Three members of a family were convicted in Belarus for participating in protests following an August 2020 presidential election that saw authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka handed victory despite opposition claims the vote was rigged.
Brothers Paval and Uladzimer Dzhezhora and Alena Nyadbalskaya were sentenced on May 17 to three years of what is known as "chemistry," under which a person is required to work at an assigned job in "open-type" correctional facilities, the rights group Vyasna said on June 7 when the news was made public.
The Crisis In Belarus
Read our coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election.
Separately, Vyasna said on June 7 that Hrazhyna Hetka, an independent election observer from 2020, was detained for a second time this year. No details were given.
The cases are emblematic of the fundamental changes that have been under way in Belarus since Lukashenka claimed a landslide victory and a sixth term in an August 2020 election that millions of Belarusians say he stole.
The harsh crackdown against pro-democracy protesters that began on election day has been institutionalized into a regime of constant intimidation and fear.
Vyasna has documented some 55,000 cases of repression since the start of the presidential election campaign in 2020. At least 4,500 people have received criminal convictions, and Vyasna has designated about 1,500 of them as political prisoners.
In January 2023, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe estimated that between 200,000 and 500,000 Belarusians have fled the country of 9.5 million since the election.
Lukashenka's regime appears to be reaching outside the country as well.
Belarusian rights defender Andrey Stryzhak wrote on Facebook on June 6 that an opposition activist, whose identity was not disclosed, said they have been stripped of their Belarusian citizenship for criticizing the government.
Stryzhak, the head of the Belarus Solidarity Foundation (BYSPOL), a group that aids victims of repression in Belarus, said it is the first case of citizenship being revoked since the beginning of the 2020 protests that he knows of.
He did not give the name of the person, but he told the Novaya Gazeta.Evropa newspaper that the activist is currently in “a safe place.”
The person, he said, received their Belarusian citizenship after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 and that authorities had used technicalities to revoke it.
RFE/RL has not verified Stryzhak's account of the person losing their citizenship.
Belarus recently adopted a law allowing for the annulment of the citizenship of those convicted of extremist charges or residing abroad.
The announcement of the contested results of the August 2020 election sparked more than three months of nationwide pro-democracy protests, with hundreds of thousands of people demanding Lukashenka's resignation and a new election.
Many contended that opposition candidate Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya was the actual winner.
The government responded with an often brutal crackdown. Several people were killed and by September 1, 2020, the United Nations had recorded 450 cases of "torture and ill-treatment," as well as reports of "sexual abuse and rape with rubber batons," as at least 6,700 people were detained.