Belarus: Baptists maltreated, fined for offering religious literature

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Fokin could not explain why after so many years police and the courts have renewed pressure on the Council of Churches Baptist community.

Times of Ahmad | News Watch |Int'l Desk
Source/Credit: Forum 18 News
By Olga Glace | December 6, 2017

The court in Lepel has repeatedly fined local Baptists since mid-October for singing and offering Christian books to passers-by near the town market. After detaining two church members, police injured the face of one and put handcuffs so tightly on another that his hands went numb. Their complaint is with the Investigative Committee.

The court in Lepel has repeatedly fined local Baptists since mid-October for singing and offering Christian books to passers-by near the town market. After detaining two church members, police injured the face of one and put handcuffs so tightly on another that his hands went numb. Their complaint is with the Investigative Committee.

In mid-October, thirteen years after the last police disruption, police in the town of Lepel in Vitebsk Region in north-eastern Belarus again began detaining Council of Churches Baptists. Since then, police have repeatedly detained church members for singing and offering Christian books and magazines to passers-by on Saturdays at the entrance to the town market. The local court has fined and warned church members.

During one of the incidents, church member Andrei Fokin said that officers injured his face and put handcuffs so tightly on another church member that his hands went numb. He complained about this torture to the Prosecutor's Office, but no police officer appears yet to have been brought to justice.

Council of Churches Baptists do not seek state registration on principle. Church members in Lepel have run a street library since the 1990s. The last previous police disruption of it was in October 2004.

Fokin could not explain why after so many years police and the courts have renewed pressure on the Council of Churches Baptist community. "I've been conducting the street library ministry for 16 years, offering Bibles, children's literature and magazines for people to read and return," he told Forum 18. "Over the last 10 years we never had any conflicts."

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