Death row inmate’s execution in July 2022 confirmed

February 17, BPN. Viktar Skrundzik was executed on July 16, 2022, Viasna’s Human Rights Defenders Against the Death Penalty campaign said citing its sources.

Authorities convicted Skrundzik in March 2020 of multiple murders and attempted murder. Three residents of the Słuck district tried in the same case were given lengthy prison terms.

A few months later, the Supreme Court overturned the death sentence on appeal, but the Minsk Regional Court sentenced the man to death again in January 2021.

Human rights defenders still do not have any information about Viktar Sierhiel, another death row inmate convicted in October 2019. An appeal court upheld his sentence in January 2020.

“The death penalty has always been under a veil of secrecy and monitoring these cases is even more difficult nowadays,” said Andrej Pałuda, the campaign’s coordinator. He did not rule out more executions in 2022.

Belarus is the only country in Europe to use the death penalty. About 400 inmates have been executed over the past 20 years. Only two are known to have been pardoned.