Pozirk branded “extremist” content

April 28, BPN. The Minsk’s Centralny District Court branded Pozirk, a media project associated with the outlawed BelaPAN news agency, as extremist content on April 21.

The information ministry has updated its register of extremist content on April 28, adding websites and social media accounts affiliated with Pozirk, including its pages on Facebook, Telegram, YouTube, streaming platforms and bpn-info.online.

The Svietłahorsk District Court in the Homiel region also blacklisted Naviny – Novosti Belarusi, a group in the Odnoklassniki social network associated with BelaPAN. Its most recent post dates back to November 2021.

BelaPAN was the first media outlet branded an extremist group by Belarusian authorities in November 2021.

The Committee for State Security (KGB) blacklisted the private news agency on November 1, weeks before its 30th anniversary. The editorial staff immediately suspended its operation to protect BelaPAN and Naviny.by journalists.

By that time, BelaPAN editor in chief Iryna Leŭšyna and former CEO Dźmitryj Navažyłaŭ had been in custody for almost three months, and its former deputy head Andrej Alaksandraŭ, for ten months. They faced a number of politically-motivated charges ranging from participating in protests to treason. Later, investigators accused the journalists of creating and running an extremist group.

In October 2022, Leŭšyna was given a four-year prison term on the extremist charge; Navažyłaŭ, four years out of the aggregate six-year prison term on the same charge, and Alaksandraŭ, five years out of 14. The journalists denied the charge, dismissing the accusations as the government’s attempt to silence its critics.