News

On August 27, the police detained the journalists covering events on Freedom and Independence Square in Minsk. They were taken to Kastrychnitski police department for checking their ids. Altogether, about 50 journalists were detained. The police released most of them after checking their documents. However, four journalists refused to give their smartphones to police for a check-up. Therefore, the police drew up reports with charges of participation in an unauthorized mass action. Katsiaryna Andreyeva, Maksim Harchanok, Aliaksandr Vasiukovich, and Andrei Yarashevich were left in custody until trial. Swedish journalist Paul Hansen will be deported. Swedish ambassador to Belarus Christina Johannesson came to the Kastrychnitski police station where the journalists were kept. Paul Hansen is to leave Belarus tomorrow. He is banned from travelling to Belarus for 5 years. BelaPAN journalist Tatsiana Karavenkova was taken to hospital by an ambulance.

On August 10, Yauhen Nikolayevich, a Media-Polesye reporter was detained while performing his professional duties. He was released on the night of August 16-17.

Alena Scharbinskaya, a correspondent with the independent satellite broadcaster Belsat TV, was among dozens of journalists detained last week in Belarus when protests erupted after the re-election of President Aleksandr Lukashenko, whose victory has been contested by many voters and the opposition. She was kept for three days in the now-infamous detention center known among locals as “Akrestsin,” the name of the Minsk street where it is located.   

Now the journalist is looking for cellmates who may also have suffered from the wardress who beat the girls.

14 August, the Belarusian regime denied an entrance to Belarus for two Members of European Parliament:Robert BiedrońMEP (Poland, S&D), chair of the European Parliament’s Delegation for relations with Belarus and Petras Auštrevičius MEP (Lithuania, Renew), the European Parliament’s standing rapporteur on Belarus.