Belarusian prisoner tries to chop personal throat in court docket listening to

A Belarusian prisoner detained in a crackdown on protests tried to chop his personal throat throughout a court docket listening to on Tuesday after being instructed his household and neighbours confronted prosecution if he didn’t plead responsible, media, activists and a witness mentioned.Footage by RFE/RL confirmed 41-year-old Stepan Latypov mendacity on a picket bench inside a prisoner’s cage within the courtroom within the capital Minsk, with cops standing over him and onlookers screaming.A second video confirmed Latypov being carried out to a ready ambulance with what seemed to be blood spots on his shirt. Local media and the human rights group Viasna-96 mentioned he was nonetheless alive.Latypov’s father Sergei had appeared as a witness in court docket on Tuesday, in line with Belarusian human rights group Viasna-96 and Irina, a pal of Latypov.Latypov addressed his father in court docket, saying he had been held in a torture cell for 51 days, and warned his father to organize for the same destiny. He then stabbed himself within the throat with an object resembling a pen, Viasna-96 reported.”Stepan got up, took his face mask off, and said: ‘Father, police officers told me I will be put into the confinement cell and my relatives and neighbours will be prosecuted under criminal law if I do not confess’,” Irina instructed RFE/RL.Stepan then “took something white in his teeth, and started literally to cut his throat. Everyone started screaming. Police officers could not open the defendant’s cage for a while. He fell unconscious. We were taken out of the courtroom.”The well being ministry mentioned a 41-year-old man was in a secure situation after medics handled his wound in hospital underneath anaesthetic. It mentioned the person injured himself in a courtroom. The inside ministry spokeswoman couldn’t be reached for remark.More heartbreaking footage from Belarus as we speak. Political prisoner Stepan Latypov slit his throat within the courtroom. His final phrases have been: “Dad, they said if I don’t plead guilty, they go after my family and neighbors”. pic.twitter.com/dkWbqE5Bmk— olexander scherba (@olex_scherba) June 1, 2021″Belarusian activist, political prisoner Stsiapan Latypau cut his throat in the courtroom today,” exiled opposition determine Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya wrote on Twitter, utilizing a unique spelling of Latypov’s title. “This is the result of state terror, repressions, torture in Belarus.”The close by guards couldn’t open the prisoner’s cage instantly as a result of they didn’t have the precise keys, unbiased media outlet Nasha Niva reported.Latypov was arrested final September throughout an intensifying safety crackdown by President Alexander Lukashenko on mass protests following a contested election the month earlier than.He was detained in a Minsk courtyard that got here to be identified by some residents and media because the “Square of Change”.Latypov had stood in entrance of a mural there to attempt to forestall state staff, accompanied by police, from portray over opposition graffiti.He was charged with organising riots, resisting police and fraud, and in addition accused on state tv of planning to poison the police. He denies any wrongdoing.In May, Lukashenko’s authorities was condemned by Western international locations when a 26-year-old dissident blogger was arrested after the Belarusian authorities grounded a Ryanair airplane travelling from Greece to Lithuania.