Roman Protasevich announced his pardon
Roman Protasevich, former editor-in-chief of the Nexta Telegram channel, sentenced to a colony in early May on various charges, has announced his pardon. “I literally just signed all the relevant documents stating that I was pardoned. This, of course, is great news,” said the former opposition activist, who collaborated with the Belarusian authorities after his arrest, in an interview with the BelTA news agency. on Monday, May 22nd.
Sentence for Roman Protasevich
On May 3, a court in Minsk found Roman Protasevich guilty of committing several crimes and sentenced him to 8 years in prison. Speaking earlier with the prosecution, the prosecutor’s office asked the court to take into account that the former editor-in-chief of Nexta fulfilled the conditions of the pre-trial agreement, therefore, as punishment for a series of articles, he cannot be given more than half of the maximum term, and for a number of articles – no more than two thirds of the term. Thus, the prosecution asked that he be sentenced to 10 years in prison. 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 were tried in absentia.
The Nexta trial began in February 2023. 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 formation, as well as as a conspiracy to seize power. Putilo was charged with 13 criminal articles, Rudik with 12 articles and Protasevich with 11 articles. In April, the court hardened the charges against Protasevich and charged him with, in addition to “organizing mass riots” and “conspiracy to seize power and incite hatred”, also “repeatedly leading an extremist formation”.
According to the investigation, Roman Protasevich in May-September 2020 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.
Source: DW
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