Trials: Journalists Charged with Hooliganism and Unsanctioned Demos

Min­sk

Mask­ous­ki dis­trict court, judge Tat­siana Motyl, lawyer Larysa Ata­manchuk:

Ali­ak­san­dr Barazen­ka, cam­era­man of Bel­sat, spent the week­end in pre-tri­al deten­tion. Charged with arti­cle 17. 1 (hooli­gan­ism).

There were motions to take pho­tos and video in court; the judge reject­ed. Ali­ak­san­dr Barazen­ka plead­ed non-guilty, claim­ing he had been per­form­ing pro­fes­sion­al duties of a jour­nal­ist, which he under­lined in the police’s report. He was detained close to Vic­to­ry Square togeth­er with a group of oth­er pro­test­ers. He sev­er­al times indi­cat­ed him­self as a jour­nal­ist, but the detain­ing police offi­cers ignored this. The jour­nal­ist was sen­tenced to 15 days’ arrest.

He tried to get the wit­ness caught on the fact that the wit­ness — Mikhail Varyvonchyk, a riot police­man of the Min­sk City Exec­u­tive Com­mit­tee police depart­ment — did not remem­ber the jour­nal­ist’s appear­ance. The jour­nal­ist also asked the police­man to write down what exact­ly foul words the jour­nal­ist had spo­ken. The judge also saw the video which showed the jour­nal­ist at the moment of deten­tion.

Frun­zen­s­ki dis­trict court:

Edi­tor of the web­site Inform­Na­palm Dia­n­is Ivashyn. Charged with art. 23.34 (vio­lat­ing the pro­ce­dure for orga­niz­ing or hold­ing mass events). He spent the week­end in pre-tri­al deten­tion at Akrestsi­na.

Savet­s­ki dis­trict court: judge Dzmit­ry Zhdanok

Mary­na Kastylian­chanka, jour­nal­ist con­tribut­ing to human rights orga­ni­za­tions. On March 25, the police searched her flat, after which she was tak­en to pre-tri­al deten­tion. Charged with art. 23.4 (dis­obe­di­ence to police’s demands). Her flat was searched fol­low­ing “infor­ma­tion that there could be explo­sives”. The police have not found any­thing, but detained her for dis­obe­di­ence, reports Vias­na. At the police depart­ment, she was rec­og­nized as a par­tic­i­pant of an ear­li­er action, on March 15. Mary­na motioned to hold an expert exam­i­na­tion of the pho­to and to request infor­ma­tion from the cell phone oper­a­tor about where she had been on that day. The judge dis­missed the motion and found her guilty on both the charges. Sen­tenced to 15 days’ arrest.

Lenin­s­ki dis­trict court, judge Tat­siana Darash­chonak:

Jour­nal­ist and blog­ger Raman Prata­se­vich was detained at Kas­trych­nit­skaya Square on March 26. Charged with art. 17.1 accord­ing to two reports, for March 25 and 26. Spent a night in deten­tion.

The judge declined the motion to watch the video prov­ing that dur­ing deten­tion the jour­nal­ist was not speak­ing obscene lan­guage and did not wave hands. Sen­tenced to 10 days’ arrest.

Viteb­sk

Pavel Lev­in­au, Kanstantsin Mardzv­intsau and Leanid Svet­sik face charges under art. 23.34. They spent a night in deten­tion.

Pavel Lev­in­au had been hos­pi­tal­ized with a hyper­ton­ic cri­sis. He is BAJ mem­ber, lawyer and human rights activist. The Belaru­sian Helsin­ki Com­mit­tee was going to file an urgent appeal against arbi­trary deten­tion to the Spe­cial Rap­por­teur on defense of human rights defend­ers.

BAJ mem­ber and human rights defend­er Leanid Svet­sik was sen­tenced to 15 days’ arrest.

Kanstantsin Mardzv­intsau was sen­tenced to 15 days’ arrest.

Art­siom Siz­intsau, Radio Racy­ja, detained on March 25, spent the week­end in pre-tri­al deten­tion, charged with art. 23.34 and was sen­tenced to 10 days’ arrest.

Polatsk

Vik­tar Stukau, charged with art. 17.1, fined for 20 basic amounts, had served pre-tri­al deten­tion. 

Chart on tri­als on March 27

* CoAV – Code of Admin­is­tra­tive Vio­la­tions

art. 23.4 – Dis­obe­di­ence to police’s demands

art. 23.34 – Vio­lat­ing the pro­ce­dure for orga­niz­ing or hold­ing a mass event

art. 22.9 – The law stip­u­lates that a for­eign mass medium’s jour­nal­ist means “a nat­ur­al per­son engaged in col­lec­tion, edit­ing, cre­ation (prepa­ra­tion) of infor­ma­tion­al reports and/or mate­ri­als for a legal per­son which is entrust­ed with func­tions of the edi­to­r­i­al board of the mass medi­um, reg­is­tered out­side the Repub­lic of Belarus, who is con­nect­ed with this legal per­son through labor rela­tions and has accred­i­ta­tion in the Repub­lic of Belarus.”

art. 17. 1 – Minor hooli­gan­ism.