Those who refuse to despair

Today marks the 45th birthday of our former Index colleague Andrei Aliaksandrau. Sadly, he will not be spending it with his family, opening presents and eating cake. Instead he is in prison, serving a 14-year prison sentence handed down by the Minsk Regional Court for “grossly violating public order”, “creation of an extremist formation” and, most severely of all, “high treason”. Of course, when you are in an authoritarian regime, such charges mean nothing.

Andrei has been in the SIZO-2 pre-detention centre in Vitsebsk for just over two years now. Vitsebsk, in north-eastern Belarus is the birthplace of artist Marc Chagall. Now it is becoming better known for holding political prisoners.

A British detainee who was held in the same centre said conditions were “disastrous”. Travel agent Alan Smith was held in a cell measuring four metres by two with five other prisoners: his alleged crime – helping Iraqis illegally enter Belarus.

“Windows were closed, [there was] no ventilation, people smoke there [and] the toilet is open,” he told the independent media channel Charter 97. He added that there were informants in every cell and they were monitored with cameras and microphones and warned not to talk about “business matters” i.e. why they were in detention.

Andrei’s father visited him in Vitsebsk just over two weeks ago. He told friends, “I was met by a gaunt-looking Andrei, with very short hair, but full of energy.” Despite everything, his father said he was in “a good moral and psychological condition”.

Andrei’s wife, Irina Zlobina, was previously a florist

Andrei was not even allowed to leave the detention centre to marry his fiancee Irina Zlobina last September. 

Irina is a graduate of the faculty of philosophy and social sciences of the Belarusian State University and in recent years had been running her own small business of selling flowers and souvenirs. She was arrested and tried at the same time as Andrei and was sentenced to nine years in prison, again for “grossly violating public order” and “high treason”.

The only time the couple have seen each other since they were arrested is at their trial, in the so-called BelaPAN case, alongside the former news agency’s editor-in-chief and director Irina Levshina, who got four years in prison, and former director of the agency Dmitry Novozhilov, who got six years. 

Before the trial, Irina was at a pre-detention centre in Homel in south-eastern Belarus; she has now been moved to a penal colony in the city.

Now Andrei is also on the move and he has been taken on a 115-kilometre journey to penal colony no.1 in Navapolack where he will serve out the rest of his sentence.

 We asked some of Andrei’s friends for their birthday wishes for him, even though he may never see their thoughts and comments.

 Joanna Szymanska, senior programme officer at ARTICLE 19, where Andrei also worked while he was in the UK, says wistfully,It’s another birthday that Andrei will spend behind bars.”

 “I have lots of good memories related to Andrei, he’s always been the life of the party. I especially miss our long discussions about Depeche Mode, we’re both huge fans and Andrei has a great voice, I can still hear him singing his favourite songs,” she says.

 “I sometimes wonder, does he still sing them? I haven’t received a letter from him in a long time, many letters are not delivered to political prisoners, especially if they are sent from abroad. But I’m sure Andrei stays strong and he knows the world hasn’t forgotten. Andrei, your friends are with you.” 

 Andrei Bastunets, chair of the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), says he met Andrei in the early 2000s: “We were united by many things: football, poetry and, of course, journalism. No, not ‘were united’, but ‘are united’. Even though he’s in prison and I’m abroad. We are united despite the fact that, it seems, my letters to Andrei do not reach him. Prison censors don’t let them through to political prisoners. I don’t think he’ll get my birthday greetings now. And not only mine, but a lot of birthday greetings. He has a lot of friends and he has been and remains a good friend – witty, charismatic, courageous.”

He says, “Once, back in the days when letters to political prisoners and their responses were still reaching their recipients, he wrote to me: ‘I now ‘listen’ to my friends’ letters, guessing vibes and intonations – a personal ‘radio’. My own Radio Liberty. My personal ‘free speech’. Thanks for that to everyone who writes to me. We all are one big independent media outlet now. A blog of those who refuse to despair.”

“In another letter – this time about football (although we follow different teams) – he wrote: ‘Somehow there was a reason to mumble the Liverpool’s anthem, You’ll Never Walk Alone. Supportive words from the letters made me ‘sing it’, playing it on my internal radio, drowning out the external Russkoye Radio. It got to the point where I caught myself thrumming the club anthem in Belarusian. It came out a bit pathetic – but it’s an anthem, just my translation (don’t shoot the pianist). But somehow it seemed somehow in tune with, I don’t know, with the moment, the feeling, the mood.”

Even if you may not get to read this Andrei, you’ll never walk alone. 

What can Index readers do? Please join our joint campaign with ARTICLE19, share the message and sign the petition. You can also befriend Andrei and Irina via our partners at Politzek.

World leaders will have “blood on their hands” if Alaa Abd El-Fattah dies

The 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP27 as it is better known, opens this Sunday, 6 November, in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheikh.

As has become customary, COP27 will become the focus of protest. Yet not all protests at COP27 will be about the environment.

One protester at the event, Sanaa Seif, says that the world leaders attending will have “blood on their hands” if they do not secure the release of her brother, the British-Egyptian writer and activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah. Abd El-Fattah is a pro-democracy activist and founder, with his wife Manal Hassan, of the Arabic blog aggregator Manalaa.  He has been held in the country’s prisons on and off for nine years for his part in the 25 January protests that rocked the country in 2011.

In 2013, the writer was jailed by the government of Egypt’s military ruler Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and has been in prison most of the time since where he has been both tortured and offered only limited communication with his family.

In order to bring attention to his plight, Abd El-Fattah went on a partial hunger strike on 2 April this year, limiting his intake to just 100 calories a day, sipping tea with a spoonful of honey. After six months on hunger strike, his body is seriously weakened and his health is in a precarious state. Four days ago, he stopped even that meagre daily allowance and is now taking only water.

On the opening day of COP27, he will stop even that.

Since 18 October, Sanaa and her sister Mona, have been holding a sit-in as part of their Free Alaa campaign outside the UK’s Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office to draw the attention of incoming Foreign Secretary James Cleverly to their brother’s plight.

On Wednesday this week, Cleverly finally spoke to the pair and vowed that the Government would “continue to work tirelessly for his release”.

In a Facebook post, the sisters said: “We were so relieved to finally get to speak to James Cleverly and hear his assurance that Alaa’s safe release is top priority. I hope this translates to tangible action that actually saves Alaa before it is too late.”

At a press conference on the street outside the FCDO the following day, Sanaa said: “Alaa will escalate his hunger strike as he stops taking water as world leaders head to Egypt to attend COP27. I want to tell these officials that if you don’t save him you will have blood on your hands. I want to call on Rishi Sunak – you are going to be in the same land as a British person dying and if you don’t show that you care then it will be interpreted as a green light to kill him.”

Sanaa’s sister Mona added: “Alaa is in a very critical state but he is not desperate to die. These are the actions of a man who is desperate to end this ordeal he has been sucked into for nine years and desperate to be reunited with his family.”

The British-Egyptian writer and activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah in happier times with his wife and baby son Khalid

Speaking to Index, Mona said: “In the eyes of the Egyptian regime Alaa is one of the symbols of 25 January [2011 revolution] and therefore one of those calling for an end to the leadership of the military regime. In some people’s minds he is a British national. For others he is a writer, or an activist. Most importantly, he is an amazing brother and a son. And most importantly of all what seems to be forgotten is that he is a father to a 10-year-old, Khalid.”

She added: “Khalid and his father have a unique and extraordinary relationship. Khalid is on the autistic spectrum and is non-verbal. We found out his diagnosis back in 2014 when Alaa was serving his first five sentences. Alaa was briefly released in 2019, although he had to spend every night in a police cell, and Alaa and Khalid formed an amazingly strong bond. We were worried about how Khalid would receive his father because he was not used to him in his life. We were honestly surprised. He and Khalid bonded immediately. He flourished under Alaa’s presence and Khalid’s doctors and teachers all noted a massive difference.”

“When Alaa was taken again in September 2019, the one hit the hardest was Khalid. When Alaa appeared before the state security prosecution, Khalid was angry with his father for disappearing. Since then, it has been particularly difficult to sustain Alaa’s presence in Khalid’s life. A very big part of why Alaa has taken such extreme measures is that he feels Khalid has been orphaned.”

Mona and family will hold a candlelit vigil for Alaa outside Number 10 Downing Street at 4pm on 6 November. Meanwhile, Sanaa will fly out to Egypt to take part in an event with the German climate envoy, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International at COP27 next Tuesday.

“This will serve as an embarrassing reminder to everyone,” Sanaa said.

Mona has another message to the leaders attending COP27. In another Facebook post this week, she wrote the following.

“Regardless of how it ends Alaa has already won this battle. If he makes it out alive and joins us, his family, in safety. Then he would have done it using only his body and words. If he doesn’t make it and dies in prison, his body will tell the whole world what a bunch of liars you all are, ruthless inhumane creatures that should not be trusted with one plant let alone people and the future of this planet.

Women pay ultimate price for Iran protests

The death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in Iran following her arrest by the “morality police” has sparked widespread protests across the country, with women taking a prominent role in demonstrating against their unequal treatment in the country. The Iranian regime, led by Ayatollah Khamenei, has responded with deadly violence.

Since Amini’s death on 16 September, precipitated by her arrest for not wearing the hijab correctly, at least 185 people, including at least 19 children, have been killed in the nationwide protests across Iran, according to the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). The deaths of several young women involved in the protests has led to a growing chorus of outrage, both within the country and internationally.

Among the dead is Sarina Esmailzadeh, a 16-year-old girl who was killed following protests on 22 September in Mehrshahr, just outside Tehran, reportedly due to repeated baton blows by security forces. Authorities have aired “so-called” confessions by alleged family members stating that her death was suicide, which have been called into question.

Nika Shakarami (right) has also died, allegedly at the hands of the Iranian security forces, after she was pictured burning her hijab. The 17-year-old disappeared for nine days before her badly beaten body was identified by her family in a morgue.

Women human rights defenders and journalists are being targeted. Femena reports that women’s rights activist Narges Hosseini, one of the “Girls of Revolution Street”, who protested back in 2017 and 2018 about the compulsory hijab, was arrested on 22 September in Kashan in central Iran. Four years ago, she spent three months in prison on charges of “encouraging prostitution” and “non-observance of hijab”.

CHRI has also reported on the arrest of Niloufar Hamedi, a well-known journalist who first revealed the circumstances surrounding Mahsa Amini’s death that same say. Hamedi has been placed in solitary confinement in the notorious Evin prison.

Others who have been detained include journalist and woman human rights defender, Elaheh Mohammadi, Kurdish writer and filmmaker Mozhgan Kavusi  and photojournalist  Yalda Moayeri, according to Femena.

Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraeei, an Index contributor who was only released from prison in May 2022 after being imprisoned in 2014 on charges of insulting the Supreme Leader and spreading propaganda against the state, has also been rearrested.

The attacks and arrests have so far not managed to silence women, who continue to protest. According to the BBC World Service’s Rana Rahimpour women are walking the streets of Tehran with no hijab and cars are honking their support. School girls have also joined the protests. Social media posts that have gone viral show them going without a hijab and making rude gestures to and removing and covering the images of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei in their classrooms.

On 9 October, teenage girls in the city of Arak, southwest of capital Tehran, marched in protest chanting “death to the dictator”, before they were fired on with rubber bullets and tear gas by riot police.

Protests have also sprung up at universities across the country. Shots were fired indiscriminately by security forces at a protest at Tehran’s Sharif University on 8 October, according to CHRI. Students at the city’s University of Art held a demonstration on 10 October where they congregated to spell out the word “blood”. The same day, female students at the Polytechnic University chanted, “Tell my mother she no longer has a daughter” – a shocking reference to the fate that could befall the students for daring to protest.

Students of Amir Kabir university protest against the hijab. Photo: Darafsh Kaviyani

There are signs that support for the protests is spreading more widely. Oil workers in Iran, including port workers in Asaluyeh and refinery workers in Abadan, are striking in support of the protests. This could be significant as such protests have not been seen since the 1979 revolution.

The city of Sanandaj in Kurdistan has become the frontline of the protests and the regime has cracked down brutally, leading some to call the city a “war zone”. The CHRI reports that at least four people have been killed and more than 100 injured on 9 October. The government has deployed forces from outside the region in the city.

News that has emerged from Iran has made it out despite widespread internet and mobile network shutdowns in the country. NetBlocks has reported that the internet national mobile disruptions were in place once again and the internet had been cut in Sanandaj. Speaking to an Index correspondent over the phone from his home city of Sari in the north of Iran, the censored musician Mehdi Rajabian said: “It has become very difficult for me to access the free internet and the speeds of the platforms are very slow and blocked. I have to connect with a filter breaker and many times the filter breakers don’t work. Our communication is very slow.”

Such restrictions mean that the number of those killed, injured or detained is likely to be much higher.

There are signs that Iranians are increasingly looking to virtual private networks (VPNs) to help them circumvent the country’s internet broad censorship. Research by the VPN tracker Top10VPN.com shows that downloads of VPNs in Iran were 30 times higher at the end of September than in the previous 28 days and that demand for the services remains significantly heightened.

CHRI’s executive director Hadi Ghaemi feels that the situation is likely to worsen as Khamenei’s rule comes under growing pressure.

“The ruthless killings of civilians by security forces in Kurdistan Province, on the heels of the massacre in Baluchestan Province, are likely preludes to severe state violence to come,” said Ghaemi in a statement about the protests.

He said, “World leaders must move beyond statements of condemnation to collective action through an international front signalling to the government in Iran that the international community will not look the other way and conduct business as usual while it slaughters unarmed civilians.”

In response, Khamenei has said foreign states are responsible for driving the women’s protests. With support growing fast, he may soon no longer be able to lay the blame outside Iran’s borders.

Too much news?

The last week has been unprecedented in global news – although I do feel that every time we see the word unprecedented to refer to current events we’re just tempting fate to make it even worse. Our news has been dominated by crucially important and life-changing stories – the economic turmoil in the UK; the impact of global inflation; the real-life effects of Hurricanes Fiona and Ian on the east coast of Canada and the USA; Putin’s annexation of four more Ukrainian territories; the election of the most right-wing prime minister since Mussolini in Italy and; the suspected nation-state-orchestrated sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines. This has been a busy news week. But beyond the headlines there have been so many other stories, other crises, other issues that in a ‘normal’ week (if there is such a thing anymore) would have demanded our attention.

So this week – I want to do a round-up of what we’ve missed as the world has become an even scarier place for too many people. To remind us all of what else is happening in the world that we’ve missed as we have been glued to the news that is struggling to report on everything that has happened.

These are just a few of the dozens of stories that many of us missed this week while the world is in turmoil. As ever the role of Index is to make sure that these stories and those of dissidents are not ignored or forgotten.