Final ruling: Court confiscates Belsat TV equipment seized over trademark case

In addi­tion, the judge imposed a fine of BYN 980 rubles on cam­era­man Ales Liu­bianchuk for the ille­gal use of the Bel­sat trade­mark.

“I think every­thing is clear: it is not about copy­right abuse, it is about free­dom of speech and cen­sor­ship,” Liu­bianchuk com­ment­ed on the ver­dict.

The cam­era­man man­aged to get back his per­son­al belong­ings – a Go Pro cam­era and a pho­to­cam­era which were also seized in the spring of 2017. Law enforce­ment offi­cers failed to prove that Liu­bianchuk used them when con­tribut­ing to Bel­sat TV.

The case about the Bel­sat trade­mark has last­ed for about five years. Accord­ing to the BEL­SAT­plus com­pa­ny own­er, our chan­nel has vio­lat­ed the inter­ests of his busi­ness. The busi­ness­man appealed to the Supreme Court of Belarus, but it did not sat­is­fy his demands.

Then BEL­SAT­plus com­pa­ny own­er tried to ban our chan­nel from using the Bel­sat TV trade­mark. At first, the Supreme Court dis­missed the claims.

The re-exam­i­na­tion of the case was ini­ti­at­ed by the Pre­sid­i­um of the Supreme Court, and the case was heard by anoth­er pan­el of judges. On Sep­tem­ber 4, 2014, the court grant­ed the appeal of Andrey Belyak­ou and banned our chan­nel from using the “Bel­sat TV” trade­mark for broad­casts on the ter­ri­to­ry of Belarus and on the web page.

In 2017, Belyak­ou filed anoth­er com­plaint against Bel­sat TV.