Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution

July 5, BPN. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on July 4 as human rights groups recorded a spike in the government’s crackdown on dissenters.

Arrests

Police arrested a Ukrainian national for allegedly inciting ethnic hatred and spreading fakes online, the Viasna Human Rights Center reported.

Criminal proceedings

The Minsk City Court sentenced Andrej Famin to seven years in a medium-security prison for publishing the Vestniki samizdat periodical that authorities labeled extremist.

A judge sentenced a 23-year-old resident of Astraviec district, Hrodna region, to two years in prison for alleged intentions to join Belarusian volunteers fighting Russia in Ukraine.

Pavieł Mažejka, journalist and urban activist, will go on trial in Hrodna on July 10, BPN reported. Authorities accuse him of promoting extremism. No further details of his case are available as his lawyer was forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement.

Ksienija Alkienava, an IT company employee, will be tried on the same day at the Minsk City Court for donating $425 via Facebook to opposition initiatives in 2020-2021, Viasna said.

The trial of Dźmitryj Bohuš, deputy chair of Technobank, will open on July 12 in Minsk. He faces charges of inciting hatred and slandering Alaksandr Łukašenka, according to Viasna.

The first hearing in the case against Mikita Bruj, 17, is scheduled for July 5 at the Minsk Regional Court, Mediazona reported. The teenager is accused of creating an extremist group and rehabilitating Nazism.

The Supreme Court upheld the four-year prison sentence for Kanstancin Załatych, Mediarynok CEO and director of the business monthly Belorusy i Rynok, the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) reported.

New political prisoners

Belarusian human rights groups declared nine more people political prisoners, saying that authorities misinterpreted their right to freedom of expression as defamation and desecration of state symbols, Viasna said. 

Other instances of persecution

On July 7, a court in Ivacevičy, Brest region, will decide on the transfer of jailed activist Alaksandr Aranovič from a colony to a prison. He is currently serving a six-year term on charges widely seen as politically motivated.

Viasna recorded the intensification of government’s crackdown on dissenters, with more than 560 people detained on political grounds and nearly 409 cases of persecution for alleged minor offenses in June.

As of July 5, human rights defenders identified at least 1,496 political prisoners but the real number is considerably higher because many cases go undocumented. Opposition sources estimate the number of political prisoners at around 5,000.