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One week after the controversial presidential elections in Belarus, Police chief investigator Andrej Ostapovic realized he could keep quiet. He lost faith in President Alexander Lukashenko and even participated in one of the first protests after the “last European dictator” declared a dubious electoral victory.
The latest turning point was his first weekend shift since August 9, when his superiors asked him to question protesters arrested in Minsk for destroying a police van. Ostapovic believes the accusations were orchestrated by the authorities.
– I saw with my own eyes how the police do not respect the law. He knew he did not want to participate in the dissolution of the protest, he had to react, he told the “Moscow Times”.
He left the letter of resignation on the table on August 16, informed his superiors that he was ill, and left for Moscow. He posted a photo of a letter on Instagram in which he resigned and also called for the “overthrow of the dictator,” and that post went viral.
From that moment on, Ostapovich’s life turned into a roller coaster: he was arrested in Russia, hiding from the police in the forests of Belarus, before finally arriving in Poland.
He is one of the few officials to have left Belarus since the protests broke out. Although Lukashenko has faced strikes at state-owned factories that have long been considered the basis of his political support, he has yet to experience significant “defection” from those structures and appears to have the support of the security apparatus that he has carefully constructed. during his 26 years of government.
Neither the Russian Federal Security Service nor the Belarus Investigative Committee responded to Ostapovic’s claims.
He claims that he realized he was in danger as soon as he arrived in Moscow, because he received a message from his Belarusian friends that they had been looking for him since he published the disputed photo, and that the police knew that he had gone to Moscow. Realizing that he had to return to the country, he contacted Latvian officials who promised to give him a visa as soon as he crossed the Russian-Latvian border.
Border crossing
When he reached the border, officials on the Russian side refused to let him pass due to travel restrictions around the corona virus, and the Latvians advised him to go to the nearest consulate in the Russian city of Pskov. There he was immediately greeted by the local police and arrested for, as he puts it, fabricated charges of disturbing the order.
After spending the night in a prison cell, he was told to go through the exit in case of danger. There, he encountered seven men in ski masks, who he believes were members of the FSB. Ostapovic claims that they covered his eyes, dragged him to the truck and tied his hands.
– My thoughts started to fly. Will they throw me in the river? He knew he was a very good swimmer, but he couldn’t bear 30 pounds. You just don’t know what they are going to do with you. They could have staged my death, ”he said.
After a few hours in the car, he heard the sound of a truck, so he suspected it was somewhere near the border with Belarus. The kidnappers forced him to remove the blindfold and told him that he was in the Belarusian region of Vitebsk, on the border with Russia. They also said that he was banned from entering Russia for five years due to “participation in a conspiracy involving members of the Wagner group.”
In July, Belarus arrested 33 Russian members of the Wagner mercenary group, who allegedly wanted to destabilize the country before presidential elections. The Belarusian government later declared that the mercenaries were drawn into a trap and that it was a special operation of the Ukrainian secret services.
– It was an absurd accusation, but I decided not to ask questions – said Ostapovich, who believes that the men did not immediately take him to the Belarusian services because in the days after the elections, Russia did not immediately declare its support for Lukashenko.
Ostapovic’s lawyer confirmed his incredible story, adding that he believes the Russian security services removed him from the country.
– Most likely, the Russian secret services transported him to Belarus. I don’t think it was driven by good Samaritans – said the lawyer.
Days in the woods
When the Russian van left, Ostapovich saw what he thought was a Belarusian police van on the road, so he ran and hid in the forest. He spent the next five days there, drinking water from a stream and eating chocolates, the only food he had with him.
– Luckily, I brought one of those big “slippers” bags. All my things stayed at the hotel in Pskov – he said.
He spent the first two nights avoiding flashlights and running from the police, and when things “calmed down”, he headed for Poland.
At one point, disoriented, he was trapped in a swamp, while one night he was chased by a wild boar. He finally arrived in Poland on September 3. He said many people helped him along the way, but declined to elaborate on them. Belarus now faces accusations of “illegal actions against state officials.”
Ostapovich believes that, in a small country like Belarus, any defector like him is a weak regime.
– One day the dam will burst, he is convinced.
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