Nobel Peace Prize winner sentenced to 10 years in prison by Belarusian court

A Nobel Peace Prize winner was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment in Belarus on Friday for what the human rights organization he leads is calling politically motivated charges.

A statement from the Viasna Human Rights Center, a human rights organization based in the capital Minsk, says Ales Bialiatski was sentenced to a decade in prison. Bialiatski serves as the chair of the organization and won the Nobel Peace Prize last year for his efforts as a human rights activist.

Three other human rights advocates were also sentenced to extensive prison terms. They are Viasna board member Valiantsin Stefanovic, who was sentenced to nine years in prison; campaign coordinator for Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections Uladzimir Labkovich, who was sentenced to seven years in prison; and Viasna member Zmitser Salauyou, who was tried in absentia and sentenced to eight years in prison.

A Belarusian court found them guilty of “training or other preparation of people to participate in group actions grossly violating the public order and financing or other material support of such activities” and of smuggling, described as the “illegal movement of cash across the customs border of the Eurasian Economic Union on a large scale by an organized group.”

The court also fined them the equivalent of tens of thousands of dollars each in Belarusian rubles, according to the statement.

The center slammed Belarusian officials for creating “unacceptable conditions” for human rights activists and organizations, saying that no registered groups of those types are left in the country.

“We strongly reject any pressure on members of our organization and other human rights defenders as well as their persecution for carrying out such activities, considering it as politically motivated persecution,” the center said.

It said the organization has been denied in its attempts to register as a human rights group, which the United Nations Human Rights Committee has twice declared a violation of the right of free association.

Viasna said it believes the true motivation for persecuting the four individuals is their involvement in human rights work and their push for democratic values for Belarus.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has led the country for almost 30 years, taking office shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union. He has called himself “Europe’s last dictator” and significantly stifles free speech in the country.

The official Twitter account for the Nobel Prize posted after the sentencing that Bialiatski has advocated for fundamental human rights, democracy and freeing political prisoners from Belarusian jails for many years. It quoted him as saying last year that, “It just so happens that people who value freedom the most are often deprived of it.”

Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya also slammed the imprisonments, saying that the 10-year sentence for Bialiatski demonstrates “what Lukashenko’s regime is.”

“The shameful sentence against Ales, Valiantsin & Uladzimir is the regime’s revenge for their steadfastness. Revenge for solidarity. Revenge for helping others,” Tsikhanouskaya said.

The three individuals who stood trial, not including Salauyou, who was able to leave Belarus, were arrested following widespread protests in the country over a 2020 election that elected Lukashenko to a sixth term and that much of the international community denounced as rigged.

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