Nasha Niva journalists are political prisoners

12 July 2021

In the morn­ing of 8 July 2021, law enforcers searched the edi­to­r­i­al office of the news­pa­per Nasha Niva and the homes of its jour­nal­ists and edi­tors. Almost at the same time, the Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion restrict­ed access to Nasha Niva’s web­site nn.by based on the report of the Gen­er­al Pros­e­cu­tor’s Office which alleged «dis­tri­b­u­tion of infor­ma­tion which is pro­hib­it­ed by the Mass Media Act». The site can be accessed nei­ther from the ter­ri­to­ry of Belarus nor from abroad.

After the search­es, a num­ber of jour­nal­ists and work­ers of Nasha Niva were inter­ro­gat­ed, and non-dis­clo­sure state­ments were received from them. Search­es and inter­ro­ga­tions were car­ried out under Arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code (orga­ni­za­tion or prepa­ra­tion of actions that gross­ly vio­late pub­lic order or par­tic­i­pa­tion in them) and Arti­cle 293 of the Crim­i­nal Code (mass riots).

Lat­er it became known that the fol­low­ing employ­ees of Nasha Niva were detained under part 1 of Arti­cle 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code (orga­ni­za­tion or prepa­ra­tion of actions that gross­ly vio­late pub­lic order or par­tic­i­pa­tion in them):

1. Yahor Martsi­novich — edi­tor-in-chief;

2. Andrei Skurko — head of the adver­tis­ing and mar­ket­ing depart­ment;

3. Vol­ha Rakovich — chief accoun­tant;

4. Andrei Dynko — edi­tor-in-chief of the pop­u­lar sci­ence and chil­dren’s mag­a­zines that are pub­lished by Nasha Niva

The orga­ni­za­tions that issued this state­ment believe that these actions against the staff of Nasha Niva news­pa­per are a con­tin­u­a­tion of the pur­pose­ful pol­i­cy of the author­i­ties to restrict the dis­tri­b­u­tion of uncen­sored infor­ma­tion in the coun­try and a con­tin­u­a­tion of the assault on free­dom of speech. After the 2020 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion, dozens of socio-polit­i­cal and media web­sites were blocked in Belarus, a num­ber of print media out­lets were forced to stop pub­lish­ing, and jour­nal­ists and employ­ees of the media sec­tor in Belarus were detained.

Giv­en these cir­cum­stances, we con­clude that the real grounds for the crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion of Yahor Martsi­novich, Andrei Skurko, Vol­ha Rakovich, and Andrei Dynko are polit­i­cal moti­va­tions aimed at stop­ping or chang­ing the nature of their pub­lic joint activ­i­ties for legit­i­mate pur­pos­es with­in the edi­to­r­i­al board of Nasha Niva in con­nec­tion with the non-vio­lent exer­cise of free­dom of expres­sion and infor­ma­tion dis­tri­b­u­tion.

On this basis, guid­ed by para­graphs 2.1 and 3.1(a) of the Guide­lines on the Def­i­n­i­tion of a Polit­i­cal Pris­on­er, adopt­ed at the II Belaru­sian Human Rights Forum, we, rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Belaru­sian human rights orga­ni­za­tions, declare Yahor Martsi­novich, Andrei Skurko, Vol­ha Rakovich, and Andrei Dynko polit­i­cal pris­on­ers and demand:

1. The imme­di­ate release of Yahor Martsi­novich, Andrei Skurko, Vol­ha Rakovich, and Andrei Dynko from cus­tody;

2. Aban­don­ing the use of crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion meth­ods as an instru­ment of pres­sure on free­dom of expres­sion;

3. The imme­di­ate ter­mi­na­tion of repres­sion, as well as the release of all polit­i­cal pris­on­ers.

Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists;
Belaru­sian PEN Cen­ter;
Human Rights Cen­ter «Vias­na»;
FORB Ini­tia­tive;
Lawtrend Cen­ter for Legal Trans­for­ma­tion;
Legal Ini­tia­tive;
Belaru­sian Doc­u­men­ta­tion Cen­ter;
Belaru­sian Helsin­ki Com­mit­tee;
Human Con­stan­ta;
Barys Zvozskau Belaru­sian Human Rights House.