BAJ statement: Siarhei Satsuk’s conviction is revenge for his excellent investigative journalist work

Judge of Min­sk City Court Svi­at­lana Ban­daren­ka sen­tenced the edi­tor of the Ezhed­nevnik online edi­tion to eight years of impris­on­ment for «incit­ing hatred,» «offi­cial mis­con­duct,» and «accept­ing bribes.»

Siarhei Sat­suk was first detained on 8 Decem­ber 2021 on sus­pi­cion of accept­ing a bribe. Search­es were con­duct­ed in his home and the news­pa­per’s edi­to­r­i­al office. The Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion blocked the web­site of the pub­li­ca­tion. Back in 2020, the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists deemed this case far-fetched and aimed at dis­rupt­ing the work of one of the best Belaru­sian inves­tiga­tive jour­nal­ists.

After the sec­ond arrest, the author­i­ties charged Siarhei Sat­suk under two more arti­cles of the Crim­i­nal Code. Alleged­ly, as an edi­tor, he «abused his pow­er» and his texts con­tained «incite­ment of hatred.»

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists is con­vinced that the inves­ti­ga­tion and the court arbi­trar­i­ly pros­e­cut­ed Sat­suk as revenge for his high-pro­file inves­ti­ga­tions.

BAJ demands that the ver­dict be can­celled and that Siarhei Sat­suk and all 32 media work­ers behind bars in Belarus be released imme­di­ate­ly.