{"id":46869,"date":"2023-05-17T11:27:17","date_gmt":"2023-05-17T08:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/api.pozirk.online\/articles\/update-on-arrests-trials-politically-motivated-persecution\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T20:29:13","slug":"update-on-arrests-trials-politically-motivated-persecution","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/46869\/","title":{"rendered":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n <b>May 17, <span>BPN<\/span>.<\/b> New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on May 16 as authorities harassed ordinary Belarusians and imprisoned activists.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Arrests\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Police arrested at least a dozen people in Hrodna but did not disclose their names and charges against them, MAYDAY TEAM reported. Human rights defenders link the arrests to subscriptions to opposition media.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Reportedly, one of the arrested is Ludmi\u0142a Sakovi\u010d, a department head at the local Priorbank branch, the Viasna Human Rights Center said. Authorities accuse her of sharing opposition content, donating money to the BySol solidarity fund and signing up for the opposition Pieramoha Plan.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Barber Pavie\u0142 \u0160pako\u016dski was arrested in Horki, Mahilo\u016d region, for allegedly participating in protests and insulting police officers and Alaksandr \u0141uka\u0161enka, <span>Na\u0161a Niva <\/span>reported. The date of his arrest and the exact charges against him remain unclear.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Criminal proceedings\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t The Minsk City Court sentenced former police special forces officer Jan Papkovi\u010d to four years in prison for participating in protests and intentions to participate in armed conflict in a foreign country, Viasna said.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t On April 5, a district court in Minsk sentenced Juryj Ma\u0161ok and his daughter Valeryja to two years of restricted freedom in home confinement in connection with protests.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Trials\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t The \u010ca\u0161niki District Court in the Viciebsk region fined a local woman 1,850 rubels (over $630) for a picture of a white-red-white cake that she posted online, Mediazona reported. The judge found her guilty of participating in an unauthorized mass event.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t A court in the Valo\u017eyn district, Minsk region, acquitted a local resident who had shot a TikTok video featuring \u017dyvie Belarus (Long Live Belarus) slogan. The man pleaded not guilty at the hearing on April 28 saying that he used the slogan to denigrate the opposition.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Other instances of persecution\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t The jailed leader of the Belarusian Popular Front, Ryhor Kastusio\u016d, was hospitalized on April 27 and was still in hospital on May 11, his son-in-law D\u017amitryj Anton\u010dyk wrote on Facebook. His family says he is battling cancer. Authorities sentenced Kastusio\u016d, 66, to 10 years in prison in a high-profile coup d\u2019\u00e9tat case.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Prominent opposition politician Mika\u0142aj Statkievi\u010d currently serving a lengthy prison term was isolated from other inmates and deprived of visits and parcels for six months, his wife Maryna Adamovi\u010d wrote on Facebook. She did not have any information about her husband for 95 days and does not receive letters from him.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t Prison authorities placed jailed opposition activist Palina \u0160arenda-Panasiuk in a punishment cell, her husband Andrej \u0160arenda said on Facebook. She is currently serving a three-year prison term on charges widely seen as politically motivated. In the past 11 months, she was punished 20 times and spent a total of 200 days in a punishment cell.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t The whereabouts and condition of jailed former presidential hopeful Viktar Babaryka remain unknown since April 28, his team&#8217;s Telegram channel says. Neither the interior ministry\u2019s correctional facilities nor prison hospitals confirmed his presence.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n\t As of May 4, human rights defenders identified at least 1,480 political prisoners.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>May 17, BPN. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on May 16 as authorities harassed ordinary Belarusians and imprisoned activists. Arrests Police arrested at least a dozen people in Hrodna but did not disclose their names and charges against them, MAYDAY TEAM reported. Human rights defenders link the arrests to subscriptions to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":75,"featured_media":0,"template":"","rubric":[16],"class_list":["post-46869","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>Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"May 17, BPN. 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New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on May 16 as authorities harassed ordinary Belarusians and","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\/46869\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk","og_description":"May 17, BPN. 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