Belarusian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski today, on Friday, was sentenced by a Belarusian court to 10 years in prison. Bialiatsky provided legal and financial assistance to protesters during the wave of unrest in Belarus in 2020 and was convicted of financing protests and tax evasion. He denied the allegations, which he and other human rights activists called politically motivated.

Nobel Prize

Bialiatsky, 61, won the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize along with the Russian human rights organization Memorial and the Ukrainian human rights organization Center for Civil Liberties. Fellow human rights activists portray him as a symbol of resistance to oppression in Belarus and around the world.

Fight for rights and democracy

Bialiatski began campaigning for independence and democracy in Belarus in the early 1980s and organized anti-Soviet protests until the fall of the Soviet Union.

During massive opposition protests in 1996, he founded the Viasna human rights organization to provide financial and legal assistance to political prisoners and their families. Viasna also documented the ill-treatment and torture of political prisoners by the authorities. Belarus denied the accusations.

Deprivation of liberty

Bialiatski was imprisoned from 2011 to 2014 on charges of tax evasion in funding Viasna, which he denied. He was arrested again in 2021 during a crackdown on anti-government protests that erupted after Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko was declared the winner of the 2020 presidential election. The opposition claimed the election was rigged, a charge Lukashenko denied.

Trial

Byalyatsky and two others appeared in court in January on charges of “trafficking in persons by an organized group” and “funding group actions in gross violation of public order.” Amnesty International called it “a blatant act of injustice when the state clearly wants to retaliate against him for his activism”.

Intellectual

Byalyatsky was born on September 25, 1962, in 1984 he graduated from Gomel University with a degree in Russian and Belarusian literature. Initially working as a teacher, he became a researcher of Belarusian literature and director of a museum.

Source: Reuters.