Opposition content branded extremist

February 17, BPN. A court in Homiel blacklisted a website and pages linked to the outlawed Belarusian Social Democratic Party (Narodnaja Hramada) and its leader Mikałaj Statkievič, the information ministry’s website says.

Statkievič has been in custody since May 2020. In December 2021, authorities sentenced him to 14 years in prison for allegedly staging protests.

The blacklisted content includes Hramada’s social media pages as well as pages of its regional offices in Brest and Mahiloŭ and Statkievič’s website statkevich.org.

On February 7, a court in Mahiloŭ also blacklisted an article about 2020 protests in Belarus published in a Russian journal. On the next day, a court in Brest branded as extremist a song by Belarusian punk rock band Daj Darohu! and its video clip.

Authorities also banned the zrblmn88-rezerv Telegram channel with 15 subscribers, the litvinby TikTok page, and a local Telegram channel from Maładziečna, Minsk region.