Supreme Court upholds sentence of Ales Marchanka convicted for cooperation with Belsat TV

On June 4, the Supreme Court con­sid­ered the appeal of Ales Marchanka, who was sen­tenced to prison. The appeal was dis­missed by Judge Ali­ak­sei Khlyshchank­ou.

Video­g­ra­ph­er Ales Marchanka. Pho­to: Ales Marchanka’s Face­book page

The crim­i­nal case under Part 3 of Arti­cle 361–1 of the Crim­i­nal Code (par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist group) was con­sid­ered in the Min­sk City Court. The tri­al against for­mer Bel­sat TV chan­nel employ­ee Ales Marchanka com­menced on March 25, 2024.

A week lat­er, on April 2, Judge Svi­at­lana Makare­vich deliv­ered a guilty ver­dict, sen­tenc­ing Marchenko to three years of impris­on­ment.

Ales (Ali­ak­san­dr) Marchanka was arrest­ed by police offi­cers on Octo­ber 19, 2023. He was sub­se­quent­ly detained for two peri­ods of 15 days each. Human rights activists know that the sec­ond of these deten­tions was imposed by the Cen­tral­ny Dis­trict Court of Min­sk on Novem­ber 3. Judge Yuliana Shcher­ba found Marchanka guilty of dis­trib­ut­ing extrem­ist mate­ri­als. While the indi­vid­ual was in deten­tion, law enforce­ment offi­cials iden­ti­fied grounds for a crim­i­nal case.

On March 28, 2024, the Belaru­sian human rights com­mu­ni­ty rec­og­nized Ales Marchanka as a polit­i­cal pris­on­er.

It is known that back in Novem­ber 2018, Ales Marchanka was con­tact­ed by KGB offi­cers. He was invit­ed to a meet­ing, and if he did not com­ply, he was informed that the sit­u­a­tion would be han­dled in a less agree­able man­ner. On the same day, plain­clothes offi­cers vis­it­ed Marchanka’s res­i­dence, but he was out. His wife was instruct­ed to give him anoth­er invi­ta­tion for a “talk,” but the vis­i­tors left no sum­mons.