
The country was swept by mass protests, some of which drew more than 100,000 people. Authorities responded with a brutal crackdown that saw more than 35,000 people arrested, thousands beaten by police while in custody, and dozens of non-governmental organizations and independent media shut down.
The number of lawyers in Belarus has dropped from about 2,200 in 2020 to about 1,650 this year, the justice ministry said.
Zikratski said the authorities have created a system in which only lawyers loyal to the government can represent political prisoners.
“It desecrates the very idea of legal defense, and political prisoners are not only denied the right to legal aid, but they cannot even report on torture conditions behind bars,” he said.
In the Belarusian legal system, where convictions are almost certain once charges are filed against a defendant, independent lawyers continue to play an important role. They ensure, for example, that a case is not rushed to a conclusion and that legal procedures are followed, and they serve as important conduits between detainees and their families.
In a recent speech, Lukashenko bluntly stated that defense lawyers “must be under control.”
“A defense lawyer is a public servant and his actions must be based on legal norms and not on imaginary norms like freedom of speech and other freedoms,” he said. “We’ve had enough of these freedoms.”
Eight prominent lawyers who defended political prisoners are serving long sentences on what are seen as trumped-up charges, including lawyer Maksim Znak, who represented a presidential aspirant and received 10 years on charges of participating in an extremist group, conspiracy to seize power and calls. for actions against national security. Aliaksandr Danilevicz, who spoke out against Russia’s war in Ukraine and defended Belarusian athletes supporting the protests, received the same sentence on charges of harming national security and aiding extremist activities.
Human rights activist Ales Bialiatski, who won the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize, is 10 years old after being convicted of financing actions that violated public order and smuggling, charges he denies. His defense lawyer, Vital Brahinets, received an eight-year sentence for inciting actions against national security, and another of his lawyers was stripped of his law license.
Bialiatski’s wife, Natalia Pinchuk, now won’t even identify her last remaining lawyer for fear of losing him.
She said she is “desperate” because she has not heard from her husband since May, when he was moved to a notoriously brutal maximum-security prison and denied access to a lawyer.
Pinchuk said he had received information through other prisoners that authorities had denied Bialiatski even a pen and paper to request access to a lawyer.
“They are keeping him in an information blackout and creating unbearable conditions to show that even a Nobel laureate could be deprived of everything, including the opportunity to meet with a lawyer,” he told the AP. “The authorities have learned to use lawyers as an instrument of manipulation and pressure.”
Recent letters from Bialiatski, 60, said his health, particularly his eyesight, has deteriorated, Pinchuk said, adding that it is impossible to assess his condition without a lawyer.
“Authorities have noticed lawyers telling journalists and international organizations about violations and torturous conditions in Belarusian prisons for political prisoners,” he said. “Lawyers know better than anyone that confinement in Belarusian prisons seriously undermines the health of inmates.”
Opposition leader Nikolai Statkevich, who is serving a 14-year prison sentence, and Maria Kolesnikova, who received an 11-year sentence, have not been heard from for more than 100 days. Similarly, the condition of Viktar Babaryka, a 14-year-old would-be presidential candidate, has been unknown for more than a month, and his supporters suspect he was beaten and admitted to a prison hospital.
Pinchuk believes the United Nations should step in to help “break the information blackout surrounding Belarusian political prisoners.”
“It would be great if the UN properly used all the instruments it has,” he said. “Unfortunately, we have recently seen that despite the terror in Belarus, the UN has often turned a blind eye to the situation.”
The authorities have banned the activities of private law firms and all defense lawyers were part of state associations that are closely monitored by the Ministry of Justice. Name the heads of these associations.
By law, authorities appoint a state defense attorney for a defendant who cannot find their own representation. State attorneys often side with investigators rather than their clients.
Volha Vysotskaya, who was charged with inciting tensions, said she tried to contact a state attorney for her trial so she could see documents related to her case, “but not only has she refused to talk with me but turned off the phone and blocked me. on all messaging apps.”
The 24-year-old fled the country before the trial began, and was convicted in absentia and sentenced to 12 years.
“Defense lawyers in Belarus have become an instrument of government repression rather than defense, and it is not even clear what is worse: the lack of defense during a trial or the formal presence of a lawyer to legitimize the verdict ” said Vysotskaya.
Opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who challenged Lukashenko in the 2020 election and was pressured to flee Belarus after the vote, was tried in absentia and convicted of extremism, high treason and threatening the security of the state She was sentenced to 15 years.
She said she was unable to read her case materials and speak with a state attorney appointed to represent her.
She ran for president after her husband, Siarhei Tsikhanouski, a popular blogger and activist, was arrested days after declaring his candidacy. He was convicted of organizing mass riots, inciting hatred and disobeying the police, and sentenced to 19½ years.
Tsikhanouskaya told the AP that her husband has been detained “under torture conditions” without access to a lawyer and that she has not heard from him in more than three months.
Citing traditional depictions of the blindfolded Greek goddess of justice, the opposition leader said Lukashenko has added “a mouth gag and earplugs”.
Last month, hundreds of lawyers who fled the country established the Belarusian Association of Human Rights Lawyers and urged the UN to act.
“Belarus has passed legislation that violates the very principles and essence of legal defense and has applied the practice of total control over lawyers,” the association said. “The repressions have destroyed the procedural and professional guarantees for the activity of lawyers, with the effective destruction of legal defense in the country.”
Zikratski said his former homeland has reached a “terrible moment”.
“Belarus is fast becoming a concentration camp in the middle of Europe,” he said. “Repressions in Belarus are increasing and the country has run out of lawyers, the consequences of which are not difficult to predict.”
