Was the child found lost in Belovezhskaya Pushcha? One of the largest searches for a boy who disappeared in Belovezhskaya Pushcha

In Belarus, over a five-year period, more than a thousand people were searched for in the forests, but 37 could not be found.15 July 18, 2018 at 03:39 pmIn Belarus, over the past five years, more than 1 thousand people have been searched for in the forests, Dmitry Kryukov, head of the department for organizing search work of the main criminal investigation department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, said today, BELTA reports.

TRC "Mir" explained how the photo of Maxim Markhaluk ended up in a fictitious story in the program. Editor fired20 June 7, 2018 at 11:16 pmA photograph of the missing Maxim Markhaluk appeared in the “Family Matters” program on the “Mir” TV channel. It was used to illustrate a fictional story of disputed paternity on Family Matters. Now the TV channel is looking into how this could have happened.

A photo of the missing Maxim Markhaluk was used in a fictitious story on the Mir TV channel.44 June 7, 2018 at 12:11 pmA photograph of the missing boy appeared in the “Family Matters” program on the “Mir” TV channel. True, they used it to illustrate a fictitious story of disputed paternity.

“I swam poorly and didn’t navigate the forest.” Investigator and mother - about the long search for Maxim Markhaluk88 February 19, 2018 at 07:00Maxim Markhalyuk disappeared on September 16, 2017. Now the search for the boy is still ongoing, although not by as many people as in September. No one is going to close the criminal case. It is being dealt with by a special group, which includes 6 investigators and police officers. One of the heads of the USC in the Grodno region told TUT.BY about how the search for the boy is going on, about working with psychics and volunteers, and about the versions that the investigation is considering. And Maxim’s mother, five months after the child’s disappearance, is still waiting for her son to come home.

The police told how the search for Maxim Markhaluk went and what is being done now37 December 22, 2017 at 01:18 pmThe police held an information day in Novy Dvor, where Maxim Markhaluk disappeared on September 16. In addition to other topics, the topic of finding the boy was also touched upon.

The investigation into the case of the disappearance of 10-year-old Maxim in Pushcha has been extendedNovember 27, 2017 at 1:00 p.m.Investigators, together with the police, the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the Ministry of Defense, local authorities and volunteers, carried out a huge amount of work aimed at establishing the whereabouts of the boy.

“We believe that he just went traveling.” Maxim, who disappeared in the Pushcha, turned 11 years old27 October 10, 2017 at 08:57 pmNow in Novi Dvor nothing reminds us that just two weeks ago the largest search and rescue operation in the country in recent times took place here.

"Polish trace" by Maxim Markhaluk. The truck driver said he was giving a lift to another boy.32 October 5, 2017 at 02:09 pmThe press service of the Radom police assured us that they know about little Maxim, who disappeared in Belarus, and if information appears about any street children, this information will not go unnoticed.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus: there has been no official information from Poland useful for finding our boy6 October 4, 2017 at 6:42 pmThe diplomat said that in connection with reports in Polish regional media, the situation is being monitored by both the Belarusian Embassy in Warsaw and the consulates in Białystok and Biala Podlaska.

"Might be related to your missing boy." Polish police are looking for a child hidden in a truck178 October 4, 2017 at 01:21 pmA Polish regional news website reported that police in the city of Siedlce were looking for an unknown 10-year-old boy.

The mother of Maxim, who disappeared in Pushcha, believes that her son is alive. What's new in your search?79 October 3, 2017 at 3:19 pmThe woman said that every day psychologists from the Ministry of Emergency Situations come to her and help maintain her morale. But, for example, locals and neighbors treat her grief differently.

There are fewer volunteers, the Ministry of Emergency Situations is working. Report from Novy Dvor, where they have been searching for a child in the Pushcha for 13 days78 September 29, 2017 at 08:10 pmAt the moment, searches in Belovezhskaya Pushcha continue, but on a smaller scale. The large camp of the "Angel" search and rescue team moved to the square near the village council.

Information has emerged that the Siedlce police are checking a report about an unknown boy who was driving into the city, hiding in a truck, and then ran away.

Photo: widefon.com, for illustrative purposes only

In the 20th of September, an as yet unidentified truck driver contacted the local police via an electronic communication form and said that on one of the previous days (more precisely, the police did not identify it), a child climbed into the cab of his car, which was presumably then parked in the Lyubartovsky district - a boy who appears to be about 10 years old, dressed in dark clothes. According to the driver, the child hid in the sleeping compartment of the truck, covering himself with a blanket.

The truck driver did not see the child at first, but when he discovered that he was carrying a “hare,” he tried to talk to him, but the boy did not answer his questions. Then the driver stopped in a parking lot in the town of Bialki to tell the police about what had happened, but the child jumped out of the cab and ran away. The man reported the incident to the Siedlce police via the website.

The city is located about a hundred kilometers from the Polish-Belarusian border. Local police, of course, are aware that a 10-year-old child has disappeared in the border Belarusian region. Police representatives explain that they are not officially looking for Maxim Markhaluk, but all information and leads on him have been communicated to every police officer in the neighboring voivodeships. According to a representative of the police press service, these two reports - about the disappearance of a Belarusian child and an unidentified boy of the same age hidden in a truck - are considered here as possibly interrelated.

This could hypothetically be connected with your [missing in Belarus] child. We pay attention to any unaccompanied children, but so far no street children have been identified on our territory,” the press service of the Siedlce police said. - We are checking any information regarding children, including this message about a boy in a car. Therefore, we posted relevant information on local websites to find eyewitnesses. So far, the story of the child who escaped from the car has not been continued.

No children have gone missing in Poland recently, police said.

Investigative authorities are working through all possible versions of the disappearance of Maxim Markhaluk - even if they seem unlikely. It cannot be ruled out that the child may be in a remote locality in Belarus or even in another country. The investigation of the criminal case continues, the search is ongoing, - a representative of the Investigative Committee department for the Grodno region told TUT.BY Sergey Shershenevich.

Photo: Katerina Gordeeva, TUT.BY

Let us remind you that Maxim Markhalyuk was on the evening of September 16th. At about 20.00 he rode his bicycle towards the forest near the village of Novy Dvor and disappeared. Later, police found the child's bicycle in the forest. So far, the search for Maxim has not yielded results.

They have been searching for 11 days for 10-year-old Maxim Markhaluk, who disappeared in Novy Dvor, Svisloch district.

As before, no traces of Maxim Markhaluk have been identified. The Investigative Committee opened a criminal case today under Part 2 of Art. 167 Code of Criminal Procedure. Svoboda has collected 10 main facts about the disappearance of a 10-year-old child:

1. Circumstances of disappearance

The first reports of the disappearance of Maxim Markhaluk appeared on September 18. The report said that the mother of a 10-year-old boy contacted the police and reported that at about 20.00 on the evening of September 16, he rode a bicycle towards the forest near his village and disappeared. Already at 22:00 on the same day, parents, fellow villagers, police officers and the Ministry of Emergency Situations began looking for Maxim. In the forest they found a boy's bicycle, a bag of mushrooms, but no more traces.

2. Where does it happen?

All events take place in the village of Novy Dvor, Svisloch district, on the outskirts of Belovezhskaya Pushcha. The village council said that the Markhalyuks’ house was located on the outskirts of the village, next to the forest. About 500 meters from the house in the forest, a hut was built where the Markhaluks dry mushrooms.

Already on Monday, September 18, not only police officers and employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, but also teachers from his school, high school students, residents of Novy Dvor and surrounding villages, and volunteers from different cities of Belarus came to search for Maxim.

3. About Markhalyukov

Maxim Markhaluk is 10 years old. According to the police report, he appears to be 8-9 years old, was wearing blue sweatpants, a brown hooded sweater, and a cherry colored sleeveless vest.

Mother Valentina Nikolaevna works as a technician at a school, father Valery Nikolaevich is a worker at a local agricultural enterprise.

Valentina told reporters that they walked around the entire neighborhood day and night in search of Maxim, examined swamps and abandoned houses, combed the forest, but to no avail. Maxim’s older brother Sasha (who had already graduated from military school) said that his brother warned him that he would only walk along the edge of the forest and would return home. He also says that Maxim did not go far alone, that he did not quarrel with anyone that day. According to Sasha, his brother could have been afraid of a herd of bison - where Maxim left his bicycle and basket, there were many bison tracks.

In the first days after the boy disappeared, the parents turned to fortune tellers and psychics - they allegedly said that the boy was alive.

4. Search headquarters version

10 days after the disappearance of Maxim Markhaluk, the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case under Part 2 of Art. 167 Code of Criminal Procedure.

The article decides to start a case if within 10 days from filing a complaint about the disappearance of a person it was not possible to locate his whereabouts.

Previously, investigators saw no grounds for a criminal case. They said there was no reason to believe the boy was the victim of a crime.

The main version, which the search headquarters followed for ten days, was that the boy got lost in the forest.

The forest area is divided into squares, each of them is checked. The headquarters says that the searchers covered the maximum distance that the boy could cover during this time. Helicopters and drones with thermal imaging are still involved in the search. The search continues.

5. The main danger in Pushcha

According to the coordinator of the “Angel” squad, Kristina Basova, who twice went to Novy Dvor to look for Maxim, the most dangerous things for the boy are wild animals, impassable swamps and the weather itself.

“During these days we met bison, a wolf, wild boars, and a roe deer,” says Christina. - It was rainy, damp and frosty this week. This is all very difficult even for a trained adult.”

6. What people say

Locals claim that the boy was prepared and could not have disappeared into the forest so easily. Many of the townspeople believe that the bison could have scared him, and assume that he is simply hiding there.

True, the same locals add that such cases have never happened in their village before. They say that the village children know well where to go and where not to go. They say about Maxim that he would not go anywhere with strangers, much less go anywhere.

7. Large-scale search operation

The search operation for Maxim was called the largest in Belarus.

A week after Maxim’s disappearance, a gathering of all search and rescue teams was announced in Belarus. Last weekend, several thousand people took part in the search for the boy. In addition to police officers, military personnel, border guards, police officers, and employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, people from all over Belarus, volunteers from the Smolensk region and Lithuania came to Novy Dvor.

8. An incredible number of volunteers

The largest number of search engines was observed on weekends. According to official data, over two thousand volunteers gathered in Novy Dvor on Saturday. Experts noted that many people had no experience at all in such operations, sometimes they simply did not know how to behave and what to do.

Nevertheless, everyone was divided into groups, each of which received its own search square.

Volunteers say they walked through the forest and swamps for 10 hours, sometimes in the rain. But no one was able to find any traces of Maxim. The coordinator of the “Angel” squad, Kristina Basova, despite various shortcomings in the organization, believes that the search is being conducted at the highest level.

“Yes, at the beginning there were problems and there was not even a single coordination point where information from all search groups would flow. But in a very short time, specialists were able to streamline coordination and direct people to search activities. They managed to feed people, warm them and provide a place to rest. Everyone participated in this. It’s just that people were actually motivated to find Maxim,” Basova said.

According to Christina, those who were unable to come and help in the search transferred money to the squad’s bank account. And this, she says, is also a big help.

9. Can a child survive in the forest for that long?

The coordinator of the “Angel” detachment, Kirill Golubev, who today coordinates the work in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, says that the possibility that the boy is alive is real. According to him, there were cases when a four-year-old child disappeared in the taiga and survived for 10 days.

“We assume that the boy is still alive. The search continues, no new traces of Maxim have been found, but we believe and are looking,” says Kirill Golubev.

The commander of the “Angel” detachment, Sergei Kovgan, said that the operation has search and rescue status.

“The fact is that now there is nothing special to eat in the forest. I understand that the hunter could still get food for himself, but he is not a hunter, he is only a teenager, and it is difficult to imagine what he could eat here,” says Kovgan.

10. The operation continues

According to official information, on September 25, over 500 people were involved in the search for Maxim. The search continues, no new traces of Maxim have yet been found.

The New Yard greets you with unusual silence. Just a week ago it was noisy and crowded here. Over the past two weeks, hundreds of volunteers have visited the agricultural town. The largest search operation took place here. Volunteers, employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, police and foresters searched for Maxim Markhaluk, who was lost in the forest. At the moment, searches in Belovezhskaya Pushcha continue, but on a smaller scale.

The camp of the “Angel” search and rescue team moved to a site near the village council. Gradually the agricultural town is returning to its normal life. But fellow countrymen still talk about the missing boy - this is topic number one. It seems that over the past two weeks all versions have already been discussed.

And now it is very difficult to separate the rumors that fill the village from the facts. People tell each other daily information about search results, supplementing the official versions with their own details.

In the morning, the headquarters of the search and rescue squad “Angel” is quiet and not crowded. Volunteers - and today, Friday, September 29, there are 60 of them according to the list - went into the forest for another “combing” of the area.

—Are you new arrivals? - asks a girl near the tents. Having learned that we are journalists, he habitually reports the situation: the search continues, the volunteers are working.

Large numbers of people, as there were a week ago, are not expected in Novy Dvor this weekend. And ordinary citizens are asked not to go looking for them. Everything that unprepared people could do has been done. Next is the work of professionals.

“We examined literally everything.” They even found bunkers from the First World War. At the moment, believe me, in the ten-kilometer zone around the village there is no place where a search engine has not set foot. The headquarters will gather this evening, where volunteers will also be present. Let's add up all the maps of the surveyed areas, and if the headquarters has even the slightest suspicion that there are still blank spots left, special groups will be organized, which will not be the first time participating in the search. The stains will be dealt with by them. There is nothing left for volunteers to comb here. Abandoned areas, forest, corn, fields, lakes, swamps - everything has been inspected, says a representative of the search and rescue team Kirill Golubev.

The situational headquarters, which is located in the village council building, is also unusually quiet. Today, 41 rescuers are participating in the search.

“We will continue the search until there is any result or special instructions regarding this search operation,” say EMERCOM employees at headquarters.
By lunchtime, a small group of volunteers emerges from the forest to get some food, talk about the work they’ve done, and then go out in search again.

— You know, during this time, a lot of versions of the boy’s disappearance were discussed. But all this is speculation and rumors; the only fact remains that the boy has not yet been found, the guys say.

Most of the volunteers who are now in Novy Dvor have been here from the very beginning of the search operation. Many have experienced repeated searches for missing people. In conversations they remember how they were looking for a teenage girl or a missing mushroom picker. But the operation in Novy Dvor, according to volunteers, is distinguished not only by its scale, but also by some special unity of people.

— Local residents always responded to all our requests. Maybe they are a little tired of so many people, but we are very grateful to them for their help. Many of them participated in the search from the first days, says the volunteer Nastya.

The girl has been here for several days.

- Look, even on the tent there is a list of telephone numbers of those who can stay overnight. Probably, there may be dissatisfied with so many people in the village. Some said that the forest was trampled, but our commanders even removed the garbage along the way.

One of the local residents who went out to search was Alexey. The young man says that he went into the forest with everyone else and really hoped that the boy would be found.

- And now I hope. They talk a lot in the village - about crime, and about the fact that he could have escaped on purpose, and that he could have gone somewhere in a passing car, he lists Alexei. “But what of this is true is no longer clear.”

“We are all, of course, worried about Maxim’s disappearance. The question remains: where is he? Why didn't you find it? Many are sure that he is not in the forest, but in some other place, but where? - says the young mother Julia and remembers that the boy was often left to his own devices. — I rode my bike around the village all summer, I could even go quite far - for example, to the lake.

Local residents seem to be already tired of the attention of the press and the large number of people in the village. True, they say that the search for the boy was followed not only in person, but also on TV.

Grandmother Vera says that this is the first such case in the village when a child disappears in the surrounding forests.

- I’ve lived 83 fates and I don’t remember this. Already, what happened in the world, I looked at the television, because far away in the center of the world my legs were ailing. But the cotton worker didn’t know about it and didn’t have any visitors - it was all dark like the village council, but we were still in the workshop,” she says.

Meanwhile, a group of volunteers again goes in search of Maxim. They will inspect the forest near the hut where the boy was last seen. According to his friends, he went to the “base” - that’s what the locals call a wooden gazebo near the village. Allegedly, Maxim went there to pick mushrooms.

- You know, there are very few leads, even fewer facts. Each version has been checked and rechecked several times. They said that some mushroom picker saw Maxim in the forest, but the mushroom picker himself was never found. It seems that the neighbor last saw the boy on the road at half past eight in the evening, but then it was already twilight. And all this with the word “seemingly.” Unnecessary information and rumors really hinder the work of volunteer searchers and specialists, volunteers say.

The so-called savages also became a problem for the search and rescue team - people who came to search, succumbing to an impulse, and went out into the forest on their own, without registration.

“It was important for us not to lose anyone during the search and rescue operation, because organizing such a number of people is very difficult. Someone doesn’t understand why we are standing and not going into the forest, someone is wandering around the forest in search of mushrooms, someone is sitting down to rest,” says Kirill Golubev.

The search continues. The boy has not yet been found.

Let us remind you that the boy disappeared in Belovezhskaya Pushcha on the evening of September 16. At about 20.00 he rode his bicycle towards the forest near the village of Novy Dvor and disappeared. Later, police found the child's bicycle in the forest. Hundreds of volunteers have volunteered to search for the child in recent days. So far the search has yielded no results.

10 year old Maxim Markhalyuk, a resident of the village of Novy Dvor, Svisloch region, has been searched since September last year, but so far to no avail. Local residents are asking for help through Belsat.

“I appealed in order to establish justice. Appeal to the head of state so that all these scoundrels who wanted to hide their tracks intentionally, or unintentionally, are brought to justice,” said a resident of Belovezhskaya Pushcha and a former huntsman Igor Akulov.

Ten-year-old Maxim did not return home on September 16, 2017. A boy's bicycle and his basket were found in the forest near the house. Thousands of people took part in the search.

“I think it was on this road that something happened to this child. Because there is no trace, nothing left of this child. Officials are skating, he could have gone out and voted in the evening, and it would have been a tragedy,” Akulov is sure.

They started looking for the boy at night. The entire road was dug up by the wheels of the participants of the Belovezhsky Bisons trophy club, who were invited to search. The road leads from the village of Voitov Bridge, where there is a hotel with a bathhouse, which belongs to the Presidential Administration, through Novy Dvor, where the boy lived, to the lake, which is rented by the SPK.

“Officials and local nobility often rest in that hotel. They rush along this road like crazy, drunk,” testifies a former huntsman.

Special road

For officials, a paved road was laid here, not marked on maps, with security and surveillance cameras. It connects the hotel on the Voitov Bridge farm with the village of Borki and leads to the airfield in Klepachi.

“It was necessary to search immediately not according to the version of the disappearance, but according to the crime, I think. Because we searched so much, but there were no results,” says another local resident Mikhail Sushko.

The conduct of the investigation raises questions among experts

“From the very beginning of Markhaluk’s disappearance, the investigation dragged on for a long time - 10 days. Why was it delayed when it was necessary to react to this?” the former investigator points out. Oleg Volchek.

The boy could not get lost in the forest without a trace.

People in the village are afraid to talk about this topic. Are officials afraid of journalistic investigations?

“Everything needs to be neat. And rightly so!!! Because there were a lot of interpretations. You came, you came from different channels, television, radio. There needs to be one interpretation! Because they interview different people who have been deprived of parental rights, and you interview them and they spill dirt. We must do all this carefully... Do you understand? (Smiles). Let’s hope that you will do everything right...,” said the chairman of the village council Vladimir Zdanovich.