MINSK -- Belarusian punk-rock musician Ihar Bantser, who was scheduled to be released last weekend after serving a 15-day jail sentence for allegedly spreading extremist materials, has instead been given another 15-day jail term on the same charge.
The Minsk-based Vyasna (Spring) human rights center said on August 23 that the central district court in Minsk sentenced Bantser a day earlier after finding him guilty of the charges. He had been expected to leave jail on August 19 following his completion of a 15-day sentence for the same offense. It has not been made clear what Bantser did to warrant either of the charges.
Last December, Bantser, who is the leader of Mister X punk group, was released after he served 18 months in a so-called open prison after he pulled down his pants and danced in front of a police car during an anti-government rally. Open prison means he lived under strict restrictions in a special dormitory and worked at an industrial facility chosen by the state penitentiary service.
Vyasna also said on August 23 that a court in the southeastern city of Homel has handed a 16-month prison sentence to a man for his online comments that "insulted" a KGB officer who was killed in a police shootout at a Minsk apartment which also left an IT worker dead in late September last year.
The 31-year-old defendant, Alyaksey Kachanau, was sentenced after the Homel regional court found him guilty of insulting an authority and inciting hatred. Kachanau was released from custody after the sentence was pronounced as the judge ruled that the time he had spent in pretrial detention covered the penalty. In Belarus, one day in a pretrial detention cell is equal to two days in a penal colony.
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Gunfight In Minsk: Doubts Raised About Dramatic Video As Two Killed In KGB Raid
Not much is known about the September 2021 shooting that resulted in the death of Andrey Zeltsar, a man working for a major U.S.-based IT company called EPAM, and KGB officer Dzmitry Fedasyuk.
Authorities claimed at the time that “an especially dangerous criminal” had opened fire on security officers after they showed up at his apartment looking for “individuals involved in terrorist activities.”
Belarus's authoritarian ruler, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, has slammed people who posted comments on social media networks praising Zeltsar and criticizing Fedasyuk, saying "we have all their accounts, and we can see who is who."
Belarus witnessed unprecedented anti-government protests that erupted after a presidential election in August 2020, in which Lukashenka claimed reelection.
Opposition groups say the vote was rigged, while many Western governments have refused to recognize Lukashenka as the winner.
Lukashenka's regime has since cracked down harshly on any sign of dissent.