section_path: Presidency/Political repression/Torture, sexual abuse and other forms of repression
section_name: Torture, sexual abuse and other forms of repression
paragraph_text: Torture, sexual abuse and other forms of repression
  
  On 1 September 2020, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) declared that its experts received reports of 450 documented cases of torture and ill-treatment of people who were arrested during the protests following the presidential election. The experts also received reports of violence against women and children, including sexual abuse and rape with rubber batons. According to the OHCHR, both male and female detainees were subjected to rape and other forms of sexual and gender-based violence. Medical records reviewed by OHCHR indicate lesions and other injuries to the male genitalia associated with forcible twisting and rape. Psychological violence, including threats of rape, was also used against detainees.
  
  At least three detainees suffered injuries indicative of sexual violence in Okrestino prison in Minsk or on the way there. The victims were hospitalized with intramuscular bleeding of the rectum, anal fissure and bleeding, and damage to the mucous membrane of the rectum.
  
  In an interview from September 2020 Lukashenko claimed that detainees faked their bruises, saying, "Some of the girls there had their butts painted in blue". In November 2021, however, Lukashenko confirmed in an interview to the British Broadcasting Corporation that people were beaten in Okrestino, saying: "OK, OK, I admit it, I admit it. People were beaten in the Okrestina Detention Centre. But there were police beaten up too and you didn't show this."
  
  In January 2021, an audio recording was released in which the commander of internal troops and deputy interior minister of Belarus Mikalai Karpiankou tells security forces that they can cripple, maim and kill protesters in order to make them understand their actions. This, he says, is justified because anyone who takes to the streets is participating in a kind of guerrilla warfare. In addition, he discussed the establishment of camps, surrounded by barbed wire, where protesters will be detained until the situation calms down. A spokeswoman for the Interior Ministry stamped the audio file as a fake.
  
  However, a phonoscopic examination of the audio recording confirmed that the voice on the recording belongs to Karpiankou. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe expressed its concern about the remarks. According to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, such a camp was indeed used near the town of Slutsk in the days from 13 to 15 August 2020. Many of those detained there are said to have been brought from the Okrestina prison in Minsk.
  
  In March 2023, Lukashenko signed a law which allows to use capital punishment against officials and soldiers convicted of high treason.