It happened on January 3. On New Year’s Eve, the law enforcers arrested Palina’s husband and broke into their home. Since then, the woman has not seen her two sons.
On June 9, a Brest court sentenced Palina Sharenda-Panasyuk to two years in jail. She was found guilty under three articles of the Criminal Code at once: “Insulting the President” (Article 368), “Insulting a representative of the authorities” (Article 369), and “Violence or threat of violence against an officer of internal affairs” (Article 364).
At the trial, the woman pleaded not guilty and called herself captured.
“Today is exactly 300 days since Palina was put behind bars. It’s been 300 days since a dozen and a half policemen, riot police officers, and representatives of the Investigative Committee broke into my and Palina’s apartment. They broke down the door and took my wife to jail without any explanation. During that time, she had to go through a lot: she was taken to the punishment cell several times, taken to the Navinki prison, and served a prison sentence for over a month. Palina has been in the penal colony in Homiel for 80 days already, half of which she spent in the punitive confinement. Various reasons were invented for that: twice they locked her up because she refused to sign a clemency petition, and in the other cases, they found minor order breaches. The colony does not accept parcels for Palina, even though they are required to do so. We’ve recently received a letter from Palina, in which she wrote that she was ready for a marathon, for a long-distance, hanging on and asking us for one thing: not to give up and put pressure on the Lukashenka’s regime,” said Andrey Sharenda.
After the verdict, Andrey Sharenda was also charged in two criminal cases: under Article 361 (“Appeals to actions harmful to national security”) and Article 368 (“Insulting the President”). The man was forced to flee abroad.
“I met Palina in 1996. Since then I have never lost sight of her: every meeting or situation that Palina found herself in gave me evidence of her firm and clear civic position. I am proud of my friendship with her because Palina is the conscience of Belarus. Palina is a deeply religious, responsible, ambitious person who cared about everything she did, and that was her concern for Belarus. Even now, in captivity and without letters, she remains that same Palina. But now it’s not us but her who needs solidarity, and not just solidarity, but evidence that we thank her for her honesty, for her truthfulness, for her firmness. And you know, if there were a Nobel Prize for conscience, I would give it to Palina. Palina Sharenda-Panasyuk — a young woman, mother, daughter, wife. We are proud of you, my dear. And we are waiting,” notes Iryna Laurouskaya, Doctor of Arts in Urban Studies and Architecture.
Ales, a friend of Palina and Andrey, notes that the Sharenda family has always fought for Belarus, and for this, the authorities retaliated against them. Now they had waited until the time when there was “no time for laws” to deal with the Sharenda family.
“Andrey and Palina are a very beautiful couple, but this criminal authority has already stolen a lot of time from this family. And it has actually stolen their children’s parents. I know that Palina really wanted to go to the sea, but last year Andrey spent almost the entire summer, and now Palina is in jail. She was imprisoned for nothing. As Palina says, it is a citizen’s honor and duty to fight back against the bandit. I’ve known Palina for more than twenty years and I am sure that this woman cannot be broken, she is a rock,” Ales, a friend of the Sharenda family, says in a conversation with Belsat.
