The 42-year-old man has been sentenced to 1.5 years and a 30-year-old woman – to 2 years of freedom restriction.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, a 42-year-old resident of Vitsebsk was charged with public abuse of the official. According to the investigation, on January 16, 2021, the man left an “insulting comment” on the publication on his page in VK.com about the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, former head of GUBOPiK Mikalai Karpyankou.
For this, the Pershamaiski district court of Vitsebsk punished the man with 1.5 years of restricted freedom and sent him to an open-type institution.
In the Stoubtsy district, a 30-year-old woman was sentenced to two years of freedom restriction for a post about Alyaksandr Lukashenka in VK. According to the General Prosecutor’s Office, the accused posted a comment on the page of a former colleague on November 15, 2020, in which she insulted Lukashenka. The investigation concluded that such a post was “contrary to universal human morality.”
According to human rights activists, the most massive repressions in the modern history of Belarus have been taking place since the summer of 2020. The Investigative Committee claims that more than 2,400 criminal cases related to protests have been opened since August. The Prosecutor General’s Office claims that more than 3,000 such crimes have been registered during this period. The exact number of politically motivated criminal cases remains unknown.
As many as 354 people have been recognized as political prisoners as of April 19. Thousands of protesters across the country became victims of targeted torture, and over 33,000 people were held in administrative detention. According to various estimates, between four and ten people died due to the security forces’ actions. However, no officers have been prosecuted for torture or murder.
