Aid to the Belarusan writer and journalist Sergei Antonov

Hel­lo!

My name is Sergei Antonov. I am a Belaru­sian jour­nal­ist and fic­tion writer.

As a fic­tion writer I am known for par­tic­i­pa­tion in the project “Metro 2033 Uni­verse”. Nine nov­els of this series came out from under my pen. Anoth­er of my nov­els “Sta­bi­liz­er. Min­sk 2041” was pub­lished in Lithua­nia. It tells about the col­lapse of the Belaru­san dic­ta­tor­ship. My books were also pub­lished in Ger­many, Poland, Hun­gary, South Korea.

My jour­nal­is­tic activ­i­ty is con­nect­ed with the por­tals 6tv.by and Mogilev.media, where I told about the events in Mogilev region and had an author’s video col­umn. In addi­tion, I was the edi­tor of the inde­pen­dent small-cir­cu­la­tion news­pa­per “Stariy Zamok” in Bykhov.

In 2012, I was nom­i­nat­ed as a can­di­date from the BPF par­ty in the elec­tions to the Belaru­sian par­lia­ment. Lat­er, as a sign of protest against elec­tion fraud, I with­drew my can­di­da­cy.

On Novem­ber 29th last year the por­tal Mogilev.media, where I worked, was rec­og­nized as an extrem­ist for­ma­tion in Belarus. A few days lat­er, on Decem­ber 6th , KGB offi­cers searched my apart­ment and pri­vate pho­to stu­dio, which belongs to my son, and con­fis­cat­ed all the equip­ment. I was inter­ro­gat­ed for 8 hours, demand­ed to con­fess to coop­er­a­tion with the por­tal, and threat­ened with a long term of impris­on­ment. After the inter­ro­ga­tion, I was placed in Bykhov deten­tion cen­ter for two days.

On Decem­ber 11, with the help of the BYSOL team, I left Belarus in an emer­gency (almost with­out mon­ey and with a min­i­mum of belong­ings). On Decem­ber 26, I found out that the law enforcers had detained my son — now he is in the pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter. In addi­tion, KGB offi­cers came to my elder­ly moth­er and called my rel­a­tives, demand­ing to tell my exact where­abouts.

Now I am in Poland. Here I applied for refugee sta­tus and for the next month and a half I will live in a shel­ter for Belaru­sians. But then I need to set­tle down, and the prob­lem is that a month is crit­i­cal­ly short to solve all the issues.

You can donate to Syarhei Antonov here

I am ask­ing for finan­cial help so that I could have more time to set­tle in. This will help me to relieve the stress of the sud­den move, to get involved in jour­nal­is­tic work and to con­tin­ue the new nov­el I have start­ed.

How much is needed?

€2000

€1000 — accom­mo­da­tion for 2–3 months
€1000 — liv­ing expens­es and a safe­ty cush­ion

Read more:

E‑NEWSLETTER: MASS MEDIA IN BELARUS IN 2023

Extremism and media

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