Journalists are not criminals! Five media representatives’ trials about to start in Belarus STATEMENT

Journalists are not criminals! Five media representatives’ trials about to start in Belarus STATEMENT

Five court hear­ings of media work­ers in Belarus are sched­uled for June. Author­i­ties are rou­tine­ly harass­ing media rep­re­sen­ta­tives, charg­ing them with any­thing from par­tic­i­pat­ing in protests to trea­son.

The tri­al in the case of the Bela­PAN news agency will start and be heard in cam­era on June 6 in Min­sk. For­mer deputy direc­tor Andrei Ali­ak­san­drau (accused of orga­niz­ing protests, tax eva­sion, estab­lish­ment of or par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion Bela­PAN, and trea­son), his part­ner Iry­na Zlobi­na (accused of orga­niz­ing protests and trea­son), for­mer Bela­PAN direc­tor Dzmit­ry Navazhy­lau (charged with tax eva­sion and estab­lish­ment of or par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion Bela­PAN) and edi­tor-in-chief Iry­na Leushy­na (estab­lish­ment of or par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion Bela­PAN).

Aksana Kolb, edi­tor-in-chief of the Novy Chas news­pa­per, which was shut down by the author­i­ties, will be tried in Min­sk on June 7. She is accused of orga­niz­ing and par­tic­i­pat­ing in protests.

RFE/RL Belarus free­lance jour­nal­ist Andrei Kuznechyk’s hear­ing is sched­uled for June 8 in Mahilou and will be held in cam­era. After his deten­tion in Novem­ber last year, the author­i­ties includ­ed RFE/RL Belarus in the list of extrem­ist for­ma­tions, and the jour­nal­ist will be tried for par­tic­i­pat­ing in one such group.

The tri­al of Bel­sat TV jour­nal­ist Kat­siary­na Andreje­va will also begin in June. The woman has already served 1.5 years in prison for cov­er­ing the protests. She has been addi­tion­al­ly accused of trea­son (faces up to 15 years in prison).

Bel­sat jour­nal­ist Iry­na Slaunikava’s court hear­ing is anoth­er one sched­uled for June. Like Andrei Kuznechyk, she is accused of estab­lish­ing or par­tic­i­pat­ing in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion.

A total of 27 media work­ers in Belarus are cur­rent­ly kept behind bars in appalling con­di­tions. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, this num­ber is grow­ing.

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists empha­sizes that jour­nal­ists are not crim­i­nals. Free­dom of expres­sion is the foun­da­tion of a demo­c­ra­t­ic soci­ety. Jour­nal­ists must be released from pris­ons, be able to work with­out inter­fer­ence, and live with­out fear for their own safe­ty and that of their fam­i­lies.

#Stand­With­Be­larus

#Jour­nal­is­mIs­No­tACrime

Repres­sions against jour­nal­ists in Belarus, 2022

Ways to support independent media on February 9. And every day