{"id":56782,"date":"2023-12-21T13:05:13","date_gmt":"2023-12-21T10:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/api.pozirk.online\/?post_type=articles&#038;p=56782"},"modified":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","slug":"update-on-arrests-trials-politically-motivated-persecution-96","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/","title":{"rendered":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>December 21, <em>Pozirk<\/em>.<\/strong> New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people political prisoners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Arrested and released<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Police arrested a man from Nara\u010d, Minsk region, for allegedly commenting on politics and distributing &#8220;Nazi symbols,&#8221; pro-government Telegram channels said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Two Brest men are under arrest for participating in 2020 postelection protests, pro-government Telegram channels said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Authorities released U\u0142adzimir Hiemza after he had served a two-year prison term on charges of inciting hatred, a Telegram channel monitoring politically-motivated persecution in Lida, Hrodna region, reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trials<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alaksandar Lach and Viktar Pilipaj\u0107 from Lida were jailed for 10 days; Viktar \u0160ymul, for 15 days, the <em>Zaderzhaniya, Sudy v Lide<\/em> Telegram channel reported. Authorities accused all three of sharing opposition content and seized phones from \u0160ymul and Pilipaj\u0107.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Searches<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week, police searched Siarhiej Bialaje\u016d&#8217;s home in Babrujsk, Mahilo\u016d region, the Viasna Human Rights Center reported. The exiled activist was involved in observation during the 2020 presidential election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Criminal proceedings<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>IT engineer Alaksiej Navahrodski went on trial in Hrodna on December 18, <em>Na\u0161a Niva<\/em> reported. Authorities filed charges of high treason against him and closed the proceedings to the public. He had been living in Poland and Germany for a while and used to work on artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A judge in Brest sentenced Iryna Sanko\u016dskaja on December 14 to 18 months in prison for allegedly abusing the state symbols and insulting Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka and public officials, Viasna said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;Terrorist&#8221; list update<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Committee for State Security (KGB) added Aleh Jermakovi\u010d, Valancin \u0160termier, Alaksandar Piskuno\u016d, U\u0142adzimir Vora\u0161a\u0144, Alaksandar Ja\u0161kin and Alaksiej Ku\u017amin to its list of &#8220;organizations and individuals involved in terrorist activities,&#8221; <em>Pozirk<\/em> reported. Now the list has 1,111 entries and 1,165 names, including 397 Belarusians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;Extremist&#8221; content update<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A judge in Brest branded musician Lavon Volski\u2019s Instagram page as extremist content. Other blacklisted content includes several opposition social media pages and groups, among them Telegram channels and chats <em>Alhierdava Chata<\/em>, <em>Mikola Dziadok<\/em>, <em>Parlamentskiy Kanal<\/em>, <em>Creative Association of Anti-fascists<\/em>, <em>Bie\u0142aru\u015b Irredenta <\/em>as well as the <em>belarus2belarus<\/em>, <em>ganc_chas.by<\/em>, <em>Pier\u0161y Rehijon<\/em> and <em>supermovaby<\/em> Instagram accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>New political prisoners<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Belarusian human rights groups declared 16 more people political prisoners, <em>Pozirk <\/em>reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As of December 21, human rights defenders identified at least 1,478 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.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people political prisoners. Arrested and released Police arrested a man from Nara\u010d, Minsk region, for allegedly commenting on politics and distributing &#8220;Nazi symbols,&#8221; pro-government Telegram channels said. Two Brest men are under arrest for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"template":"","rubric":[16],"class_list":["post-56782","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=\"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Pozirk\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pozirkonline\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Pozirk_online\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"NewsArticle\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\"},\"headline\":\"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-21T10:05:13+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\"},\"wordCount\":403,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\",\"name\":\"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-21T10:05:13+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00\",\"description\":\"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/\",\"name\":\"Pozirk\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Pozirk\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/cropped-Logo_color_512.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/cropped-Logo_color_512.png\",\"width\":512,\"height\":512,\"caption\":\"Pozirk\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pozirkonline\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/Pozirk_online\"]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk","description":"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people","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\/56782\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk","og_description":"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people","og_url":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/","og_site_name":"Pozirk","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pozirkonline\/","article_modified_time":"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_site":"@Pozirk_online","twitter_misc":{"Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/"},"headline":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution","datePublished":"2023-12-21T10:05:13+00:00","dateModified":"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/"},"wordCount":403,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization"},"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/","url":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/","name":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution | Pozirk","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#website"},"datePublished":"2023-12-21T10:05:13+00:00","dateModified":"2026-03-09T20:10:49+00:00","description":"December 21, Pozirk. New cases of politically-motivated persecution were documented in Belarus on December 20 as rights groups declared 16 more people","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/56782\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Update on arrests, trials, politically-motivated persecution"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#website","url":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/","name":"Pozirk","description":"","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#organization","name":"Pozirk","url":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/cropped-Logo_color_512.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/cropped-Logo_color_512.png","width":512,"height":512,"caption":"Pozirk"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pozirkonline\/","https:\/\/x.com\/Pozirk_online"]}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/articles\/56782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/articles"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/articles"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"rubric","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rubric?post=56782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}