{"id":45230,"date":"2023-01-07T19:21:05","date_gmt":"2023-01-07T16:21:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/api.pozirk.online\/articles\/un-human-rights-office-demands-release-of-viasna-leaders\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","slug":"un-human-rights-office-demands-release-of-viasna-leaders","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/45230\/","title":{"rendered":"UN human rights office demands release of Viasna leaders"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n <b>January 7,<span> BPN<\/span>. <\/b>Belarusian authorities must release Ales Bialacki and his associates Valancin Stefanovi\u010d, U\u0142adzimir \u0141abkovi\u010d, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t \u201cSuffice to say that we consider these to be arbitrary arrests &#8211; constitute arbitrary detention &#8211; and the charges are simply politically motivated,&#8221; OHCHR spokesperson Jeremy Laurence told journalists on January 6.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t The trial of the Viasna Human Rights Center&#8217;s leaders opened on January 5 at the Leninski District Court in Minsk.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Authorities accuse Bialacki of smuggling cash across the border and financing protests. His associates Stefanovi\u010d and \u0141abkovi\u010d are tried as part of the same case, while \u0179micier Sa\u0142a\u016djo\u016d, who has fled the country, is tried in absentia.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Bialacki, Stefanovi\u010d and \u0141abkovi\u010d were arrested in July 2021 on tax evasion charges, which were dropped in September 2022, only to be followed by accusations of smuggling.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Last October, Bialacki won the Nobel Peace Prize together with human rights organizations Memorial, Russia, and Center for Civil Liberties, Ukraine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>January 7, BPN. Belarusian authorities must release Ales Bialacki and his associates Valancin Stefanovi\u010d, U\u0142adzimir \u0141abkovi\u010d, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). \u201cSuffice to say that we consider these to be arbitrary arrests &#8211; constitute arbitrary detention &#8211; and the charges are simply politically motivated,&#8221; OHCHR spokesperson Jeremy Laurence [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":75,"featured_media":0,"template":"","rubric":[16],"class_list":["post-45230","articles","type-articles","status-publish","hentry","rubric-politics"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>UN human rights office demands release of Viasna leaders | Pozirk<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"January 7, BPN. 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Belarusian authorities must release Ales Bialacki and his associates Valancin Stefanovi\u010d, U\u0142adzimir \u0141abkovi\u010d, the Office of the United","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/45230\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"UN human rights office demands release of Viasna leaders | Pozirk","og_description":"January 7, BPN. 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