BelaPAN’s editor in chief marks another birthday in prison

November 29, Pozirk. BelaPAN editor in chief Iryna Leŭšyna is celebrating her birthday behind bars on November 29. She has been in custody for 834 days.

Police arrested her and her colleague Dźmitryj Navažyłaŭ on August 18, 2021. In October 2022, authorities sentenced Leŭšyna to four years in prison on charges of forming and running an extremist group. Human rights groups consider her a political prisoner.

Her associates Navažyłaŭ, Andrej Alaksandraŭ and Alaksandraŭ’s wife Iryna Złobina were also given lengthy prison terms on charges of participating in protests, tax evasion and association with an extremist group.

In January 2023, the Supreme Court rejected Leŭšyna’s appeal. She is serving her prison term at a women’s prison in Homiel where she works as a seamstress. She now can retire as she has turned 58.

“The most difficult thing for me here is being away from Minsk,” she admitted in one of her letters. “At the previous place [of detention] I was comforted by the thought that my home is very close to me . . . Geography matters even if you are isolated.”

German MP Merle Spellerberg, Leŭšyna’s symbolic godmother, has repeatedly spoken out in defense of the journalist.