Belsat journalist Katsiaryna Andreyeva charged with treason

“We do not know what events lead to the accu­sa­tion. The case was han­dled by the Homel Region KGB, the inves­ti­ga­tion was car­ried out in com­plete secre­cy – that is, until yes­ter­day, 55 days after her trans­fer to jail, rel­a­tives did not know either Katsiaryna’s sta­tus or the arti­cles used as grounds for the offense pro­ceed­ings. We are unaware of the grava­men and we will prob­a­bly not receive any infor­ma­tion about it – the court will obvi­ous­ly be held in cam­era,” Ihar Ilyash wrote.

Kat­siary­na faces 7 to 15 years in prison. The inves­ti­ga­tion is over, the case will be sent to the prosecutor’s office. The tri­al may take place in May.

Kat­siary­na Andreye­va was detained togeth­er with Darya Chultso­va on 15 Novem­ber 2020 while cov­er­ing a protest ral­ly in Min­sk. She was charged under Art. 342 of the Crim­i­nal Code (“Orga­ni­za­tion and prepa­ra­tion of actions that gross­ly vio­late pub­lic order, or active par­tic­i­pa­tion in them”).

At first, they were arrest­ed for 7 days for “par­tic­i­pa­tion in an unau­tho­rized protest and dis­obe­di­ence.” They were then crim­i­nal­ly charged. On 18 Feb­ru­ary 2021, the jour­nal­ists were sen­tenced to 2 years of impris­on­ment.

Human rights activists have rec­og­nized the jour­nal­ists as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers.

“My task is to save my soul from decay and give the jail no chance of creep­ing into me. Not to become a part of the ugly [prison world], but to cre­ate some beau­ti­ful space around me,” Kat­siary­na Andreye­va said dur­ing a vis­it by her hus­band to the Homel cor­rec­tion­al facil­i­ty.