BelaPAN staff searched and interrogated Accountant, director and former director of the news agency have been detained

Illus­tra­tive pho­to Search in Min­sk on Feb­ru­ary 16, 2021

Jour­nal­ist Iry­na Turchy­na, edi­tor of Bela­PAN’s web news­pa­per Naviny.by Alexan­der Zait­sau and the com­pa­ny’s accoun­tant Kat­siary­na Boye­va man­aged to inform the pub­lic about the raids in their homes.

Bela­PAN accoun­tant Kat­siary­na Boye­va has been placed in the deten­tion cen­ter at Akrestsi­na Street. She is sus­pect­ed under Part 1 of Arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code (orga­ni­za­tion and prepa­ra­tion of actions that gross­ly vio­late pub­lic order, or active par­tic­i­pa­tion in them), her hus­band reports.

Bela­PAN’s for­mer direc­tor Dmit­ry Novozhilov has also been placed in the deten­tion cen­ter.

The police also raid­ed the apart­ment of the Bela­PAN direc­tor Iry­na Leushy­na. After that, she was tak­en to the Bela­PAN office for a search there, and then for ques­tion­ing by the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee.

Leushy­na, Bela­PAN’s direc­tor and edi­tor-in-chief, was detained for 72 hours. .

After the inter­ro­ga­tion, she will be tak­en to the Akrestsi­na deten­tion cen­ter. A lawyer was allowed to see her.

After the search at home of Bela­PAN jour­nal­ist Zakhar Shchar­bak­ou, he was tak­en for ques­tion­ing. «The search is over. My hus­band, Bela­PAN jour­nal­ist Zakhar Shchar­bak­ou, was tak­en away for ques­tion­ing,» Ele­na, his wife, post­ed on Face­book. After the inter­ro­ga­tion, Shchar­bak­ou was released.

Deputy edi­tor-in-chief of Bela­PANAlexan­der Zait­sau had his equip­ment seized, but was not detained.

Accord­ing to Zait­sau, the search last­ed for about an hour as part of the case under Arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code. There were sev­en peo­ple in the search team: two employ­ees of the Depart­ment for Fight­ing Eco­nom­ic Crime, their super­vi­sor (pos­si­bly from anoth­er unit), two spe­cial force offi­cers in full equip­ment, and two wit­ness­es.

They took away a mobile phone, a com­put­er hard dri­ve, an old tablet, as well as an edi­to­r­i­al ID and sev­er­al busi­ness cards. The case is being han­dled by the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee. Alexan­der Zait­sau was not detained, but signed an under­tak­ing to appear. His pro­ce­dur­al sta­tus was not explained to him.

12: 50 The for­mer direc­tor of Bela­PAN Dmit­ry Novozhilov was searched and tak­en for ques­tion­ing.

After the ques­tion­ing he was placed in the deten­tion cen­ter.

Novozhilov became act­ing direc­tor, and lat­er direc­tor of Bela­PAN after the death of its founder Ales Lipai in August 2018. In Jan­u­ary 2021, Novozhilov left the com­pa­ny by his own voli­tion.

13: 00 Bela­PAN jour­nal­istIry­na Turchy­na was released after ques­tion­ing. Her phone was seized from her.

She told about the search in her home.

They came at 7 am, the search last­ed for about two hours. . The search war­rant spec­i­fied arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code. They seized all dig­i­tal media — a com­put­er, a mobile phone, flash dri­ves, a voice recorder and a note­book.

After the search, they took her to Min­sk City Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee for ques­tion­ing, where she refused to tes­ti­fy. She signed a non-dis­clo­sure agree­ment and was released. Turchy­na remains a wit­ness in a crim­i­nal case.