Belarus Interior Minister: I have no reason to apologize to 'gypsies'

Belarus Interior Minister Ihar Shunevich has spoken about the mass detentions of the Roma community members in the Mahiliou village of Chapayeuk which occurred after a tragic accident involving a traffic police officer.

"The minister has neither reason nor ground for apology to the gypsies. Do you understand?"

This was his answer to the question of Euroradio about potential apology to the numerous detainees.

“I consider the actions of my subordinates as absolutely reasonable and corresponding to the circumstances in which the discovery of this particularly grave crime took place,” Shunevich said. “There were grounds and reasons for this.

We investigated a separate group solely on the basis of evidence obtained at that time. The source of this evidence was information from the victim. Therefore, at that time we had no doubts about its authenticity. We were required to check all versions including the one where it was necessary to check some of the diaspora of our citizens.

The prosecutor's office will assess the legality of our actions. If a violation is found, then everyone, including the minister, will be held accountable before the law."

As it is known, the investigation stated that the main version of the traffic police officer's death in the Mahiliou region is suicide.

"Are you not afraid of being accused of xenophobia?" Shunevich was slso asked.

“They tried to do this more than once. It's useless. I consider any statement from the point of view of fulfillment of my functional duties,” the minister replied.