Belarus sentences several activists as crackdown over dissent continues

Vadalaskaya was found guilty on June 7 by Min­sk’s Zavodz­ki dis­trict court of the orga­ni­za­tion and prepa­ra­tion of activ­i­ties that dis­rupt­ed social order.

She was sen­tenced to 30 months in open prison, a sys­tem known across the for­mer Sovi­et Union as «khimiya» (chem­istry), a term that dates to the late 1940s when con­victs were sent to work at dan­ger­ous facil­i­ties such as chem­i­cal fac­to­ries and ura­ni­um mines while liv­ing in spe­cial near­by dor­mi­to­ries instead of being incar­cer­at­ed in pen­i­ten­tiaries.

These days a khimiya sen­tence is seen as less harsh as a con­vict will stay in a dor­mi­to­ry not far from their per­ma­nent address and work either at their work­place as usu­al or at a state enti­ty defined by the pen­i­ten­tiary ser­vice.

In a sep­a­rate case on sim­i­lar charges at the cen­tral dis­trict court in Min­sk, pros­e­cu­tors asked for a 30-month open-prison sen­tence for Kolb, edi­tor of the Min­sk-based inde­pen­dent week­ly Novy Chas (New Time).

Novy Chas report­ed that rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Swedish, Czech, and Ger­man embassies in Min­sk were not allowed to attend the tri­al. Belaru­sian human rights groups have rec­og­nized Kolb as a polit­i­cal pris­on­er since she was arrest­ed on April 20.

The cas­es high­light Lukashenka’s harsh, and some­times vio­lent, crack­down against any dis­sent since the elec­tion, which oppo­si­tion mem­bers say was rigged.

The 67-year-old, who has been in pow­er since 1994, has direct­ed the cam­paign to arrest tens of thou­sands of peo­ple. Fear­ing for their safe­ty, most oppo­si­tion mem­bers have been forced to flee the coun­try.

In anoth­er tri­al that began on June 7, this one in the south­east­ern city of Homel, a court began a hear­ing against Russ­ian cit­i­zen Andrei Pod­neben­ny, who is charged with ter­ror­ism, attempt­ing to dam­age pri­vate prop­er­ty, and the cre­ation of an extrem­ist group. All charges are relat­ed to Pod­neben­ny’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in anti-Lukashen­ka ral­lies in the city.

Mean­while, a for­mer lec­tur­er at the Depart­ment of Ital­ian Lan­guage at the Min­sk State Lin­guis­tic Uni­ver­si­ty, Natallya Duli­na, was sen­tenced to 15 days in jail on hooli­gan­ism charges that she has reject­ed. That is Duli­na’s third 15-day jail sen­tence for actions relat­ed to protests over Rus­si­a’s inva­sion of Ukraine in late Feb­ru­ary.

In the east­ern city of Babruysk, jour­nal­ist Dzmit­ry Sus­lau on June 7 was sen­tenced to 15 days in jail for the «dis­tri­b­u­tion of false mate­ri­als» about Ukraine war.

Sev­er­al oth­ers were also con­vict­ed on sim­i­lar charges as author­i­ties try to keep a lid on protests relat­ed to the war.

Lukashen­ka has allowed Rus­sia to use Belarus ter­ri­to­ry to stage the inva­sion of Ukraine.

The West has refused to rec­og­nize the results of the elec­tion and does not con­sid­er Lukashen­ka to be the coun­try’s legit­i­mate leader. Many coun­tries have imposed sev­er­al rounds of sanc­tions against his regime in response to the sup­pres­sion of dis­sent in the coun­try.

Коллеги в тюрьмах. Напишите им письмо поддержки АКТУАЛЬНЫЕ АДРЕСА

У закрытым рэжыме пачаўся працэс па «справе БелаПАН»