Journalists Ales Sabaleuski and Yauhen Hlushkou sentenced to prison terms and heavy fines

Jour­nal­ist Ales Sabaleus­ki and video­g­ra­ph­er Yauhen Hlushk­ou have been accused of par­tic­i­pa­tion in extrem­ist and armed for­ma­tions. The tri­al com­menced on July 12 in the Mahil­iou Region­al Court, and since then, five court ses­sions have been held. The ver­dict was announced on July 31.

Ales Sabaleus­ki and Yauhen Hlushk­ou

Ales Sabaleus­ki was sen­tenced to 4 years in prison, while Yauhen Hlushk­ou was sen­tenced to 3 years of impris­on­ment. Both also had heavy fines imposed – $2,450 each.

The case was con­sid­ered by the judge of the Mahil­iou Region­al Court Dzmit­ry Kren­zhy­jeus­ki.

Ales Sabaleus­ki and Yauhen Hlushk­ou were charged with par­tic­i­pa­tion in an extrem­ist for­ma­tion and par­tic­i­pa­tion in an armed for­ma­tion or armed con­flict on the ter­ri­to­ry of a for­eign state, mil­i­tary actions, recruit­ment, or prepa­ra­tion for such par­tic­i­pa­tion.

Both jour­nal­ists are rec­og­nized as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers.

How did the sto­ry start?

Jour­nal­ist and blog­ger Ales Sabaleus­ki was arrest­ed on Decem­ber 12, 2023. The fol­low­ing day, the Kas­trych­nit­s­ki Dis­trict Court of Mahil­iou sen­tenced him to 10 days of admin­is­tra­tive deten­tion. While he was in the tem­po­rary deten­tion cen­ter, a sec­ond admin­is­tra­tive tri­al was held, result­ing in the jour­nal­ist being rede­tained on charges of “dis­tri­b­u­tion of extrem­ist prod­ucts.” How­ev­er, when the sec­ond deten­tion expired, Sabaleus­ki was not released. In ear­ly Jan­u­ary 2024, he was trans­ferred to a remand cen­ter.

Indi­vid­u­als who shared a cell with Sabaleus­ki in the tem­po­rary deten­tion cen­ter have report­ed that the jour­nal­ist was beat­en dur­ing inter­ro­ga­tion. Sabaleuski’s body exhib­it­ed indi­ca­tions of tor­ture. He was com­pelled to pro­vide a con­fes­sion that he had col­lab­o­rat­ed with the edi­to­r­i­al staff of 6tv.by, a media enti­ty that had been des­ig­nat­ed as an “extrem­ist for­ma­tion” on Novem­ber 29 of the pre­vi­ous year. At the time of his appre­hen­sion, Sabaleus­ki had ceased his involve­ment with the media, hav­ing retired from jour­nal­ism and tran­si­tioned to a career in the ser­vice sec­tor.

Yauhen Hlushk­ou, a free­lance video­g­ra­ph­er, was tak­en into cus­tody in ear­ly Jan­u­ary 2024. As he resided alone, his arrest was not imme­di­ate­ly dis­closed. His acquain­tances ini­ti­at­ed a search when they noticed that he had not been in touch for sev­er­al days. Fol­low­ing his arrest, Hlushk­ou was ini­tial­ly held in a tem­po­rary deten­tion cen­ter and then trans­ferred to a remand cen­ter.

Yauhen Hlushk­ou was employed at Mahil­iou City Tele­vi­sion for sev­er­al years, and in the ear­ly 2000s, he col­lab­o­rat­ed with sev­er­al city news por­tals. How­ev­er, he has not been involved in any pub­lic or jour­nal­is­tic activ­i­ties recent­ly and has main­tained a rel­a­tive­ly seclud­ed lifestyle.

The details of the case, in which the accused is free­lance video­g­ra­ph­er Yauhen Hlushk­ou, have been made pub­lic fol­low­ing the post­ing of a video on the social media feed of a Telegram chan­nel asso­ci­at­ed with the Mahil­iou police struc­tures. In the “forced repen­tance” video, the detainee states that he has been coop­er­at­ing with the online resource 6tv.by since 2017.