Returning Belarusians can face arrest – human rights activists

February 2, BPN. Darja Rubleŭskaja of the Viasna Human Rights Center has said that the authorities lure back Belarusians only to arrest them on return on politically motivated charges.

“At least 58 people who returned to Belarus from abroad were detained in 2022 and early 2023,” despite promises of forgiveness, she told an online event.

At least 10 of them were sentenced to terms of one to five years in prison, according to Viasna. Four were sentenced to restricted freedom, a type of home confinement. Some were fined or jailed under the Administrative Offenses Code only to be released soon.

According to Rubleŭskaja, “it is difficult to imagine what the authorities are up to” when they encourage people to return, but “there is no indication that anything will fundamentally change for the better in terms of human rights and an end to reprisals.”

On January 24, Prosecutor General Andrej Švied shared with Belarusian television details about a future commission that would filter political emigrants wishing to return to their homeland.

He told Belarus 1 that “at least three categories of our citizens” would be able to return: those who mistakenly believe that the state has complaints against them; those who committed misdemeanor; and those who committed minor crimes but have publicly repented.

The decision to establish the body had been taken at a meeting with Alaksandr Łukašenka. Švied called it a “step of humanism, mercy and helping those who have lost their way and fallen into the networks of propaganda and lies.”