He was a psychological profiler for the CIA, examining the minds of world leaders such as Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong-il.

But in his later years turned his attention closer to home, penning a book on the mindset of US President Donald Trump.

Jerrold Post, a former political psychologist and author, died from complications related to coronavirus in late November at the age of 86.

Those who knew him have paid tribute to his work.

Magnus Ranstorp, a special advisor to the EU Radicalisation Awareness Network, described Post as “very gentle, kind and with a sharp mind“.

His friend psychologist Kenneth Dekleva said Post was a “giant in the field of leadership analysis and a CIA trailblazer“.

Jessica Case, a publisher with Pegasus Book who worked with him on his last book on President Trump, told the BBC: “His knowledge and insight into psychology were unmatched. He was endlessly curious.”

Bio critical information

Post, born in 1934 in New Haven, attended Yale University, where he did his undergraduate degree, before heading to medical school.

He then undertook his postgraduate psychiatric training at Harvard Medical School and the National Institute of Mental Health, according to the Washington Post.

Post spent more than 20 years working at the CIA. He set up the agency’s Centre for the Analysis of Personality and Political Behaviour in the early 1970s.

“We looked at foreign leaders in their cultural and political context and gauged to what degree they were playing out personal conflicts on an international stage,” he told Yale University.

The unit analysed foreign leaders such as Cuba’s Fidel Castro, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein and Libya’s Muammar al-Gaddafi. Their assessments enabled presidents and high-profile officials to prepare for negotiations and crisis situations.

Post wrote the “Camp David Profiles” of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, which were said to have significantly influenced President Jimmy Carter’s strategy for negotiations at Camp David – the US presidential retreat in Maryland – in 1978. The ensuing accords, signed by the two leaders, led directly to the 1979 Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty.

In his book Keeping Faith, Post said: “After Camp David, there was scarcely a major summit without our being asked to prepare profiles and assessments of the foreign leaders.”

Post was awarded the Intelligence Medal of Merit in 1979.

He then went on to assume his position of director of the political-psychology programme at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.

However, US government officials later called on Post again to help guide them in their decisions surrounding Iraq and Saddam Hussein.

Speaking to the BBC in 2002, Post said Hussein had a “traumatic upbringing”. Hussein fled his parent’s home, who refused to give him and education, and went to live with his uncle who “filled him with these dreams of glory”.

Post said this cultivation of grandiose fantasy turned him into a “malignant narcissist”.

Analysing the US president

Post wrote 14 books on a range of topics, from the mind of terrorists and the increase of politicians with narcissistic personalities.

He faced some criticism during his career for diverging from the American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) Goldwater Rule, which prohibits psychiatrists from commenting on the mental health of public figures, or diagnosing them, without examination and consent.

However, Post argued that it was sometimes unethical to stay quiet.

“I think there’s a duty to warn,” Post told The New Yorker in 2017. “Serious questions have been raised about the temperament and suitability of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named,” he said about President Trump.

In 2019, he took this idea further, co-writing a book with Stephanie Doucette titled: “Dangerous Charisma: The Political Psychology of Donald Trump and His Followers”.

In a interview with news site Salon ahead of the release of the book, he predicted Mr Trump’s moves following the 2020 election.

“Should Trump win, as he did in 2016, he will make it a much bigger win and talking [sic] about the fraudulent election support on the Democratic side. But should Trump lose narrowly, I think we can be assured that he will not concede early.

“Trump may not even recognise the legitimacy of the election,” he said.

Following the book’s publication, Post’s health began to decline and he suffered a stroke in July.

He spent his final weeks at home and died on 22 November, a week after testing positive for coronavirus.

Police in Italy have arrested 19 people accused of running a smuggling ring bringing migrants to Europe.

The smugglers allegedly transported migrants from countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan to Italy and then on to northern Europe.

Those arrested included Iraqi Kurds, Afghans and Italians, police said.

Police announced the findings following a two-year investigation that linked the suspects with smugglers in Turkey and Greece.

Investigators began looking into the alleged smuggling ring when ships carrying migrants began to arrive in the Sicilian city of Syracuse in 2018.

According to police, the migrants paid roughly €6,000 (£5,412).

Prosecutors said that the migrants were brought from Turkey and Greece to Italy in sailboats that were hired or stolen. Those who drove the boats were paid about €1,000.

They then travelled onward to northern Europe or were given the choice of remaining in Italy.

According to the investigation, specific groups across the country had their own special task.

Those in Bari, southern Italy, were responsible for finding the migrants accommodation and provided documents and residence permits that allowed the migrants to move around the country.

Senegalese football hero Papa Bouba Diop, who died in France last week aged 42, is being buried in a private ceremony at his birthplace near Dakar.

On Friday, President Macky Sall led tributes to him, saying the nation’s loss was “immense”.

Diop scored the only goal in the 2002 World Cup match which saw Senegal upset then reigning champions France.

Several of his former teammates, some overcome with emotion, attended Friday’s ceremony.

They wore the shirts of the national team bearing his name, and his number, 19.

Striker El Hadji Diouf said Diop had been a model team-mate, while Henri Camara said he had lost his “twin brother”.

Diop’s body was flown back on Friday from Lens in northern France, where he died after a long illness.

‘The Wardrobe’

President Sall said that Diop’s goal against France meant Senegal would go down in the annals of global football.

After beating France, Senegal reached the quarter-finals. No African team has gone further.

The president announced that a museum at a 50,000-seater stadium being built outside the capital, Dakar, would be named after Diop, who has also been given a posthumous national award, the Knight of the National Order of Merit.

The highlight of his club career was winning the 2008 FA Cup with Portsmouth. He also played for Fulham, West Ham United, Birmingham City and French club Lens.

His Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp last week told the BBC he was “very lucky to have managed such a fantastic boy – he was special”.

“They called him the Wardrobe, he was so big you couldn’t move him,” he said.

President Donald Trump’s campaign and the Republican National Committee say they have raised $207.5m (£154m) since the US election last month.

Since October – including the weeks running up to the vote – Trump committees have raised a total of nearly half a billion dollars.

The money is funding legal challenges to Democrat Joe Biden’s victory.

Mr Trump has refused to concede and alleges without evidence that Mr Biden’s win was the result of fraud.

Over the same period, Mr Biden’s campaign has raised $112m, according to a filing with the Federal Elections Commission.

Mr Trump’s campaign manager, Bill Stepien, said the fundraising “positions President Trump to continue leading the fight to clean up our corrupt elections process in so many areas around the country”.

The post-election fundraising drive saw emails sent to supporters asking them to contribute to an “Official Election Defense Fund” to “protect the results and keep fighting even after Election Day”.

However the small print showed that most of the money would be spent on other priorities

China has planted its flag on the Moon, more than 50 years after the US first planted the Stars and Stripes there.

The pictures from China’s National Space Administration show the five-starred Red Flag holding still on the windless lunar surface.

They were taken by a camera on the Chang’e-5 space probe before it left the Moon with rock samples on Thursday.

Two previous Chinese lunar missions had flags on the crafts’ coatings – so neither could be affixed to the moon.

The US planted the first flag on the Moon during the manned Apollo 11 mission in 1969. Five further US flags were planted on the lunar surface during subsequent missions up until 1972.

In 2012 Nasa cited satellite images as showing that five of the flags were still standing, but experts quoted in media reports say they are likely to have been bleached white by the sun’s glare.

The first flag was said by astronaut Buzz Aldrin to have been placed too close to the Apollo lunar module and was, he said, probably blown away when the module blasted off.ADVERTISEMENT

China’s mission?

The state-run Global Times newspaper said the Chinese flag was a reminder of the “excitement and inspiration” felt during the US Apollo missions.

The fabric flag was unfurled by the Chang’e-5 lander vehicle just before its ascender vehicle took off using the lander as a launchpad.

It has taken soil and rock samples to China’s lunar orbiter 15km (nine miles) above the lunar surface – which will then be enclosed in a module that will be aimed at China’s Inner Mongolia region.

The Chinese flag is 2m wide and 90cm tall and weighs about a kilogram. All parts of the flag have been given features such as protection against cold temperatures, project leader Li Yunfeng told the Global Times.

“An ordinary national flag on Earth would not survive the severe lunar environment,” project developer Cheng Chang said.

China’s national flag was seen on the Moon during its first lunar landing mission, Chang’e-3 in photographs taken by the lander and rover of each other. The Chang’e-4 lander and rover brought the flag to the dark side of the moon in 2019.

However, in both cases the flag was on the crafts’ coating rather than being an actual fabric flag on a pole.

The Chang’e-5 mission is China’s third successful landing on the Moon in seven years

Namibia: Man named after Adolf Hitler wins local election

A Namibian politician named after Adolf Hitler says he has no plans for world domination after winning a sweeping victory in local elections.

Adolf Hitler Uunona was elected last week as councillor for the Ompundja constituency.

In an interview with German newspaper Bild, he insisted he had “nothing to do” with Nazi ideology.

Adolf, like other Germanic first names, is not uncommon in the country, which was once a German colony.

He was elected for the ruling Swapo party, which led the campaign against colonial and white-minority rule.

Mr Uunona admitted that his father had named him after the Nazi leader, but said “he probably didn’t understand what Adolf Hitler stood for”.

“As a child I saw it as a totally normal name,” said Mr Uunona, who won his seat with 85% of the vote.

“It wasn’t until I was growing up that I realised: This man wanted to subjugate the whole world,” he said, adding. “I have nothing to do with any of these things.”

Mr Uunona said his wife calls him Adolf and he goes by the name in public, and has no plans to change it.

A tiger “nearly tore” off the arm of a volunteer at a big cat sanctuary in Florida that featured in the Netflix series Tiger King.

Candy Crouser, 69, a volunteer at Big Cat Rescue – the animal refuge made famous by Tiger King character Carole Baskin – was injured on Thursday.

In a statement, the sanctuary said Ms Crouser was hurt after Kimba, a male tiger rescued from Guatemala, bit her.

She broke protocols by sticking her hand into his cage, it added.

Ms Crouser, who had been with the sanctuary for five years, had arrived for feeding to find that the tiger was “locked in a section that was away from where he was usually fed”, the statement said.

After reaching inside to unlatch a door, the tiger “grabbed her arm and nearly tore it off at the shoulder”.

The statement added: “Candy said she just wasn’t thinking when she reached in to un-clip it [the door].”

Bystanders used a belt as a tourniquet, and packed ice around Ms Crouser’s arm in an effort to save it.

Ambulance workers arrived to transport her to hospital in around 20 minutes, the statement adds.

Ms Crouser was still conscious after the attack, “and insisted that she did not want Kimba Tiger to come to any harm for this mistake”. The organisation added that her arm had been broken in three places and that her shoulder had been “badly damaged”.

The tiger is being kept in quarantine for 30 days as a precaution, Big Cat Rescue said, adding, “but [he] was just acting normal due to the presence of food and the opportunity”.

The incident comes during the same week that the US House of Representatives is due to consider a law that would ban private big cat ownership and the handling of young cubs.

The Big Cat Public Safety Act had been championed by Ms Baskin and Big Cat Rescue, which cited Thursday’s incident as evidence for why the law must be passed.

It “confirms the inherent danger in dealing with these animals and why we need the Big Cat Public Safety Act to eliminate having them untracked in backyards around the country and ending up in sanctuaries”, the group said.

The Tampa-based sanctuary is home to over 50 exotic cats including lions, bobcats and servals.

This world remains an amazing one. Who could imagine that reptiles from Mexico will be smuggled to another country?

German airport customs officers have found 26 rare reptiles – 10 of them dead – smuggled inside parcels of toys and sweets from Mexico.

Some of the dead animals had suffocated as they had been stitched inside cloth dolls, a statement from Cologne Bonn airport customs said.

The endangered horned lizards, alligator lizards and box turtles were destined for private buyers in Germany.

They are among many species that the global Cites accord seeks to protect.

German officials are now trying to trace the origin of the reptiles, using DNA samples.

It is not yet clear if they came from the wild or from captive breeding programmes. They were in two packages seized on 30 October and 8 November.

The customs service is collaborating with Mexican authorities and with zoologists at the Alexander Koenig Research Museum (ZFMK) in Bonn. The smugglers could be fined, if the police can identify them.

The 16 surviving reptiles might be returned to their Mexican habitat.

ZFMK’s work with customs mostly focuses on illegal goods made from poached endangered species, such as snakeskin handbags or furs.

The 1973 Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites) has been signed by 182 states and the EU, and covers about 6,000 animal species and 30,000 plant types.

Hong Kong media tycoon and pro-democracy supporter Jimmy Lai has been charged with fraud and detained until a court hearing in April next year.

On Thursday a court denied him bail over a charge relating to the illegal use of his company’s premises.

It comes a day after three prominent pro-democracy activists were jailed.

The cases have raised fears of a renewed crackdown on the city’s activists and media figures, spurred by a controversial new security law.

Mr Lai was arrested under the National Security Law earlier this year and later released on bail.

China has said the new law will return stability to the territory after a year of unrest, but critics say it has silenced dissent.

In another development, former Hong Kong pro-democracy legislator Ted Hui has announced during a trip to Denmark that he is going into exile.

What happened to Jimmy Lai?

Mr Lai, 73, was arrested on Wednesday night along with two other senior executives from media company Next Digital.

Mr Lai is the founder of Next Digital which publishes Apple Daily, a well-read tabloid which is frequently critical of Hong Kong and mainland Chinese leadership.

On Thursday, the three men appeared in court to face charges relating to the alleged illegal use of their company’s headquarters for purposes not permitted by its lease.

The charges stated that they had sublet a section of the premises. The landlord is a corporation established by the government to run the city’s industrial parks.

The fraud charge is not being heard under the National Security Law but, according to an Apple Daily report, the judge presiding over the case had been hand-picked by the city’s leader, Carrie Lam, to handle national security cases.

A police statement on the arrests did not name those detained but pointed out that one of them – Jimmy Lai – was still under investigation for violating the National Security Law.

While the two senior executives were granted bail, Mr Lai was denied because he was deemed an “absconding risk”, according to local reports.

Biocritical information on Jimmy Lai

One of the city’s most prominent supporters of the pro-democracy movement, Mr Lai is estimated to be worth more than $1bn (£766m). Having made his initial fortune in the clothing industry, he later ventured into media and founded Next Digital.

In a local media landscape increasingly fearful of Beijing, Mr Lai is a persistent thorn for China – both through his publications and writing that openly criticises the Chinese leadership.

It has seen him become a hero for many residents in Hong Kong. But on the mainland he is viewed as a “traitor” who threatens Chinese national security.

Earlier this year, he was accused of “colluding with foreign forces” under the National Security Law.

He was arrested in August, becoming the most high-profile person in Hong Kong to be detained under the law, and his newspaper offices were raided by hundreds of police officers.

He was later released on bail.

Interviewed by the BBC before the latest arrest, he said he would not give in to intimidation.

“If they can induce fear in you, that’s the cheapest way to control you and the most effective way and they know it.

“The only way to defeat the way of intimidation is to face up to fear and don’t let it frighten you.”

Earlier today a post was shared on the recent announcement by the UK government to roll out COVID19 vaccine sooner. This vaccine is more than good news, it’s a game changer,” Dr Mohammed Khaki states

Today it was announced the Covid-19 vaccine could be rolled out as early as next week – with NHS staff among the first to get it.

It’s after the UK approved the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine for widespread use.

Dr Khaki, who works as a GP and in A&E, says for doctors it’ll hopefully mean the return to a normal situation.

“Hopefully we’ll be able to see patients face-to-face and hold their hands again,” he says.

The British regulator, the MHRA, says the jab offers up to 95% protection against Covid-19.

“It hopefully means we’re able to move away from lockdowns, a world restricted by masks where conversation is difficult, where movement is difficult and working is stifled,” Mohammed says.

He’s looking forward to a world where we can travel and see friends again.

‘I haven’t seen family since March’

For many NHS workers, a vaccine will mean they can see vulnerable family members and friends again.

“I’ve been isolating from vulnerable family members since the beginning of March,” Dr Sara Otung, who’s been treating Covid patients in Cardiff, tells Newsbeat.

“The hope of getting a vaccine and getting that extra layer of protection is really exciting. Vaccines can save lives,” the 27-year-old junior doctor says.

“It feels like a glimmer hope on what’s been such a difficult year.”

‘Hope before the festive season’

“I was ecstatic to hear the news a vaccine is now becoming possible and we’re getting closer to it,” Dr Daniel Olaiya tells Newsbeat.

The 28-year-old works at a busy hospital in London treating Covid patients.

“For clinical staff working in Covid areas, you can wear as much PPE as possible and be as careful as possible, but at the end of the day we are at risk.

“Having another barrier of protection, a weapon of armoury, is exactly what we need.”

“We needed a glimmer of hope and it’s come at the best time – Christmas, New Year and new beginnings.”

‘It’s absolutely amazing and a long time coming’

Lucy works as nurse administering the flu jab to NHS colleagues.

The 23-year-old says she expects to be on the frontline giving fellow NHS workers the Covid-19 vaccine in the next few weeks.

Around 50 hospitals are on standby and vaccination centres in venues such as conference centres are being set up now.

“If you’re asymptomatic, you don’t know if you’ve got the Covid virus ,so it’s a really good way to stop the spread and protect those vulnerable around you.”

A photograph of a paramilitary policeman swinging his baton at an elderly Sikh man has become the defining image of the ongoing farmers’ protest in India.

The photograph, taken by Ravi Choudhary, a photojournalist with Press Trust of India (PTI), has gone viral on social media.

It has also resulted in political wrangling – with opposition politicians using the image to criticise the way the protesters are being treated and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claiming – falsely – that the farmer was not hit.

Hundreds of thousands of farmers have laid siege to Delhi for the past few days, choking almost all the entry points to the national capital.

They are protesting against a recent law that they say is against their interests. The government says the reforms, which open the farming sector to private players, will not hurt farmers.

Unconvinced, thousands of them have marched upon Delhi, where they were met by barricades at the border.

As they arrived in a convoy of tractors and on foot, tens of thousands of police and paramilitary troops were deployed to halt their march, leading to clashes with the police.

In several places, police fired tear gas shells and used water cannons to try to beat them back.

The photograph of the Sikh farmer, with a flowing white beard, being threatened by a paramilitary policeman was taken last Friday at the Singhu border in north-west Delhi as farmers and protesters breached the barricades and entered the city.

“There was stone pelting, barricades were broken and a bus was also damaged with violent clashes between the police and protesters,” photojournalist Ravi Choudhary, who took the picture, told fact-check site Boomlive.com.

He said the police started hitting the protesters and the old man in the photo was also hit.

The photograph went viral quickly, shared by tens of thousands of people on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Many, including the photographer, tagged the image with “Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan” (or “Hail the Soldier, Hail the Farmer”) – a slogan coined by former Indian PM Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1965 during the India-Pakistan war to stress the importance of soldiers and farmers in nation building.

Rahul Gandhi, senior leader of the opposition Congress party, also tweeted the image.

“It’s a very sad photo. Our slogan was Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan, but today PM Modi’s arrogance has pitted the soldier against the farmer. This is very dangerous,” he wrote.

Covid-19: Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine judged safe for use in UK from next week

The UK has become the first country in the world to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine, paving the way for mass vaccination.

Britain’s medicines regulator, the MHRA, says the jab, which offers up to 95% protection against Covid-19 illness, is safe to be rolled out.

The first doses are already on their way to the UK, with 800,000 due in the coming days, Pfizer said.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the NHS will contact people about jabs.

Elderly people in care homes and care home staff have been placed top of the priority list, followed by over-80s and health and care staff.

But because hospitals already have the facilities to store the vaccine at -70C, as required, the very first vaccinations are likely to take place there – for care home staff, NHS staff and patients – so none of the vaccine is wasted.

The Pfizer/BioNTech jab is the fastest vaccine to go from concept to reality, taking only 10 months to follow the same steps that normally span 10 years.

The UK has already ordered 40 million doses of the jab – enough to vaccinate 20 million people.

The doses will be rolled out as quickly as they can be made by Pfizer in Belgium, Mr Hancock said, with the first load next week and then “several millions” throughout December.

Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said the first people in Scotland will be immunised on Tuesday.

The bulk of the rollout will be next year, Mr Hancock said, adding: “2020 has been just awful and 2021 is going to be better.”

While he said that the government does not yet know how many people need to be vaccinated before restrictions can start being lifted, he added: “I’m confident now, with the news today, that from spring, from Easter onwards, things are going to be better. And we’re going to have a summer next year that everybody can enjoy.”

Prime Minister Boris Johnson added: “It’s the protection of vaccines that will ultimately allow us to reclaim our lives and get the economy moving again.”

The free vaccine will not be compulsory and there will be three ways of vaccinating people across the UK:

1.Hospitals

Around 50 hospitals are on stand-by and vaccination centres – in venues such as conference centres or sports stadiums – are being set up now.

It is thought the vaccination network could start delivering more than one million doses a week once enough doses are available.

NHS chief executive Sir Simon Stevens said the health service was preparing for “the largest-scale vaccination campaign in our country’s history”.

But experts said people still need to remain vigilant and follow rules to stop the virus spreading – including with social distancing, face masks and self-isolation.

“We can’t lower our guard yet,” said the government’s chief medical adviser Prof Chris Whitty.

A car has ploughed through a pedestrian area in the western city of Trier, killing four people including a nine-month-old baby, police say.

The driver, a 51-year-old local man, has been arrested. The prosecutor said the suspect had drunk a significant amount of alcohol.

Authorities said they were not working on the assumption that the incident was politically or religiously motivated.

The city’s mayor described the scene as “horrible”.

Witnesses said people screamed in panic and some were thrown in the air by an SUV travelling at high speed in Trier’s Fleischstrasse pedestrianised street, near the city’s famous Roman gate, the Porta Nigra.

The incident happened at around 13:45 local time (12:45 GMT), and the suspect drove for 1km (0.62 miles) “hitting people at random on his way” before being stopped by a police car, Trier police spokesman Karl-Peter Jochem said earlier.

The victims were two women, aged 25 and 73, a 45-year-old man and a nine-month-old baby

Who is the officer that has a conscience?

Andrei Ostapovich was a high-flying young police investigator in Belarus when protests broke out earlier this year, in the wake of the country’s disputed presidential election. He was so horrified by the beating and torture of demonstrators in custody that he left the country. He’s one of hundreds of Belarusian police officers now in exile in Poland and the Baltic states.

Sitting on a Warsaw park bench in the autumn sunlight, Andrei Ostapovich is lost in thought. He’s oblivious to the couples strolling past, to the laughing teenagers and to the grandmother and toddler feeding the ducks a few metres away. With his sharp cheekbones and olive green eyes, the 27-year-old could almost be mistaken for a guy modelling Italian knitwear or promoting an expensive brand of aftershave. But Andrei is a policeman on the run.

Strictly speaking, Andrei is not running any more – he feels relatively safe in Poland. But when he decided to quit his job as a high-flying detective in the Belarusian capital, Minsk this summer, he realised he would have to leave the country straight away or risk arrest.

“I’ve been in police uniform for the past 10 years,” he says. “But after the elections in August, I thought I was no longer safe wearing it because of the way people now feel about the police. My uniform made me ashamed”

Brought up in the Grodno region, near the Polish border, Andrei’s bravery and quick wittedness was first spotted when, aged 15, he saved a younger boy from drowning in a lake. Local firemen and paramedics were so impressed by the rescue that they suggested he might like a job with them after he left school.

But Andrei had other plans. After five years at an academy attached to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where he studied law and forensics, he qualified as an investigator. He began with probes into medical negligence and just three months after graduation he made a name for himself by catching a notorious paedophile. He soon moved on to some of the country’s most complex murder cases.

“The job was really exciting,” he tells me, sucking hard on a cigarette. “There were interesting cases in which the suspects proved elusive and it was such a thrill when you managed to outsmart them – like winning a game of chess.”

He says there was little political interference in his work as a senior investigator. But as elections approached he was troubled by the arrest of presidential candidates – a banker, Viktor Babaryko and blogger Sergei Tikhanovsky – on the flimsiest of pretexts.

What other experience?

Andrei went to the rallies after work to see what was going on. He found himself running for cover as police fired rubber bullets and stun grenades into the crowd.

What he saw with his own eyes – and in videos posted online – sickened him. So although he loved his job, he wrote a five-page letter of resignation, detailing all the abuses he’d witnessed, stating that the riot police “were the only people who provoked violence” and claiming that they had executed “criminal orders”. Fully aware that he might face arrest, he fled across the border to Russia.

Very soon the Russian security services, the FSB, showed up at his hotel in the city of Pskov. “They put handcuffs on me and a ski mask covered with black cloth,” says Andrei. “Then they attached a dumbbell to the handcuffs – it was so heavy, more than 30kg of metal. I thought they might throw me in the lake with this dead weight, and I wouldn’t be able to swim. When you can’t see anything, you have no idea what’s going on.”

The FSB officers, who did not introduce themselves, drove for four hours to the Belarusian border. Then they stopped, took Andrei out of the car, and removed his mask and handcuffs.

His Escape

“The FSB tried to act like they were not involved in my arrest,” he says. “They gave me back my things and told me to walk along the road. I saw some [Belarusian] KGB agents approaching so I didn’t hang about, I ran into the forest,” says Andrei. “They chased me but they couldn’t keep up, so I managed to escape.”

Dressed in no more than his jeans, trainers and a T-shirt, Andrei sought refuge among thick forests of pine and birch, lakes and treacherous marshes. He immediately threw away his three mobile phones, to avoid being traced. He had no food apart from some chocolate bars and a bottle of water. Once he slipped into a swamp up to his waist and couldn’t move his legs. Fortunately he was able to reach some thick reeds, but it took all his strength to haul himself out.

Then there was a close encounter with a wild boar – “a huge beast with tusks”, he says. “I managed to dazzle it with my torch and it ran off but it was very scary being alone at night in the forest.”

After 10 days of wandering in circles and getting hopelessly lost, Andrei eventually reached Poland, where he applied for asylum.