Glavred and CEO of Tut.by sentenced in Minsk to 12 years
The Minsk City Court found the editor-in-chief of opposition online publication Tut.by Marina Zolotova and its CEO Lyudmila Chekina guilty of tax evasion, incitement to hatred and calling for action against Belarus’ national security, and the sentenced on Friday, March 17, to 12 years in prison, reports the state news agency BelTA.
The trial in the Tut.by case began on January 9 and was held behind closed doors. The accused in the case, in addition to Chekina and Zolotova, were three former employees of Tut By Media LLC: Olga Loiko, editor of the economics and politics department, correspondent Elena Tolkacheva and legal adviser Yekaterina Tkachenko. However, before the trial, they went abroad, were put on the wanted list, and the criminal case against them was separated into a separate case, notes the Nasha Niva newspaper.
Lyudmila Chekina and Marina Zolotova have been in Minsk SIZO-1 since May 2021. Then the editorial office was searched and 15 people were detained for non-payment of taxes. They were accused of the fact that the portal, as a resident of the Hi-Tech Park (HTP), had received tax benefits for just over a year, allegedly without the right to this. Most of those detained were later released from custody.
The company paid the damages calculated by the investigation – more than 1 million and 120 thousand euros, but during the investigation political accusations against Zolotova and Chekina were added – “incitement to social hatred” and “call for actions aimed at harming the national security of a Republic of Belarus”.
In June 2022, the Belarusian authorities recognized Tut.by as an extremist organization and the activities of the LLC that published it on the territory of the country were banned.
Source: DW
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