Former editor-in-chief of Nexta Protasevich sentenced to 8 years
A Minsk court has issued a verdict in the case of Roman Protasevich, former editor-in-chief of the Nexta Telegram channel. On Wednesday, May 3, Protasevich was found guilty of several crimes and sentenced to 8 years in prison. The Belarusian prosecutor’s office previously demanded that the young man be sentenced to 10 years. Protasevich will remain under house arrest until the sentence takes effect, Belarusian media reported.
Speaking earlier with the prosecution, the Public Ministry asked the court to take into account that the former editor-in-chief of Nexta fulfilled the conditions of the pre-trial agreement and therefore, as punishment for a series of articles, he cannot be convicted. to more than half of the maximum penalty and, for several articles – not more than two-thirds of the penalty.
Meanwhile, Nexta founder Stepan Putilo was sentenced to 20 years in prison, and former Telegram channel editor Yan Rudik to 19 years. They are abroad and are tried in absentia.
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The Nexta trial began in February 2023. In addition to Protasevich, the founder of Nexta Putilo and the former editor of the Telegram channel Rudik pass through him. The state prosecutor’s office asked them to serve 20 and 19 years in prison in a penal colony, respectively. The defendants were accused of committing more than 1,500 crimes, including articles on organizing mass riots, calling for sanctions against Belarus, creating or leading an extremist group, and conspiring to seize power. Putilo was charged with 13 criminal articles, Rudik – 12, and Protasevich – 11 articles.
In April, the court hardened the charges against Protasevich and attributed to him, in addition to “organizing mass riots” and “a conspiracy to seize power and incite hatred”, also “repeated leadership of an extremist formation”. According to the investigation, in May-September 2020, Roman Protasevich was the chief editor of the Nexta channel, which widely covered the protests in Belarus after the presidential elections in August of the same year. In October 2020 Protasevich moved from Warsaw to Vilnius and until May 2021 he was responsible for the operation of the Belarus Brain Telegram channel.
Ryanair plane landed to detain Protasevich
Roman Protasevich was detained in Minsk on May 23, 2021, when Belarusian dispatchers forced the Ryanair plane, on which he flew from Athens to Vilnius, to make an emergency landing at the airport due to a message about “mining”. As an International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) investigation later established, the bomb report was deliberately false and was brought to the attention of the crew under the direction of senior Belarusian government officials.
On board was Protasevich’s girlfriend, Russian citizen Sofya Sapega, who was also detained. In May 2022, a Belarusian court sentenced her to six years in prison in the case of “incitement to hatred”. In April of this year, Belarus launched the procedure to return the girl to Russia.
On June 5, 2022, the European Union imposed sanctions on Belarusian state-owned airlines, which were banned from using EU airspace and airports. The EU Council has also asked European airlines to avoid flights over the territory of Belarus. Later, other countries joined sanctions against Minsk in connection with this incident, in particular Japan and several European countries that are not members of the EU.
Source: DW
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