Criminal case of Yury Drakakhrust, Hanna Liubakova, and 18 other defendants forwarded to Prosecutor General

The Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee has report­ed the com­ple­tion of the pre­lim­i­nary inves­ti­ga­tion against twen­ty ‘ana­lysts of Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya’, who are rec­og­nized in Belarus as an ‘extrem­ist for­ma­tion’. The crim­i­nal case involves mul­ti­ple defen­dants, includ­ing jour­nal­ists Yury Drakakhrust and Han­na Liubako­va.

Illus­tra­tion image. Source: pexels.com

The defen­dants also include polit­i­cal observers and ana­lysts: Ryhor Astape­nia, Fil­ip Bikanau, Ali­ak­san­dr Dabravol­s­ki, Andrei Kaza­ke­vich, Han­na Kra­suli­na, Yauhen Kryzhanous­ki, Dzia­n­is Kuchyn­s­ki, Verani­ka Laput­ska, Ali­ak­san­dr Lahvinets, Vasil Nau­mau, Maria Roha­va, Piotr Rud­k­ous­ki, Ale­sia Rud­nik, Natal­lia Raba­va, Pavel Usau, Tat­siana Chulit­skaya, Ali­ak­san­dr Shlyk, Kat­siary­na Shmatsi­na.

The tri­al will be orga­nized as “spe­cial pro­ceed­ings” because all the defen­dants are out­side Belarus, accord­ing to the telegram chan­nel of the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee. The web­site of the Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee out­lines the charges against 20 mem­bers of the extrem­ist for­ma­tion ‘Ana­lysts of Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya’.

The inves­ti­ga­tion revealed that the ana­lysts, under the guid­ance of for­eign super­vi­sors, devel­oped strate­gies and tac­tics to sup­press the cur­rent Belaru­sian author­i­ties. They also pre­pared the­ses for pub­lic speech­es made by Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya and “pub­li­ca­tions on super­vised destruc­tive resources.” These efforts were aimed at “acti­vat­ing protest sen­ti­ments, deep­en­ing the split in Belaru­sian soci­ety, and increas­ing polit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic pres­sure on the Repub­lic of Belarus”.

On Jan­u­ary 25th of this year, inves­ti­ga­tors began ‘spe­cial pro­ceed­ings’ against 20 indi­vid­u­als who were declared to be part of an ‘extrem­ist for­ma­tion’. The crim­i­nal charges include sev­er­al arti­cles:

- Arti­cle 16, para­graph 6 and Arti­cle 130, para­graph 3, of the Crim­i­nal Code that pro­hib­it the facil­i­ta­tion of delib­er­ate acts aimed at incit­ing social hatred and dis­cord based on social affil­i­a­tion by a group of per­sons.

- Arti­cle 357, para­graph 1, of the Crim­i­nal Code that crim­i­nal­izes con­spir­a­cy to seize state pow­er through uncon­sti­tu­tion­al means.

- Arti­cle 16, para­graph 6, and Arti­cle 361, para­graph 3, of the Crim­i­nal Code that pro­hib­it the facil­i­ta­tion of pub­lic appeals to seize state pow­er or com­mit oth­er acts that harm the nation­al secu­ri­ty of the Repub­lic of Belarus, as well as the use of mass media and the inter­net to appeal to a for­eign state, for­eign orga­ni­za­tion, or inter­na­tion­al orga­ni­za­tion to com­mit acts that harm the nation­al secu­ri­ty of the Repub­lic of Belarus is also pro­hib­it­ed.

- Arti­cle 361–1, para­graph 1, of the Crim­i­nal Code that crim­i­nal­izes lead­er­ship in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion and its struc­tur­al sub­di­vi­sion.

- Arti­cle 361–1, part 3, of the Crim­i­nal Code that pro­hibits join­ing an extrem­ist for­ma­tion to com­mit an extrem­ist crime (par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion).

The Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee has for­ward­ed the case to the Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al for fur­ther sub­mis­sion to the court.

The IC reports that the prop­er­ty belong­ing to ‘ana­lysts of Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya’, includ­ing apart­ments, hous­es, and land plots, has been seized to com­pen­sate for the dam­age caused.