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“Nowadays, people are divided into two categories — for and against — but to be among the ‘indifferents’ is a crime!”

Marked with a red mark hit especially hard

Andrey is embarrassed and stresses that his story is ordinary; he was lucky to not find himself at Okrestina in August. Nevertheless, he came to the interview wearing layered clothing and without money and his apartment key. “You need to be ready for anything, at all times, in a country lacking basic understanding of the law.” Everything that happened to him reminds him of Solzhenitsyn’s novel “The Gulag Archipelago,” which he started reading after his second detention in November.

Andrey Markov,typography print operator
Age: 45 years old
City: Minsk
When: 10.08.2020

Detained twice. On August 10, riot police detained him on his way home. On November 8, detained during the “Sunday March” and sentenced to 15 days of arrest

Held in custody: Sovetskiy district police department, Zhodino prison (after detention on August 10); Okrestina, prison in Baranovichi (after detention on November 8)
Medical diagnosis: Multiple hematomas on the back, buttocks and hips
Aftermath: Insomnia, seized bicycle which was unusable after it was returned

Author: Project team August2020

Photo and video: Project team August2020

- On the night of August 9, my family and I went to the school to check the final election results. There were several polling stations at our school. One station posted the results, and the second one never did. According to the records, the winner was Svetlana Tikhanovskaya. We felt optimistic. A hope for fair elections had been born. We decided to walk toward the city center where people were gathering. My wife called her friend to find out what was going on by the Stela. She responded fervently: “Don’t even think of going to the Stela! There is a war here.” Later, she said that there was a provocateur beneath her window. He changed his clothes, picked up stones that he gathered in advance and went into the crowd. 

On the morning of August 10, I went to work. I went by bicycle, so I decided to go through the center to see what was going on in the city. Everything was calm, as if nothing had happened. But it felt like the calm before the storm. Somehow I worked and took off home around 5:45 p.m. My wife said we would decide what to do, whether we should go out or not, once I arrived home. I was quietly riding home along Independence Avenue. As soon as I passed the circus, I saw a cordon of riot police officers. I was boiling over; I wanted to speak out. So I wouldn’t snap, I think. I approached an officer and told him “Can’t you see the way our elections are held? Please obey the law.” He responded, “Do you want to pass through? Go ahead.” 

I got on my bicycle. I went a couple of meters and heard one of them shout: “Grab that guy with the bike!” There were around nine OMON officers. They were so quick to take me off the bicycle, I could hardly understand what had happened. Somebody took my bike away and they took me to the bus. 
 

“Should you run, we will shoot to kill.”

- They unloaded us at the Sovetskiy district police department in their usual manner. We were immediately placed against the wall along the fence. They constantly threatened that they would shoot to kill if we fled. I laid out all my belongings. 
- “Should I also take off my glasses?” I asked them.
- “Take them off, what the fuck are you asking for,” replied the law enforcers.

And so I was left “without eyes” — I have horrible eyesight. It was hard for me to see anything. From time to time, some Sonderkommandos showed up to mock and beat us. Their favorite entertainment was to make us place the tops of our hands against the fence and bend us over. In this position, anyone would have a tremor. If they didn’t like something, they started beating you, either with their truncheons or their fists. They beat me with their fists. 
 

They periodically asked whether we wanted to use the toilet or drink some water. Since I didn’t want anything, I stayed there. Even if I wanted to, I would have held out until the last moment because it’s impossible to walk while bent over with your arms twisted behind your back. We later found out that the person who was taking us to the toilet took our phone numbers and called our relatives. Thus, I never had a chance to let my family know I had been detained and where I was. All night, we were standing by the wall. Later, we calculated, it was around 17 hours that we stood still, bent over, along the fence. It was cold. Everyone had their summer clothes on. We were standing and waiting for the sun to come out. 

“Don’t you understand? We haven’t abused you that bad.”

- There were around 29 of us stuffed into a police wagon. It was very difficult to ride. When someone asked “Can I raise my arm? Can I change my position?” he would get hit with a truncheon in response. When we arrived at Zhodino, the law enforcers in the wagon told us:
- Don’t you understand? We haven’t abused you that bad. What are you complaining about? Here in Zhodino, we don’t envy you. We can’t help you here. Here, they will welcome you another way. Including you, the curly one. They love guys like you, they will beat the hell out of you for sure. 

And young guys hear all of that. Naturally, you take it to be true, because the beatings got increasingly severe. And when they say that it will be even worse, you believe this and know that it will be so. So someone shit their pants. And nobody paid attention to this; everyone understood that it is normal for a person to get overwhelmed in such situations. 

The cell doors opened and there were already people inside. They welcomed us nicely. There was a lot of bread; they shared their food. I laid down and thought I would probably never leave this place. It was so hard to breathe. I felt a little better later; it was probably the lack of oxygen and exhaustion. The sounds of the other cells opening haunted me. All night long, you hear doors banging. Through a dream, you realize that the doors would open and they would beat you again. I’m not sure whether I dreamt about those blows or heard them in reality throughout the night. 

I got home. I have two cats. I saw the cats shying away from me. I asked my wife: 
- Do I smell that bad? 
- Well, what can I say? It’s not just that bad, it’s horrible!
I thought this couldn’t be the case. 
- You got used to that smell and don’t notice it anymore. 
The cats kept avoiding me [he laughs]. I started to take off my clothes and saw tears in my wife’s eyes. 
- Why are you crying?
- You’re all blue from the beatings!
“Oh,” I told her, “It doesn’t hurt. I don’t care what my back looks like, I’m home and that’s all that matters.”

“I don’t believe in peaceful protest. I don’t believe Lukashenko will leave peacefully.”
 

- They detained me again on November 8. During the Sunday March. It was harder the second time. I was panicking at the Zavodsky district police department (God, I have to go through all of this again, when will it be enough, why do I need this?). They called me up and recorded me on video, asking, “Are you going to protest more?” I sat and thought about it. No, I’ll pack my things and leave this country. When I was in the cell and talking to the educated people there, I realized I wasn’t alone in caring about all this. 

Something needs to change. I don’t believe in peaceful protest. I don’t believe Lukashenko will leave peacefully. We keep stepping on the same rake. We already had it in 1937, and in 1953 we denounced the cult of Stalin. Half of those who tortured people, who put them in prisons, who slandered them, were never punished for it. The situation proves that no punishment will come from these actions and that it’s possible to do them. And if they realize that they will receive retribution for these deeds — perhaps in some other country or similar situation — there wouldn’t be such abuses of humanity. Everyone should be responsible for their own actions. 

The repressions continue, people are being detained, the courts are handing down crazy and false sentences. Of course, the overall mood is down. I now feel abandoned. The [Belarusian opposition] Coordination Council follows its own agenda, Tikhanovskaya follows hers, the courtyard chats are also doing their own thing. And what about me? I want to be useful. And I do nothing. 

We need a leader, a goal and a task. So that people know what to do. It is necessary to work with those who were “indifferents” before today’s events: “We are against Lukashenko, but we are not coming out [to protest].” We have to think about how to work with such people. With those who are afraid. I am also afraid. Afraid of going out and getting beaten. Everybody is afraid. There are no people who are not afraid. 

I believe that we will succeed!
P.S. Andrei’s injuries were not registered. On September 2, he filed a complaint with the Sovetskiy district police department for damaging his bicycle. On December 8, the case was suspended because it was impossible to identify the person who committed the offense. On September 14, he filed a complaint with the Tsentralny district police department for violations by law enforcement agencies. He has still received no answer.

*August2020 editorial team thanks SPECIAL PROJECT 23.34 for help in preparing the material.

If you have suffered during peaceful demonstrations and are ready to tell your story, write to us at avgust2020belarus@gmail.com with the note “History”. We will contact you. thanks

Andrey Markov,typography print operator
Age: 45 years old
City: Minsk
When: 10.08.2020

Detained twice. On August 10, riot police detained him on his way home. On November 8, detained during the “Sunday March” and sentenced to 15 days of arrest

Held in custody: Sovetskiy district police department, Zhodino prison (after detention on August 10); Okrestina, prison in Baranovichi (after detention on November 8)
Medical diagnosis: Multiple hematomas on the back, buttocks and hips
Aftermath: Insomnia, seized bicycle which was unusable after it was returned