The Belarusian pro-democracy activist Ales Bialiatski, who was one of those distinguished in 2022 with the Nobel Peace Prize, was sentenced this Friday to ten years in prison by a Belarusian court.
The founder of the Viasna human rights center (“Primavera”), 60, has been detained since July 2021 accused of “financing activities that violate public order,” reports Agence France-Presse.
His two collaborators Valentin Stefanovich and Vladimir Labkovich also risk 12 years in prison each.
Initially detained for tax evasion, they are now accused of bringing large amounts of money into Belarus and “financing collective actions that seriously undermine public order,” the Viasna Center reported in November.
More than 20 human rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, released a statement denouncing the legal persecution of the three men and demanding their “immediate and unconditional release”.
Ales Bialiatski, who founded the Viasna Center in 1996, won the Nobel Peace Prize along with two other human rights organizations, Memorial (Russia) and the Center for Civil Liberties (Ukraine).
The Belarusian activist and his two colleagues were detained following anti-regime protests in 2020, following the unilaterally declared presidential election victory of Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus since 1994.
A fourth defendant, Dmitri Soloviev, is also on trial, but in absentia, having fled to Poland.
Source: TSF
