The Belarusian security services tortured 24-year-old Ukrainian citizen Pavlo Rabeshko for six hours during his July 3 detention in Pinsk, human rights center Vyasna reported on July 9.
Rabeshko was released on the same day and has since departed Belarus.
According to Rabeshko, KGB officers beat him on the head and body, choked him, threw him into a closet, threatened him with additional violence and insulted him.
Ukrainian Pavlo Rabeshko poses for a photo, showing signs of torture by the Belarusian law enforcers. (Spring96/Twitter)
Rabeshko documented the battery for use in a criminal case.
Oleg Nikolenko, a spokesman for the Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, wrote on Twitter that Ukrainian “diplomats stayed in close contact, helping him safely escape Belarus.”
“We condemn the torture of Ukrainian citizen Pavlo Rabeshko in Belarus,” Nikolenko wrote. “We call on Belarus authorities to end repressions against its citizens and foreigners, and to release all political prisoners”.
Belarusian law enforcers detained Rabeshko on July 3 in the Belarusian town of Stolin, in the Brest region.
The reason for his arrest is unknown.
Rabeshko, who has a Belarusian residency permit, was taken at his home. Five police officers searched the premises and seized his mobile phone.
