Brest journalist Alena Tsimashchuk sentenced to 5 years in prison and huge fine

The Brest Region­al Court hand­ed down a five-year prison sen­tence and a $14,000 fine to local jour­nal­ist Ale­na Tsi­mashchuk. The tri­al com­menced on Fri­day, May 31, and at the next ses­sion on June 3, Judge Dzmit­ry Karasin­s­ki deliv­ered a guilty ver­dict.

Jour­nal­ist Ale­na Tsi­mashchuk. Pho­to: Ale­na Tsimashchuk’s Face­book page

Judge Karasin­s­ki deter­mined that the jour­nal­ist was guilty of dis­cred­it­ing the Repub­lic of Belarus, incit­ing hos­til­i­ty or dis­cord, and par­tic­i­pat­ing in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion.

Pre­vi­ous­ly, Ale­na Tsi­mashchuk was a free­lancer for sev­er­al region­al pub­li­ca­tions, includ­ing Vech­erny Brest, Brest­sky Kuri­er, Brest­skaya Gaze­ta, Vir­tu­al­ny Brest, and Brest­sky Zele­ny Por­tal.

Local jour­nal­ists have con­firmed that Ale­na Tsi­mashchuk did not write polit­i­cal arti­cles dur­ing her tenure with inde­pen­dent pub­li­ca­tions. She occa­sion­al­ly con­tributed adver­tis­ing arti­cles and pieces on psy­chol­o­gy, as she holds a degree in this field.

The rea­son for the journalist’s pros­e­cu­tion is not yet known.