A Capitol riot suspect who fled to Belarus seeking asylum said he was afraid the US would torture him

• Capitol riot suspect Evan Neumann is seeking political asylum in Belarus after fleeing the US.
• He told Belarusian TV he was worried US authorities would torture him if he returned.

A California man accused of attacking a police officer during the Capitol defended his decision to flee to Belarus, saying he was afraid of being tortured by the US justice system.

Evan Neumann, 48, gave an interview to state TV in Belarus, the authoritarian nation next to Russia which is in a long-running dispute with the US and EU over the legitimacy of its last presidential election.

Neumann is on the FBI's most-wanted list and faces six charges including assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers, and violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.

The charges against him are laid out in legal documents filed in Washington DC's federal court.

Neumann sold his home in Mill Valley, California, in April last year after the charges were filed against him, ABC 7 News reported.

He described fleeing first to Switzerland, then to Ukraine, and on to neighboring Belarus.

On Thursday, Belarusian state broadcaster ATN aired an extended interview with Neumann in which he claimed that he was seeking political asylum in Belarus because he believed he would be tortured in the US.

"I have no hope in the US justice system right now. I'm not strong enough to withstand torture," he said.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has mocked the Capitol riot and said in January: "In our country, protesters and other dissatisfied people don't storm government agencies and capitols."

Belarus is known for its violence repression of political dissent, including those who protested against Lukashenko's re-election in August 2020.

Neumann also raised the baseless conspiracy theory that the riot on January 6 was a so-called false flag operation which the US government started on purpose.

He claimed that a man he saw breaking a window of the Capitol was a government agent, and said that the doors of the Capitol building "were opened from the inside and we were invited to come in." There is no evidence to support either of those claims and Neumann did not seek to provide any.

According to the Justice Department's document detailing the charges against Neumann, video footage during the Capitol riot captured him verbally abusing and behaving violently towards police officers. When he refused orders to move away from a barricade, he is alleged to have said: "No, you can't tell me what to do you piece of shit."

He is also alleged to have called punched police officers, called them "little bitches," and told them: "I'm ready to die, are you?"

Neumann claimed during the interview that he had not assaulted a police officer on January 6 and found the claim "very upsetting."

A spokesperson for the US embassy for Belarus, which is based in Lithuania, saidin a statement provided to NBC News: "We have seen Belarusian state media reporting about Mr. Neumann. Due to U.S. privacy laws, we are limited in what we can say about individual U.S. citizens."

"The United States condemns the Lukashenko regime for its brutal measures against members of civil society, the media, athletes, students, legal professionals, and other citizens."