February 9, Pozirk. The BySol Solidarity Fund has received 150 requests from people seeking to flee Belarus in the four days since the data breach that affected the Biełaruski Hajun Telegram chatbot, BySol’s Andrej Stryžak said on Facebook.
The chat linked to an opposition defense monitoring group shut down two days ago after its founder Anton Matolka confirmed that an unauthorized account had access and could have exported data.
People who shared information with the group may face politically-motivated persecution in Belarus. Belarusian border guards stepped up controls at the border in an apparent attempt to identify them, Stryžak warned earlier.
Pro-government sources reported the arrest of Maksim Nikicienka, an employee at the Homiel region’s Mazyr oil refinery, for allegedly sharing information with Biełaruski Hajun.
Established in early 2022, Biełaruski Hajun documented the military activity of Russian troops in Belarus and helped the Ukrainians assess threats after Russia launched a full-scale war on their country in February 2022.
