They don’t hit you with their hands, they hit you with sticks to make your body grow bigger, to swell up, so that no one will try to pass by – Amina’s nine pushbacks

Amina experienced a total of nine pushbacks to Belarus including eight from Poland to Belarus and one, the last, from Latvia to Belarus. The events she cites in her account took place between July and the second half of September. On the eighth and final time the woman found herself on Polish territory, she asked for help from one of the humanitarian organisations operating on the Polish-Belarusian border. During the meeting, she and her relative reported to the humanitarian workers the experience, at that moment, of seven pushbacks. After another pushback, Amina agreed to share her testimony. Her account differs from the others included in this study. The story is not linear, at many points we do not know who accompanied Amina, how the perpetrators were dressed, what cars they drove. The woman experienced violence so many times that she was not able to present the events chronologically. We know that she travelled with her brother and five other relatives. We know that many events have faded in her memory, while others remain vivid.

Beginning.

It was a long time ago and I don’t remember the exact date. But I spent two months trying to cross from Belarus to Poland, to finally cross the Polish border. But I don’t remember the exact dates. I got to the forest on the 10th of that month and stayed there for about 10 or 15 days. So I don’t remember the exact date and time.

Crossing.

Someone was checking at the fence whether the situation was OK, whether it was safe. He was watching to see if there was a danger that a Polish patrol would appear and he was choosing the right time to pass. As I passed, a patrol spotted us. There were a lot of people behind us.  There were a lot of people behind us, because  of that,  they noticed us. The border guards don’t beat, but when Polish soldiers come, they beat blindly. Only in the head they don’t beat. They don’t beat with their hands, they beat with batons, so that you get bigger, so that your body swells up, so that no one tries to pass anymore. This time when we tried, when we started to run to the forest and the things in the forest, when we ran, the guards and the army started to shoot. When they started shooting at us, we stopped because they were shooting blindly. We stopped and we couldn’t continue. They started beating us with black military batons.

Muharrama.

One time we were sleeping in the muharrama. And suddenly the girls came, two of them, border guards or Polish officers, I don’t know. We were sleeping and they started throwing something like firecrackers at us, just big ones, to wake us up. They laughed at us and mocked us. They threw firecrackers at us, three times, four times. They were big, but thank god they didn’t hurt any of us.

The worst pushback.

The last time we went through the fence, they cut the fence and we went through. We walked about 800 metres past the fence and one soldier caught us. After some time a patrol came, which consisted of an officer and three soldiers. They led us a bit deeper into the forest, further away from the fence, so that no one could see or photograph us being beaten. They took our phones the fourth time. They took sticks from the forest and started beating us on our legs and hands. Then they let us walk towards the fence and threw us through a hole we had cut earlier to enter. We then returned to the muharrama. Having experienced and suffered from the beatings, we were in no condition to try again. We turned back and retreated to Belarus. When we retreated towards Belarus from the border fence, the Belarusians took our belongings and burned them. Then they unleashed dogs on us and beat us in the forest. Then they asked us if we wished to return to Minsk or to Poland. When we chose to return to Minsk, they beat us and then turned us back to Minsk[…].

As I said, this last time, they pushed us back through the same place that we entered. They beat us in the middle of the forest. They stripped my brothers and sprayed us with pepper gas. Then they turned us back to the place where we had passed. The muharrama was small and narrow, so the Belarusian guards spotted us. They caught us and beat us.