​A man jailed for publishing a caricature of Belarusian President Oleksandr Lukashenko died in prison on Sunday in a country where dissent is suppressed, an NGO said, saying the prisoner in question had heart problems, reports France-Presse. and Agerpress.

Mykola Klimovich (61 years old) died in correctional colony No. 3 in the Vitebsk region (north-east), the Human Rights Protection Center “Vyasna” reports in Telegram, without specifying the cause of death yet.

Klimovych was imprisoned, despite the fact that he had a disability due to serious heart problems, the relevant organization notes.

He was arrested in December in the Pinsk region (south) and charged with “insulting the head of state” for publishing a satirical cartoon of Alexander Lukashenko on social networks, “Vyasna” reports.

Mykola Klimovych was released before the court after he fell ill in the pre-trial detention center. At the end of February, he was sentenced to a year in prison on this charge and sent to prison.

“It is with pain to learn that political prisoner Mykola Klymovych died in the colony,” Svitlana Tikhanovskaya, a well-known Belarusian opposition in exile, reacted on Twitter.

“If emergency medical care does not reach other political prisoners, even more will die,” she added.

Oleksandr Lukashenko, who has been in power since 1994, was re-elected in 2020 after the presidential election was found to be rigged, leading tens of thousands of people to demonstrate against him for several weeks.

Mass arrests, forced exiles, and harsh prison terms for activists and journalists defeated the movement.

According to the list published by the “Vyasna” center, there are now almost 1,500 political prisoners in Belarus. Mykola Klimovych was also on this list.