Five dissidents given lengthy prison terms in absentia

January 18, BPN. The Minsk City Court has delivered a guilty verdict against alleged administrators of Chernaya Kniga Belarusi (Eng.: Black Book of Belarus), an online project exposing the identities of security officers who mistreated and brutalized peaceful protesters.

Janina Sazanovič, Daniił Bahdanovič, Dźmitryj Navoša, Volha Vysockaja and Valeryja Zaniamonskaja were sentenced to 12 years in prison each.

Authorities accused them of inciting hatred and illegally handling personal data. The Committee for State Security (KGB) has added them to a terrorist register. All five are based abroad and may lose Belarusian citizenship under new legislation.

“12 years? I don’t care if it’s 112 years,” Navoša has tweeted. “I think, other so-called convicts in absentia would be ready to accept any virtual terms by bogus courts at the price of freedom for real political prisoners.”

“There’s not much to comment on, to be honest,” he told BPN. “The inmates of the [penal] colony, into which these crooks have turned Belarus. . . are trying to control the fate of people from the free world whom they can’t get.”

This is the second guilty verdict against defendants tried without being present in court. In late December 2022, Alaksandra Hierasimenia and Alaksandr Apiejkin, founders of the Belarusian Sports Solidarity Foundation, were given 12 years in prison each for alleged appeals for sanctions.