Alyaksandr Lukashenka declared a “regime of heightened terrorist threat” in Belarus, but before that, the head of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry, Vladimir Makei, claimed that a “counter-terrorist operation regime” had been introduced in the republic. As Pavel Sapelka, a lawyer at the Viasna human rights center, told The Insider, various data from the mouths of top officials show the situation with human rights in Belarus. He also explained what the introduction of the “counter-terrorist operation” regime on the territory of the republic means for citizens:
“This situation shows the state of human rights in Belarus. First, the minister declares that an anti-terrorist operation regime is already operating on the territory of Belarus, then other departments refute this, and it is impossible to verify either the first or the second word. The procedure for conducting a counter-terrorist operation is established by the law "On Combating Terrorism" and this law does not contain information on how to declare this regime and whether citizens are notified at all. The law more or less describes who can start an anti-terrorist operation, who leads it, and who can stop it.
There is also a list of restrictions that are introduced in the territory of this operation. These rules regarding who can start and who can lead are also described in rather lengthy language without specifics. For example, it says that the chairman of the State Security Committee has the right to establish this regime, and then he can instruct someone to conduct this operation. Can enter the Ministry of Internal Affairs and directly implement it. Or maybe the president. In general, the situation is very vague, which leads to the situation that we have experienced today.
The further consequences of the conduct of the regime of the counter-terrorist operation are reflected in people who do not even have the opportunity to know from what time and in what territory their rights may be restricted. The law says nothing about this. What rights are limited and what duties are imposed – this is listed in the law. The introduction of the counter-terrorist operation regime gives the right to use the armed forces within the country and provides the opportunity to conduct inspections and searches without the sanction of the prosecutor, personal searches of citizens, restrict entry and exit from the territory where the operation is being carried out.
In principle, we have been living in this regime since 2020, and we were not very surprised when we announced that this regime had already been introduced somewhere. Without any worthy reason, they broke into people's apartments and searched them without registration and without authorization from the authorities. Search warrants were mostly issued without due regard to the circumstances of the case, that is, they were simply signed in batches and handed out to police or KGB officers.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who announced the regime of the counter-terrorist operation, for some reason talks about political prisoners, and about the validity of the conviction of these people, and about some other things that do not lie in the plane of foreign policy. His task is to justify what is happening inside Belarus on the outside, and he is trying to cope with this as best he can. For us, this is not very surprising, because Makei was sometimes the source of much news that we should have heard from power ministers, from the head of state and other departments or courts.
Most likely, now the authorities will introduce some restrictions in the border areas or in some areas. It will simply add a vulgar legal basis for limiting the rights of people and imposing additional obligations on them. The readiness to impose restrictions is evidenced by the movement of Russian troops and statements about threats from Ukraine to Belarus. It is also possible that Russian troops will merge with Belarusian ones under someone else's command.”
On October 14, the head of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry, Vladimir Makei, in a conversation with Izvestia, said that a counter-terrorist operation regime had been introduced in Belarus "against the background of reports of impending provocations from nearby states." Later, Lukashenka cited other information: he officially announced that a “regime of heightened terrorist threat” had been introduced in Belarus.
On October 9, Belarus accused Ukraine of "preparing an attack." In March, Lukashenka, at a meeting with Vladimir Putin, also hinted at some kind of intelligence. He said : “Now I’ll show you where the attack on Belarus was being prepared from,” and began to show something on the maps he brought with him. In July, Lukashenka accused the Ukrainian authorities of trying to launch a missile attack on Belarus.