- Protesters against President
Alexander Lukashenko inBelarus are building a giant database of security officers' names and personal information. - Many of those officers have beaten and detained peaceful protesters, and activists want to hold them accountable.
- Women, many of whom middle-aged, have been helping build the database by ripping off officers' balaclavas and helmets at demonstrations, therefore revealing their faces.
- The women believe that young male officers are far less likely to beat women that remind them of their grandmothers.
- A Dutch law-enforcement official told Insider that the information in the database could then be used to impose travel bans on the officers or even try them in a criminal court.
Activists in Belarus are crowdsourcing a database of security officers' names and personal details so they can be later identified and held accountable.
This coordinated effort has been aided by women, many of whom are middle-aged, who have been ripping off officers' masks, balaclavas, and riot helmets so their faces can be seen and recorded.
The women have been stationing themselves between officers and younger protesters in the belief that young male officers are far less likely to beat women that remind them of their grandmothers.
Demonstrators in Belarus — who are mostly peaceful — have been beaten and randomly detained by Belarusian security forces since they started rallying against Lukashenko last month.
The database of security employees — specifically, members of the Belarusian police, riot police, and domestic intelligence — has grown to 2,000 so far, Reuters reported.
Efforts to build the database have been aided by a leak of internal documents on the security forces on Telegram, according to Reuters. The Belarusian government has vowed to punish those responsible for leaking the data, the news agency reported.
Many of the entries include specific details about the officers' jobs, assignments, home addresses and in many cases, tax information.
"As the arrests continue, we will continue to publish data on a massive scale," the opposition news channel Nexta Live announced on the Telegram messaging app, according to Reuters. "No one will remain anonymous even under a balaclava."
This information can also later be used to pursue criminal cases as well as economic and travel sanctions against them, a Dutch law-enforcement official, who has worked as an investigator on several human-rights and war-crimes tribunals, told Insider.
The official asked not to be identified because the exact policy and process for pursuing such measures have yet to be decided by the senior European Union leadership. The source's identity is known to Insider.
The list, said the Dutch official, could also provide invaluable leverage for the opposition in negotiating a political settlement with the regime, should all sides eventually come to a serious effort to find a political solution.
The official noted that such a compromise may not happen considering the current unwillingness of Lukashenko's government to negotiate in good faith.
But even without a negotiated reconciliation scenario, the data collected by the activists could be the basis for tough personal travel and financial sanctions from the EU on rank-and-file security service employees, and even evolve into evidence to seek indictments for referrals to international or European courts, the official said.
'No holidays in the EU'
"Lukashenko knows he's probably never going to visit the EU again except maybe as a head of state, although I doubt that could ever happen," the official said.
"But what this list will do is provide a framework for holding ordinary Belarusians who work for the state apparatus accountable in the future, and we have evidence it is starting to give some members of the security services pause," the official said.
The source explained that while top-ranking officials — who tend to be very rich — might accept that the EU will be off limits, ordinary security officers have begun to realize anyone on the list is unlikely to be safe traveling to the EU.
"No bank accounts, no holidays in the EU, no sending children to EU universities, fear of arrest outside of Belarus' border: These are things that do not concern Lukashenko but could weigh heavily on the mind of a mere police captain," said the official.
The source added that even if the fear doesn't change behavior of the security forces in the short term — and there's little sign it has thus far — it will add a level of stress to people working for the police.
"No official decision has been made on these sorts of sanctions or the possibility of pursuing international prosecutions," said the Dutch official.
"But what's important now is to develop as much information as possible to use when such things are decided. I don't know how long Lukashenko will be able to hold on to power but for a low paid riot police officer it won't matter because this list will be forever."
Protests erupted from August 9 after Lukashenko — who has ruled Belarus since 1994 — declared victory in the country's presidential elections, and opposition leaders said the vote was rigged.
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