Why are three Belarusian journalists in jail and what punishment do they face?

Katsiaryna Andreyeva, Belsat: livestreamer from street protests and author of a book about Donbass

Four weeks ago, Kat­siary­na Andreye­va turned 27, she has been work­ing with Bel­sat TV since 2017.

Her real last name is Bakhvala­va, Andreye­va is a cre­ative pseu­do­nym that the jour­nal­ist took in hon­or of her father, Siarhei Vahanau, a jour­nal­ist and Kat­siary­na’s grand­fa­ther, told Nasha Niva.

She was detained in the evening of Novem­ber 15. That Sun­day, hun­dreds of peo­ple came to the «Square of Change», a court­yard, where Raman Ban­daren­ka was arrest­ed and lat­er a spon­ta­neous memo­r­i­al to him was formed. For sev­er­al hours, Kat­siary­na, togeth­er with her video­g­ra­ph­er Daria Chultso­va, were stream­ing from the Square: they showed how peo­ple gath­er, secu­ri­ty forces dri­ve up and car­ry out deten­tions, and then destroy the peo­ple’s memo­r­i­al.

As the jour­nal­ist’s hus­band Ihar Ilyash told Medusa, Kati­s­ary­na was invit­ed by «con­cerned peo­ple who lived on the 14th floor and offered her a chance to livestream from their win­dows.» The jour­nal­ist spent 5.5 hours there. After dis­pers­ing the pro­test­ers, the secu­ri­ty forces broke the door of the apart­ment and detained every­one who was there.

On Novem­ber 17, Andreye­va was con­vict­ed on two admin­is­tra­tive charges: for par­tic­i­pa­tion in an unau­tho­rized mass event and dis­obey­ing the demands of police offi­cers, and received 7 days of arrest. The police report stat­ed that she had been detained «on the side­walk near the road­way», where she «active­ly par­tic­i­pat­ed in the ral­ly».

But on Novem­ber 20, it turned out that Kat­siary­na would not be released in 7 days: she was charged under part 1 of arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code — «Orga­ni­za­tion and prepa­ra­tion of actions that gross­ly breach pub­lic order, or active par­tic­i­pa­tion in them.» For the time of inves­ti­ga­tion, Kat­siary­na was put in cus­tody for 2 months — until Jan­u­ary 20, 2021.

At the moment, she is in a pre-tri­al deten­tion facil­i­ty in Zhodz­i­na. If found guilty, she could face a fine, arrest, restric­tion of free­dom for up to three years or impris­on­ment for the same peri­od.

The pro­fes­sion­al com­mu­ni­ty knows Andreye­va as a lead­ing street livestream­er, she’s been repeat­ed­ly detained and penal­ized for her pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ties. She also inves­ti­gat­ed cor­rup­tion cas­es, and wrote about the war in the Don­bass — this year in Kiev, she pub­lished a book Belaru­sian Don­bass that she co-authored with her hus­band.

Daria Chultsova, Belsat videographer

Daria Chultso­va is 23. She has been work­ing with Bel­sat since the begin­ning of 2019, judg­ing by her Face­book pro­file. Her home city is Mahil­iou. On Novem­ber 15, she worked as a video­g­ra­ph­er togeth­er with Kat­siary­na Andreye­va, film­ing from an apart­ment win­dow the events on the Square of Change.

 

 

 

 

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That evening, she was detained togeth­er with Andreye­va and tak­en to Akrestsi­na deten­tion cen­ter. The next day she was tried and sen­tenced to 7 days in jail. We learned about a crim­i­nal case against her only when Daria had not been released after her admin­is­tra­tive arrest. Her lawyer did not report on this, as he had to sign a non-dis­clo­sure agree­ment.

On Novem­ber 30, thanks to the appeal against cus­tody as a mea­sure of restraint, it became known that Daria Chultso­va had been charged under the same arti­cle — part 1 of arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code.

At the moment, 23-year-old Daria Chultso­va is in the Zhodi­no pre-tri­al deten­tion facil­i­ty. It is not known how long she will remain in cus­tody.

Katsiaryna Barysevich — TUT.BY reporter. Legal issues are her main field, she received a «Winner’s Diploma» from the Prosecutor General’s office in 2015.

Bary­se­vich was last online on Novem­ber 19 at 16.59. Around this time, she was detained by offi­cers in plain clothes and masks, who searched her apart­ment and took her to the KGB pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter.

As it became known a lit­tle lat­er, the Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al’s office opened a crim­i­nal case for an arti­cle about the con­di­tion of the deceased Raman Ban­daren­ka, who was tak­en to an unknown des­ti­na­tion from the Square of Changes on Novem­ber 12, and lat­er tak­en to the emer­gency hos­pi­tal with seri­ous injuries, where he died less than a day lat­er. Cit­ing the doc­tors, Kat­siary­na wrote that at the time he reached the hos­pi­tal, Raman was sober, refut­ing the words of law-enforce­ment agen­cies that Ban­daren­ka had alleged­ly had «alco­hol intox­i­ca­tion».

On the same evening, on Novem­ber 19, the emer­gency hos­pi­tal anes­the­si­ol­o­gist Art­siom Sarokin was detained. Accord­ing to the Pros­e­cu­tor’s Gen­er­al Office, «act­ing inten­tion­al­ly, the sus­pect entered into crim­i­nal col­lu­sion with a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of an online resource (tut.by), and informed it about the results of the med­ical exam­i­na­tion of Raman Ban­daren­ka.»

Both became defen­dants in the crim­i­nal case under part 3 of arti­cle 178 of the Crim­i­nal code — «Dis­clo­sure of med­ical secrets that led to seri­ous con­se­quences» (pos­si­ble penal­ty — impris­on­ment for up to three years and depri­va­tion of the right to hold cer­tain posi­tions).

Mean­while, the fam­i­ly of the deceased Ban­daren­ka did not com­plain about dis­clo­sure by either the media or the med­ical staff of the hos­pi­tal. Ale­na Ban­daren­ka, Raman’s moth­er, approved dis­tri­b­u­tion of infor­ma­tion about her son’s con­di­tion.

Kat­siary­na Bary­se­vich spent sev­er­al days in the KGB pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter, and on Novem­ber 20, her first inter­ro­ga­tion took place. A week lat­er, she was trans­ferred to pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter No. 1 on Val­adars­ki Street. The Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al’s Office pressed charges and left her in cus­tody, thus choos­ing the most severe mea­sure of restraint.

Her lawyers had to sign a non-dis­clo­sure agree­ment in the broad­est sense pos­si­ble, so we do not know any­thing about the cir­cum­stances of the case, or even about how long Kat­siary­na will remain in cus­tody. We can assume that she will be there for two months, that is, until Jan­u­ary 19, 2021, judg­ing by reg­u­lar prac­tice.

Kat­siary­na Bary­se­vich is 36, she has been a jour­nal­ist for almost 15 years, spe­cial­iz­ing in legal issues: high-pro­file crim­i­nal cas­es and court pro­ceed­ings. So, thanks to her, hun­dreds of thou­sands of read­ers learned details about the res­o­nant «doc­tors’ case» and «sug­ar case», where a plane had to turn around and land back in Belarus, got acquaint­ed with the home­land of the for­mer KGB Chair­man Valery Vakulchyk, fol­lowed the fate of the MZKT engi­neer, and empathized with those who were detained on August 9–12 and sur­vived vio­lence by the secu­ri­ty forces.

While study­ing at the fac­ul­ty of jour­nal­ism of the BSU, Kat­siary­na worked for The First Chan­nel of the Belaru­sian radio, and joined Euro­ra­dio after her grad­u­a­tion. For nine years, Kate­ri­na was a colum­nist for Kom­so­mol­skaya Prav­da in Belarus, and at the begin­ning of 2017, she joined TUT.BY.

Kat­siary­na repeat­ed­ly became the win­ner of many pro­fes­sion­al com­pe­ti­tions. In par­tic­u­lar, in 2015, the Pros­e­cu­tor Gen­er­al’s office award­ed her the win­ner’s diplo­ma «for pro­fes­sion­al­ism and jour­nal­is­tic skills». This year, the agency srat­ed a crim­i­nal case against her for her pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ties.

What was the response to the arrests and criminal cases against journalists?

Belaru­sian human rights defend­ers rec­og­nized Kat­siary­na Bary­se­vich, Kat­siary­na Andreye­va and Daria Chultso­va polit­i­cal pris­on­ers. In their opin­ion, the cas­es against teh jour­nal­ists were arbi­trary and polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed. Human rights activists demand to imme­di­ate­ly release the jour­nal­ists from cus­tody and stop their crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion. At the moment, more than 160 peo­ple have been rec­og­nized as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers in Belarus.

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists has sim­i­lar demands. In its state­ment, BAJ demands to imme­di­ate­ly release the jour­nal­ists, to stop their crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion and to bring those respon­si­ble for vio­lat­ing the rights of jour­nal­ists and cit­i­zens to jus­tice.

Amnesty Inter­na­tion­al rec­og­nized jour­nal­ist Kat­siary­na Bary­se­vich and anes­the­si­ol­o­gist Art­siom Sarokin pris­on­ers of con­science.

— They are both pris­on­ers of con­science, detained sole­ly for the exer­cise of their right to free­dom of expres­sion, and must be imme­di­ate­ly and uncon­di­tion­al­ly released and the crim­i­nal pro­ceed­ings against them end­ed, Amnesty Inter­na­tion­al states,

call­ing the doc­tor and the jour­nal­ist whistle­blow­ers who exposed dis­in­for­ma­tion.

UK For­eign Sec­re­tary Dominic Raab called on the Belaru­sian author­i­ties to release impris­oned jour­nal­ists . The For­eign Sec­re­tary also urged to drop all charges against jour­nal­ists. He not­ed that reporters are impris­oned in order to silence them and pre­vent the dis­sem­i­na­tion of infor­ma­tion about a vio­la­tion of rights and free­doms of the Belaru­sian peo­ple.

Accord­ing to BAJ esti­mates, Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists have been detained almost 370 times since August 9.

You can sup­port jour­nal­ists behind bars by writ­ing let­ters to them. You can send them to the fol­low­ing address­es:

• Kat­siary­na Bary­se­vich — 220030 Min­sk, Val­adars­ki street, 2; SIZO No. 1;
• Kat­siary­na Bakhvala­va — 222160 Zhodz­i­na, Savet­skaya street, 22A;
• Daria Chultso­va — Zhodz­i­na 222160, Savet­skaya street, 22A.

Читать полностью: https://news.tut.by/society/709616.html?c