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  • Pavel Mazheika’s sentence upheld. He is to be transferred to correctional facility soon

    Today, October 17, the Supreme Court of Belarus reviewed the appeals of Hrodna journalist Pavel Mazheika and attorney Yulia Yurhilevich, who were sentenced to prison for “promoting extremist activity”. The Hrodna Regional Court sentenced them both to 6 years of imprisonment on 26 July of this year. The verdict was upheld by the Supreme Court.

    Pavel Karshunovich, head of the Supreme Court’s judi­cial board, con­sid­ered the appeals.

    The hear­ing was held in cam­era, but fam­i­ly mem­bers were per­mit­ted to attend the announce­ment of the rul­ing.

    Pavel Mazheika’s spouse, Iry­na Char­ni­ak, is cur­rent­ly resid­ing out­side of Belarus with their chil­dren. Iry­na report­ed that nei­ther she nor Pavel antic­i­pat­ed the Supreme Court to reverse or improve the ini­tial rul­ing.

    “I observe com­pa­ra­ble tri­als of media employ­ees and do not expect a pos­i­tive out­come. Pavel express­es the same sen­ti­ment and antic­i­pates being trans­port­ed to the cor­rec­tion­al facil­i­ty by ear­ly Novem­ber.”

    Dur­ing the Supreme Court hear­ing, the fam­i­ly saw that both Paul and Yulia have lost a lot of weight, but did not appear to be bro­ken.

    The journalist’s fam­i­ly was already abroad when Iry­na last saw Paul via Zoom, just half an hour before his arrest on 30 August 2022. Pavel Mazhei­ka was detained upon his return to Belarus, and law enforce­ment offi­cers searched his and his par­ents’ homes after­ward.

    The case file states that Pavel Mazhei­ka, with Yulia Yurhilevich’s help, pro­vid­ed infor­ma­tion in Feb­ru­ary and March 2022 about Yulia’s revoked law license and expul­sion from the Hrod­na Region­al Bar Asso­ci­a­tion, and report­ed on artist Ales Pushkin’s tri­al.

    Pavel Mazhei­ka is a well-known jour­nal­ist and pub­lic fig­ure in Hrod­na. A web­site devot­ed to his work was cre­at­ed after he was tak­en into cus­tody.

    Mazhei­ka was among the ear­li­est polit­i­cal detainees in Belarus, serv­ing a two-year restrict­ed free­dom sen­tence for slan­der­ing the pres­i­dent in 2002. The amnesty then reduced his sen­tence by one year.

    In 2021, Pavel Mazhei­ka, artist Ales Pushkin, who died in prison recent­ly, and oth­ers were accused of actions pro­mot­ing Nazism, and a crim­i­nal case was opened against them. Accord­ing to the prosecutor’s office, the por­trait of Yauhen Zhykhar, a Belaru­sian activist who opposed the Sovi­et Union, was dis­played at a paint­ing exhi­bi­tion on 19 March 2021, with a machine gun on his shoul­der. These actions were aimed at the reha­bil­i­ta­tion and jus­ti­fi­ca­tion of Nazism. Mazhei­ka was released lat­er because there were no suf­fi­cient grounds for deten­tion.

    Read more:

    Andrei Tolchyn accused of harming Belarus’ national security

    Reporters need helmets, body armor, and psychological support. What challenges do media in Israel face?

    «Independent media is experiencing a business model collapse, and society is subjecting itself to self-censorship.» Highlights from the Freedom House report

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