The United Nations' human rights commissioner said Friday that she had been alarmed by thousands of allegations of police violence against detained protesters in Belarus.
"Overwhelmingly peaceful" protesters are being "violently dispersed" by the Belarusian authorities, commissioner Michelle Bachelet said during a live-streamed meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva.
"I am alarmed by the numerous allegations of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment in custody, with up to 2,000 complaints reportedly lodged by the end of October," Bachelet said.
There have been mass protests against long-time President Alexander Lukashenko every weekend in Minsk since a disputed presidential election nearly five months ago.
More than 27,000 people have been detained since the Aug. 9 election, Bachelet said in an address to the U.N. council.
Lukashenko, 66, has led Belarus, a former Soviet republic in Eastern Europe between Russia and European Union states Poland and Lithuania, for more than a quarter of a century, tolerating little dissent. The EU has denounced the August election as "neither free nor fair" and refused to recognize Lukashenko as the current president.
