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A warn­ing is cir­cu­lat­ing in the Belaru­sian infor­ma­tion space about a sus­pi­cious account whose author presents him­self as a BBC jour­nal­ist, though his con­nec­tion to the British broad­cast­er has not been con­firmed.

This occurred over the past three and a half months — after April 2026, though the exact dates are unknown.

Zmitser Salauy­ou, who left his home­land due to polit­i­cal per­se­cu­tion for his pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ties, learned of the Belaru­sian author­i­ties’ request from the Pol­ish prosecutor’s office.

Six years on from the fraud­u­lent Belaru­sian elec­tions of 9 August 2020, the crack­down on press free­dom in Belarus has inten­si­fied, with 21 jour­nal­ists cur­rent­ly impris­oned and those in exile fac­ing intim­i­da­tion. The Inter­na­tion­al and Euro­pean Fed­er­a­tions of Jour­nal­ists (IFJ-EFJ) joins their affil­i­ate, the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists (BAJ), in call­ing for an end to the crim­i­nal­i­sa­tion of jour­nal­ists, […]

Over the past two months, the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists has been receiv­ing reg­u­lar reports of pres­sure on the par­ents, rel­a­tives, and even friends and acquain­tances of jour­nal­ists who were forced to flee Belarus. 

Secur­ing the release of jour­nal­ists impris­oned for their pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ties is a mat­ter of fun­da­men­tal impor­tance. How­ev­er, recent prac­tice has shown that this process does not always serve the inter­ests of the detainees them­selves — par­tic­u­lar­ly when it is con­di­tioned on their forced expul­sion from Belarus. Down­load PDF.

Andrei Kudzinien­ka, a direc­tor and doc­u­men­tary film­mak­er for Bel­sat TV, has been forced to leave Belarus under threat of crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion. The news was report­ed on Face­book by his friend, art man­ag­er and direc­tor Janusz Gawry­luk.

Kurlovich works with Malan­ka Media and does not con­ceal this fact — her pho­to­graph can even be found on the outlet’s home­page under the “Team” tab. But an unknown indi­vid­ual who iden­ti­fied him­self as a KGB offi­cer did not approach her direct­ly; instead, he called her via Telegram from her brother’s num­ber.

A sol­i­dar­i­ty action was held at the Tuta­ka Fes­ti­val in sup­port of impris­oned jour­nal­ist Ihar Ilyash, who marked his birth­day behind bars on July 18, and in sup­port of oth­er impris­oned jour­nal­ists in Belarus.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the human rights com­mu­ni­ty of Belarus have pub­lished a joint state­ment regard­ing sound engi­neer Yuriy Trashchyn­s­ki, who is charged under Part 3 of Arti­cle 361–1 of the Crim­i­nal Code of Belarus for “par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist group.” The sound engi­neer was charged with col­lab­o­rat­ing with the Belaru­sian Radio Racy­ja.

On July 17, the per­son­al details of Yury Trashchyn­s­ki, who was sen­tenced to prison, were added to the Belaru­sian Inte­ri­or Ministry’s list of indi­vid­u­als “linked to extrem­ist activ­i­ties.” The reg­istry indi­cates that the sound engi­neer is already serv­ing his sen­tence.

For­mer polit­i­cal pris­on­er and jour­nal­ist Pavel Mazhei­ka has told BAJ that as part of a new crim­i­nal case opened against him in Belarus, secu­ri­ty ser­vice offi­cers have been vis­it­ing not only his fam­i­ly mem­bers but also his acquain­tances.

The pri­ma­ry objec­tive of the mon­i­tor­ing is to ascer­tain and doc­u­ment the occur­rence, quan­ti­ty, con­tent, and form of pro-Russ­ian (includ­ing anti-West­ern and anti-Ukrain­ian) pro­pa­gan­da in the lead­ing Belaru­sian state-owned tele­vi­sion media.

For­mer polit­i­cal pris­on­er and ex-Radio Svabo­da jour­nal­ist Ihar Karnei has said that after his release and forced removal from Belarus, he found him­self abroad with­out valid doc­u­ments con­firm­ing his legal sta­tus.

Web­sites of at least six exiled Belaru­sian news out­lets and one jour­nal­ists’ asso­ci­a­tion have been tar­get­ed since March by dis­trib­uted denial-of-ser­vice (DDoS) attacks, which aim to over­whelm web­sites with floods of inter­net traf­fic.