On Friday 26 May, 2023 Belarus’ Supreme Court in Minsk has upheld an eight-year prison sentence for a prominent member of the country’s Polish minority and a correspondent for a Polish newspaper.
Andrzej Poczobut (Андрэй Пачобут), born 1973, reporter for GazetaWyborcza, and former journalist for several media in Belarus, was convicted 8 February, 2023 of harming Belarus’ national security and “sowing discord.” He had been arrested on 25 March 2021 and has been in custody since then. It is the second time that he was arrested. In 2011 he was arrested for allegedly libeling Belarus President Aleksandr Grigorievich Lukashenko in his reports
Poczobut extensively covered the mass protests that erupted in Belarus in 2020 following the disputed presidential election, which both the opposition and the West denounced as manipulated.
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