Imprisoned journalist Dzmitry Navazhylau likely remains behind bars despite being on “pardon list”

Among the 250 peo­ple par­doned by Belaru­sian author­i­ties on March 19 were sev­er­al inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ists. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, for­mer Bela­PAN news agency direc­tor Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau, whose name appeared on the release list, was not freed. As of March 31, there has been no con­tact with him.

Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau. Pho­to: facebook.com/veratinsky

Fol­low­ing the March 19 vis­it to Min­sk by John Coale, spe­cial envoy of U.S. Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, Belaru­sian author­i­ties announced the par­don and release of 250 polit­i­cal pris­on­ers. Fif­teen were tak­en to Lithua­nia the same day, while 235 remain in Belarus.

Among those released ear­ly and deport­ed to Lithua­nia were jour­nal­ist Kat­siary­na Bakhvala­va (Andreye­va) and blog­ger Eduard Palchys.

The list of pris­on­ers who were par­doned but allowed to remain in Belarus includ­ed the names of media work­ers: Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau, Aleh Suprun­yuk, Ali­ak­san­dr Marchanka, Valeryia Kast­si­uho­va, and Anton Kazel­s­ki.

As of March 31, noth­ing is known about Dzmit­ry Navazhylau’s release. He appears to remain in the cor­rec­tion­al facil­i­ty.

Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau is the for­mer direc­tor of the Bela­PAN news agency and a defen­dant in the crim­i­nal case against media employ­ees. He was detained on August 18, 2021. On Octo­ber 6, 2022, he was sen­tenced to 6 years in prison for “par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion” and “tax eva­sion.”

The BelaPAN case

The tri­al of Bela­PAN employ­ees began on June 6, 2022. A recess was then announced for “expert exam­i­na­tion,” and the tri­al resumed at the end of Sep­tem­ber until the final hear­ing.

Secu­ri­ty forces searched Iry­na Leushy­na, Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau, and sev­er­al oth­er cur­rent and for­mer Bela­PAN employ­ees on August 18, 2021. They also searched the news agency’s Min­sk office. Near­ly 50 pieces of equip­ment were seized, includ­ing servers, lap­tops, hard dri­ves, and account­ing doc­u­ments.

Iry­na Leushy­na and Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau were ini­tial­ly detained under Arti­cle 342 for alleged­ly orga­niz­ing actions that dis­rupt pub­lic order. The charges were lat­er changed to large-scale tax eva­sion, with an addi­tion­al count for cre­at­ing or par­tic­i­pat­ing in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion.

Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau and Iry­na Zlobi­na had been behind bars since Jan­u­ary 12, 2021. They were for­mal­ly detained for “enabling oth­er indi­vid­u­als to par­tic­i­pate in riots.” This was based on pay­ment of admin­is­tra­tive fines for par­tic­i­pa­tion in protests.

Soon, the cas­es of the four defen­dants became inter­twined. Jour­nal­ists Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau, Iry­na Leushy­na, and Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau were charged with “cre­at­ing and oper­at­ing an extrem­ist for­ma­tion,” although all were detained before the State Secu­ri­ty Committee’s deci­sion. Bela­PAN was des­ig­nat­ed an “extrem­ist for­ma­tion” by the KGB more than two months after Leushy­na and Navazhylau’s deten­tion, on Novem­ber 1, 2021.

For Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau and Iry­na Zlobi­na, the charge of “financ­ing protests” was sup­ple­ment­ed with “high trea­son.” Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau and Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau were list­ed as sus­pect­ed of fail­ing to pay $200,000 in tax­es. The penal­ties from all charges were used to cal­cu­late the final prison terms.

Dur­ing the tri­al, none of the defen­dants admit­ted guilt, and human rights defend­ers declared them all polit­i­cal pris­on­ers.