Nexta trial to begin on February 16

February 2, BPN. The Supreme Court says the Minisk Regional Court will try journalists Ściapan Puciła and Jan Rudzik on February 16 without the defendants being present.

The Prosecutor General’s Office referred the case against Puciła, the Nexta media project founder, and journalists Rudzik and Raman Pratasievič to court in late 2022. It accused them of forming an extremist group, staging mass riots, calling for the seizure of power and other crimes punishable by long prison sentences.

Citing state interests, the prosecutors also demanded that the accused pay 30 million rubels (some $11 million) for property damage. They said that Pratasievič remains under house arrest in Belarus, and that EU-based Puciła and Rudzik would be tried in absentia.

The Supreme Court, however, hasn’t mentioned Pratasievič in its press release.

Belarusian investigators said he accepted a plea bargain, and his future is unclear.