Belarus: EFJ and BAJ call for the overturn of journalist Iryna Slaunikava’s sentence

On 3 August, the region­al court in Homel, Belarus, sen­tenced jour­nal­ist Iry­na Slau­nika­va to 5 years in prison in a closed tri­al. The Euro­pean Fed­er­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists (EFJ) joins its affil­i­ate the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists (BAJ) in call­ing for the annul­ment of this arbi­trary and ille­gal court deci­sion.

The jour­nal­ist, who is vice-pres­i­dent of BAJ, was found guilty of organ­is­ing col­lec­tive actions seri­ous­ly under­min­ing pub­lic order and cre­at­ing or lead­ing an extrem­ist group. The lat­ter refers to the Bel­sat TV chan­nel, which the Belaru­sian dic­ta­tor­ship con­sid­ers an extrem­ist organ­i­sa­tion.

The pro­ceed­ings last­ed almost one and a half months. Judge Mikalai Dolya exam­ined the case behind closed doors. The pros­e­cu­tor was the rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the prosecutor’s office Iry­na Pod­kavy­ro­va.

Iry­na Slau­nika­va and her hus­band Alexan­der Loi­ka were arrest­ed in Octo­ber 2021 at Min­sk air­port, while return­ing from a hol­i­day in Egypt. They were sent to prison under admin­is­tra­tive arrest, alleged­ly for “dis­sem­i­nat­ing extrem­ist mate­ri­als” and lat­er for “hooli­gan­ism”.

Alexan­der Loi­ka was released after 45 days, but Iry­na was nev­er released. After a month of admin­is­tra­tive arrest, she was charged in a crim­i­nal case for alleged­ly “organ­is­ing and prepar­ing actions seri­ous­ly under­min­ing pub­lic order.” The Belaru­sian judi­cia­ry then added new charges: “cre­ation of an extrem­ist group, or lead­er­ship of such a group or a struc­tur­al unit that is part of it.”

The inves­tiga­tive com­mit­tee claimed that dur­ing the inves­ti­ga­tion of the crim­i­nal case there was evi­dence that Slau­nika­va was the head of the Bel­sat chan­nel. At the time of her arrest, Iry­na Slau­nika­va had not coop­er­at­ed with Bel­sat for a long time, but was a full-time employ­ee of the Pol­ish pub­lic tele­vi­sion chan­nel TVP.

“With this shame­ful and ille­git­i­mate ver­dict, the Belaru­sian judi­cia­ry equates the right to receive and dis­sem­i­nate infor­ma­tion, guar­an­teed by the Euro­pean Con­ven­tion on Human Rights, with extrem­ist activ­i­ty,” said EFJ Pres­i­dent Maja Sev­er. “The Belaru­sian dic­ta­tor­ship con­tin­ues to per­se­cute jour­nal­ists who are sim­ply exer­cis­ing their right to free­dom of expres­sion. Jour­nal­ists are not extrem­ists, and it is not a crime to hold opin­ions that dif­fer from those of the author­i­ties.”

“The EFJ joins BAJ in call­ing for the over­turn­ing of Iry­na Slaunikava’s sen­tence and the imme­di­ate release of the 29 media pro­fes­sion­als cur­rent­ly behind bars in Belarus, added EFJ Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Ricar­do Gutiér­rez. “We call on the Euro­pean Union, the Coun­cil of Europe and the OSCE to take the nec­es­sary mea­sures to iden­ti­fy and pun­ish the agents of the Belaru­sian repres­sion.”

Togeth­er with Belaru­sian Human Rights organ­i­sa­tions, the EFJ and BAJ con­sid­er Iry­na Slau­nika­va as a polit­i­cal pris­on­er.