Schools obliged to report on those who miss classes and opposition members

The Sub-Committee on Education of Minsk city executive committee, together with Minsk police elaborated a Directive "On strengthening the counter-measures against dissemination of activity of non-formal extremist-oriented youth groups in Minsk". The document obliges shools' administrations to define extremists by the appearance and to put them on the police prophylactic record. The document says:

“The young people, who are involved into extremist groups are often used by the destructive politically oriented opposition structures as an instrument to conduct extremist political activity, participation in non-sanctioned events, and anti-governmental protest actions”.

 
“Luckily, there are no extremist groups in the schools of our neighbourhood. At the session we conveyed this information to the schools' headmasters, issued responsibility protocols, but there had been no cases like this so far. We will consider students with shaved heads, with gammadion signs, mostly skinheads, as suspects”, – representatives of the educational department of Zavodzki district of Minsk have said to Euroradio.

They will also conduct up-bringing correctional work with students who were detained at a meeting.

“They are kids! Why involving them into some extremist organizations? We are responsible for their health. Is a school student is detained at a meeting, for, for example, hooliganism, we will definitiely conduct some upbringing correctional work with him”, – a representative of the educational department has added.

 
According to the document, schools and police will detect places where extremists get together, conduct meetings with parents on the topic of extremism, and unreliable students will be involved in the events, which are useful for the society. Schools are also obliged to report on those students who miss classes without a justified reason. 

“As for missing classes, we are supposed to inform a local district department of internal affairs if a student misses classes without a justified reason for 3 days. However, we contact his or her parents first”, – a headmaster of one of Minsk schools has said.

Another school's administration decided to take photographs of the students who do not wear the school's uniform!

“We haven't noticed any extremists among our students. However, we held a special seminar dedicated to symbols of different groups, – the headmaster says. – I go round the classes from time to time. We take pictures of the kids who do not wear uniform. We discuss the pictures only at our sessions. If a kid wears jeans, we are not supposed to inform the police on that. Or, for example, we do not suspect boys with long hair in some criminal activity".

According to the authors of the Directive, it was elaborated because the problem of dissemination of non-formal extremist-oriented youth groups' activity in Minsk had become acute nowadays. This makes the crime rate worse and influences Minsk's image in a negative way. An ideologist from the Sub-Committee on Education of Minsk city executive committee, together with the head of Minsk police for public order Ihar Yauseeu will control how the Directive is followed. Ihar Yauseeu is famous for his brutal actions at the opposition demonstrations.