Appeal of the Chernigiv public committee of human rights protection on brutal violation of citizens’ right for the freedom of movement
In particular, Igor Yashchenko and Vera Lavrinenko informed us that the newspaper “Obyavlenie” of 27 October 2004 published the announcement about the vacancies of cleaners for the work on 31 October and 1 November. After the phone call they met with Svetlana, a representative of the organization that was hiring the workers, who explained them that they would work on 29 and 30 October in Kyiv, transport to Kyiv and back would be free of charge and they would get 25 hryvnas for every day of work. Besides, the employees promised to transport the workers home every night.
The departure was appointed on 29 October, at 13:00. The people came to the appointed place and waited for a representative from Kyiv. He arrived only at 15:00 and they got the order to go to the plant of silicate production, where the main column was formed. Igor and Vera calculated that the column consisted of 17 buses with register numbers of the Chernigiv oblast. In their opinion, the majority of the passengers of the buses were students of colleges and technical schools younger than 18 years. The column was escorted to the boundary of the Chernigiv oblast by two cars of Chernigiv road militia, after the boundary – by two cars from Kyiv.
During the trip Svetlana, who was in charge of the group, told to passengers that they would work in Kyiv building the tents for Donetsk and Dnepropetrovsk groups for the support of Yanukovich. Yet, the buses passed Kyiv and transported the people to the Obukhovskiy district of the Kyiv oblast, towards the village of Piatikhatki, to the children’s camp “Kashtan”. About 19:30, after the arrival to the camp, the young men appeared, who started to count the people in the buses, allegedly, for their nourishment. They refused to answer any questions. Electric lighting was absent in the camp. The manager of the camp led the people to the dining-hall with a torch. The youths from Kyiv, who received the newcomers from Chernigiv, began to persuade them to stay there for night. They promised that on the next day, 30 October, the visitors would be transported to the central square of Kyiv to a concert and later would be driven back to Chernigiv. Yet, the people demanded to render them buses for return to Chernigiv. After two hours of rather strict talks one bus was given to the group from Chernigiv. Only 53 persons could go by this bus, and several hundreds remained in the camp. In other words, these people stayed in the camp contrary to their wish.
Besides, on 30 October 2004 Kirill D. turned to the ChPCHRP, who stated that his friends, students of Chernigiv juridical institute, on 29 October departed, by order of administration of their institute, for Kyiv to the meeting in support of candidate to presidency V. Yanukovich. Yet, after the meeting, instead of returning home, they were put to buses and transported, contrary their will, to the camp “Yasne” near Piatikhatki, where they spent night. In evening of 30 October the friends told to Kirill by phone that they were held under guard in the camp and were not let out, that it was promised that they would be released only on 31 October, but they doubted this.
The Chernigiv public committee of human rights protection, taking into account the importance of the above-described events, has collected and studied the information about the removal on 29 October of numerous group of Chernigiv inhabitants and reckons that the unknown persons restricted freedom of about 1000 persons, among them a great deal of minors.
The events around this incident and their form give the grounds to believe that on the day before election the unknown persons brutally violated the rights of citizens of Ukraine to the freedom of movement with the goal of their coercive use for provocations, which, after all, could result in derangement of presidential election. These illegal actions of the strangers factually endanger the fundamental constitutional rights of these Chernigiv dwellers – the rights for health and life.
We are very anxious about the fact that the top officers of law-enforcing organs knew about these actions, since the column of buses was escorted by militia cars, but they did not take any measures for termination of brutal violations of constitutional rights of citizens.
The above-mentioned facts give grounds to the Chernigiv public committee of human rights protection for anxiety about the observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms of Chernigiv dwellers, whom the unknown persons try to involve in political provocations around the election of the President of Ukraine and who are kept, contrary to their wish, in the camps near the village of Piatikhatki, the Kyiv oblast. The actions of these unknown persons have characteristics of the violation of Articles 27, 29 and 33 of the Constitution of Ukraine.
So, we demand from the persons, who hold the Ukrainian citizens contrary to their will in the camps near the village of Piatikhatki, to release these citizens and help them to return home!
We demand from law-enforcing organs and prosecutor’s office to take the urgent measures for termination of the illegal actions and for disclosure of the guilty!
We appeal to public organizations of Kyiv to take measures for organization of rendering aid to the Chernigiv dwellers, who became hostages of the political intrigues in the outskirts of the capital!