KGB designates Free Belarus Center as extremist group

January 20, Pozirk. Belarus’ Committee for State Security (KGB), by its January 15 decision, designated Free Belarus Center as an extremist group. The interior ministry added the nonprofit to its blacklist on January 20.

The interior ministry identified Marta Skuharava, Alvina Minhazava, Palina Brodzik and Ivan Maroźka as individuals associated with the group.

Based in Warsaw and Kyiv, Free Belarus Center provides legal and mental health counseling to Belarusians. The group helped evacuate people to safer locations in Ukraine after the start of Russia’s large-scale invasion in February 2022.  

Belarus’ list of extremist groups contains 325 organizations, including most of the exiled Belarusian media outlets.

Politics

Politics

Trials, arrests, digital censorship reported on January 17–19

January 20, Pozirk. Trials, arrests, digital censorship and new discriminatory legislative changes were among instances of politically motivated harassment documented between January 17 and 19. On January 17, the government enacted changes prohibiting people convicted of extremism-related crimes — charges …

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