“Riding for our people”: Solidarity bike ride for imprisoned journalists held in Vilnius

“Rid­ing for our peo­ple” — a sol­i­dar­i­ty bike ride for impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists — took place in Vil­nius on May 14. It was orga­nized to mark the 30th anniver­sary of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists (BAJ). Among those show­ing their sup­port was the leader of the Belaru­sian pro-democ­ra­cy forces, Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya. Her diplo­mat­ic advi­sor, Dzia­n­is Kuchyn­s­ki, joined the ride on behalf of her office.

Leader of the Belaru­sian pro-democ­ra­cy forces Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya at the “Rid­ing for our peo­ple” sol­i­dar­i­ty bike ride for impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

The ride drew mem­bers of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists, NGO rep­re­sen­ta­tives, and oth­er Belaru­sians and allies who care deeply about press free­dom. Among them were Lithuan­ian free­lance reporter and rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Lithuan­ian Union of Jour­nal­ists, Audrius Gelzi­nis, as well as Finnish jour­nal­ist Ingrid Svan­feldt, who trav­eled from Helsin­ki. Ingrid per­son­al­ly knows two impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists — Larysa Shchyrako­va and Yauhen Merkis from Homel.

Lithuan­ian free­lance reporter Audrius Gelzi­nis, Finnish jour­nal­ist Ingrid Svan­feldt, and Svi­at­lana Tsikhanouskaya at the “Rid­ing for our peo­ple” bike ride in sol­i­dar­i­ty with impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

Sol­i­dar­i­ty, not silence
At the begin­ning of the event, human rights defend­er and one of the orga­niz­ers, Leanid Sudalen­ka, empha­sized that this bike ride was a demon­stra­tion of sup­port for impris­oned inde­pen­dent Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists.

“These are cur­rent­ly 39 indi­vid­u­als. This event high­lights that only 150 kilo­me­ters from Vil­nius, some of the most respect­ed fig­ures in Belaru­sian jour­nal­ism are impris­oned. We decid­ed to ride to Vingis Park to talk to vis­i­tors there, to ask them how they feel about the real­i­ty in Belarus — where a prison regime effec­tive­ly rules, where free­dom of speech has no val­ue. Peo­ple are in prison sim­ply for exer­cis­ing their right to free speech.”

Prepar­ing for the “Rid­ing for our peo­ple” bike ride in sol­i­dar­i­ty with impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“I felt uneasy staying home”

Par­tic­i­pants shared their reflec­tions. Maria, an IT spe­cial­ist, said she always sup­ports Belaru­sian civ­il actions:

“That’s why I’m here. In Belarus, I always biked — it was my main form of trans­porta­tion. Here, I walk more. But I was hap­py to join the ride. Even though I’m not a jour­nal­ist, I have sev­er­al reporter friends. One of them, media work­er Andrei Kuzneczyk, was recent­ly released from prison. But I still have so many acquain­tances behind bars in Belarus! I want all of them to be released.”

IT spe­cial­ist Maria. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

Jour­nal­ist and human rights activist Natal­lia said:

“I’m par­tic­i­pat­ing in this action to sup­port my col­leagues who are behind bars right now.

All par­tic­i­pants wore vests with por­traits of impris­oned jour­nal­ists on the chest and the back — all of them were close acquain­tances of mine. It breaks my heart to see how many years they’ve been sen­tenced to,” she said. “I do every­thing I can to sup­port them and con­stant­ly think about what more can be done to help them and their fam­i­lies — and how to be more effec­tive.”

Jour­nal­ist and human rights activist Natal­lia. June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“Some actions may have run their course, and it might be time to explore new approach­es — while also tak­ing the time to under­stand what peo­ple tru­ly need. Each of us has to do every­thing we can while our col­leagues, loved ones, and fel­low cit­i­zens are behind bars in Belarus.”

“You have pho­tos of Kanstantsin Zalatykh and Dzia­n­is Ivashyn on your vest. Were you close to them?”

“Yes, Dzia­n­is and I once stud­ied togeth­er. I know him well and fol­low his sit­u­a­tion close­ly.”

“This bike ride wasn’t phys­i­cal­ly demand­ing for me — I’ve been cycling with my father since child­hood. But it was emo­tion­al­ly hard to see por­traits of peo­ple I per­son­al­ly know and the hor­ri­fy­ing sen­tences they’ve received.”

The “Rid­ing for our peo­ple” sol­i­dar­i­ty bike ride for impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

Jour­nal­ist Tat­siana Bub­lika­va:

“Phys­i­cal­ly, the ride wasn’t hard — but emo­tion­al­ly, it’s hard to keep believ­ing it mat­ters. So many years have passed, and so many jour­nal­ists are still impris­oned. Yes, some are released, but usu­al­ly just because they’ve served their full sen­tence. And more keep get­ting arrest­ed…”

I’m wear­ing a vest with the por­trait of my boss, Zmitser Navazhy­lau — he was sen­tenced to six years. BelaPAN’s media man­ag­er Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau got 14 years — he’s in prison ham­mer­ing nails into rot­ten pal­lets with his tal­ent­ed hands. I real­ize this 10-kilo­me­ter ride won’t direct­ly help Ali­ak­san­drau, but some­how, some­where, it’s all con­nect­ed. Why did I come today? Because it felt right. Per­son­al­ly, I would’ve felt uneasy stay­ing home.

Do I believe this will change the world, stop the war, free all polit­i­cal pris­on­ers? No. But I do believe every giga­byte of atten­tion is worth some­thing. And we must give atten­tion to the things that mat­ter most — sol­i­dar­i­ty, sup­port, truth, love, phys­i­cal and men­tal health, respect, the abil­i­ty to lis­ten to one anoth­er, and to com­mu­ni­cate. That’s what this ride is about.”

The “Rid­ing for our peo­ple” sol­i­dar­i­ty bike ride for impris­oned Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“I know sto­ries of peo­ple out­side prison who some­times feel guilty about buy­ing a glass of wine or ice cream at a café — because they know that their col­leagues, the ones they filmed sto­ries with, worked with, can’t afford even that. And feed­back mat­ters. I think if Iry­na Slau­nika­va knew we were behav­ing like vic­tims — let­ting repres­sion crush us — she’d say, ‘Please, don’t do what the regime wants. Don’t give in to this per­ver­sion, this vio­lence, these repres­sions — at least not while you’re free.’”

And the bur­den, per­haps, is in keep­ing the focus on what true life is.

“Doing something is never pointless”

After arriv­ing at Vingis Park, par­tic­i­pants also vis­it­ed an inter­na­tion­al music and dance pic­nic host­ed by the Red Cross as part of Refugee Week. Many nation­al­i­ties were present, but the bike ride espe­cial­ly drew the atten­tion of Belaru­sian atten­dees — many of whom had faced repres­sion or impris­on­ment in Belarus.

Ali­ak­san­dr Kaza­ke­vich from the town of Mal­adzech­na, now liv­ing in Lithua­nia, shared his thoughts:

“As a for­mer polit­i­cal pris­on­er, I under­stand what’s hap­pen­ing in Belarus — I saw it with my own eyes. It’s hor­ri­fy­ing that peo­ple are impris­oned just for report­ing on the events of 2020. This should not be hap­pen­ing in the 21st cen­tu­ry in the heart of Europe. Nor­mal peo­ple can­not be indif­fer­ent to this.”

Ali­ak­san­dr Kaza­ke­vich. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“We sup­port actions like this. What would be wrong is doing noth­ing. Doing some­thing — any­thing — is already mean­ing­ful. Writ­ing let­ters to polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, even if they don’t get through — there’s a let­ter bank. When the pris­on­ers are released, they can receive these let­ters and be remind­ed that they had been remem­bered and await­ed. That includes the jour­nal­ists who are in prison. So doing some­thing is nev­er point­less.”

“Rid­ing for our peo­ple”: Sol­i­dar­i­ty bike ride for impris­oned jour­nal­ists. Vil­nius, June 14, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

At the end of the event, par­tic­i­pants received com­mem­o­ra­tive note­books fea­tur­ing pho­tos of impris­oned jour­nal­ists and the prison terms they were giv­en by the regime. This event became not only a ges­ture of sol­i­dar­i­ty but also proof that even in exile, Belaru­sians are not silent — they con­tin­ue the strug­gle with words, with wheels, with their pres­ence.