Independent journalist arrested for treason in Belarus

TALLINN – An independent journalist in Belarus has been arrested on charges of high treason, the latest move in a relentless crackdown on media and freedom of expression by President Alexander Lukashenko’s authoritarian government, a watchdog said Thursday media rights.

Brest city reporter Danil Palianski was arrested in September and remains behind bars, according to the Belarusian Association of Journalists. The 53-year-old journalist faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Palianski, who has worked for several independent media outlets, is one of 34 journalists detained in Belarus, serving time or awaiting trial.

“Belarus has become the most dangerous country in Europe for journalists, a place where journalists disappear behind bars and we don’t know what happens to them,” said Andrei Bastunets, president of the journalists’ association .

He noted that authorities have intensified their crackdown in the run-up to next year’s presidential election. Lukashenko, in power for more than 30 years, is expected to seek a seventh term.

“Most independent media outlets have fled abroad and the authorities are doing everything they can to ensure that not a single independent journalist remains in the country,” Bastunets said.

After Lukashenko’s 2020 re-election, which was seen as rigged at home and abroad, he responded to a wave of mass protests with brutal crackdowns that saw more than 65,000 people arrested.

Around 1,300 people are currently held behind bars as political prisoners, according to the human rights group Viasna, including the group’s founder and Nobel Peace Prize winner Ales Bialiatski.