Imprisoned videographer Yauhen Hlushkou released upon completing his sentence

On August 22, he was already back in Mahilou after spend­ing more than two and a half years behind bars. Hlushk­ou’s health dete­ri­o­rat­ed sig­nif­i­cant­ly dur­ing his impris­on­ment, and he is now receiv­ing treat­ment in a hos­pi­tal.

Yauhen Hlushk­ou. Pho­to: social media

After his release, Yauhen Hlushk­ou had to seek med­ical atten­tion for a troph­ic ulcer on his left leg.

His health prob­lems began while he was serv­ing his sen­tence at Cor­rec­tion­al Facil­i­ty No. 2 in Babru­jsk. He received treat­ment there, but he will need to con­tin­ue it now that he is free.

Free­lance video­g­ra­ph­er Yauhen Hlushk­ou was detained in Mahilou on Jan­u­ary 5, 2024. At the time, he was liv­ing a rel­a­tive­ly seclud­ed life, so news of his deten­tion did not emerge imme­di­ate­ly. Friends began look­ing for him after real­iz­ing that he had been out of con­tact for sev­er­al days.

Hlushk­ou was ini­tial­ly held in a tem­po­rary deten­tion facil­i­ty on an admin­is­tra­tive charge. Author­i­ties lat­er opened a crim­i­nal case against him and trans­ferred him to the pre­tri­al deten­tion cen­ter.

Police also forced Hlushk­ou to appear in a so-called “con­fes­sion” video, which was post­ed by a Telegram chan­nel with close ties to law enforce­ment agen­cies in Mahilou. In the video, Hlushk­ou said that he had worked with the 6tv.by online news out­let since 2017. Belaru­sian author­i­ties have des­ig­nat­ed the out­let an “extrem­ist enti­ty.”

Yauhen Hlushk­ou in hos­pi­tal. Pho­to: social media

On July 31, 2024, the Mahilou Region­al Court found Yauhen Hlushk­ou and fel­low Mahilou jour­nal­ist Ales (Ali­ak­san­dr) Sabaleus­ki guilty of cre­at­ing or par­tic­i­pat­ing in an “extrem­ist enti­ty” and prepar­ing to par­tic­i­pate in an armed for­ma­tion, armed con­flict, or mil­i­tary oper­a­tions in a for­eign coun­try.

The case was heard by Judge Dzmit­ry Kren­zhyeus­ki. He sen­tenced Hlushk­ou to three years in prison and fined him $2,555. Sabaleus­ki received a four-year prison sen­tence and a sub­stan­tial fine.

Both jour­nal­ists appealed the ver­dict to a high­er court. The Supreme Court heard their appeals on Sep­tem­ber 27, 2024. It is unclear whether their prison terms or fines were sub­se­quent­ly changed. How­ev­er, the Belaru­sian Inte­ri­or Min­istry’s list of indi­vid­u­als involved in “extrem­ist” activ­i­ties lat­er no longer cit­ed par­tic­i­pa­tion in armed for­ma­tion among the charges against Hlushk­ou and Sabaleus­ki.

Yauhen Hlushk­ou worked for Mahilou city tele­vi­sion for many years. After the 2000s, he worked as a video­g­ra­ph­er for sev­er­al local news web­sites.