«Empty chair» for Katsiaryna Andreyeva in Riga: Solidarity from Latvian PEN Center

A sol­i­dar­i­ty action was held on the fourth anniver­sary of Kat­siary­na Andreye­va’s impris­on­ment. Poet and trans­la­tor Ale­sia Lose­va read excerpts from the book Belaru­sian Don­bas and poems by the impris­oned jour­nal­ist Kat­siary­na Andreye­va trans­lat­ed into Lat­vian.

Poet and trans­la­tor Ale­sia Lose­va and writer Inga Geile

Novem­ber 15 is the Day of Impris­oned Writ­ers. PEN Inter­na­tion­al employs the «emp­ty chair» sym­bol to draw atten­tion to the plight of writ­ers who are impris­oned, evad­ing author­i­ties, or have been killed. The emp­ty chair read­ings serve as a protest and a call to action to safe­guard free­dom of expres­sion and the courage to speak out and cre­ate despite the risks.

On Novem­ber 15, exact­ly four years ago, Belaru­sian jour­nal­ist Kat­siary­na Andreye­va was arresred for stream­ing a protest action in mem­o­ry of the mur­dered neigh­bor­hood activist Raman Ban­daren­ka.

Poet and trans­la­tor Ale­sia Lose­va and writer Inga Geile

This year, the Lat­vian PEN Cen­ter bestowed hon­ors upon six esteemed authors, includ­ing Kat­siary­na Andreye­va. Poet and trans­la­tor Ale­sia Lose­va read selec­tions from Kat­siary­na’s poems, writ­ten while incar­cer­at­ed, and an excerpt from the book Belaru­sian Don­bas, co-authored with her hus­band, Ihar Ilyash, who is cur­rent­ly also a polit­i­cal pris­on­er.

Andreye­va has been incar­cer­at­ed for four years.

She was arrest­ed in Min­sk on Novem­ber 15, 2020, for stream­ing a video dur­ing a ral­ly in mem­o­ry of Raman Ban­daren­ka, who was killed by police.

On Feb­ru­ary 18, 2021, the Frun­zen­s­ki Dis­trict Court of Min­sk hand­ed down a two-year prison sen­tence to Kat­siary­na and her cam­er­a­woman Daria Chultso­va.

On Feb­ru­ary 10, 2022, Kat­siary­na Andreye­va was trans­ferred from Wom­en’s Cor­rec­tion­al Facil­i­ty No. 4, where she was serv­ing her first sen­tence, to Homel Pre­tri­al Deten­tion Cen­ter instead of being released. Addi­tion­al­ly, she was charged with trea­son.

In July 2022, Kat­siary­na Andreye­va was sen­tenced to eight years’ impris­on­ment by Judge Aleh Kharosh­ka of the Homel Region­al Court. The tri­al was held behind closed doors, and the nature of the charges remains unknown.

On Sep­tem­ber 20, the Supreme Court upheld the deci­sion of the court of first instance. It was also announced that the word­ing of the charges had been amend­ed. Instead of «reveal­ing state secrets to a for­eign orga­ni­za­tion or state,» Kat­siary­na Andreye­va’s jour­nal­is­tic activ­i­ties were clas­si­fied as «espi­onage.»

Kat­siary­na Andreye­va and Ihar Ilyash, a jour­nal­ist cou­ple cur­rent­ly incar­cer­at­ed. Pho­to: Social media

On Octo­ber 20, 2024, Ihar Ilyash, a jour­nal­ist and the hus­band of Kat­siary­na Andreye­va, was arrest­ed in Min­sk on sus­pi­cion of «pro­mot­ing extrem­ist activ­i­ties.» He has cho­sen to remain in Belarus to sup­port his wife in prison.

As of the end of Octo­ber, Ihar Ilyash was trans­ferred to a pre-tri­al deten­tion cen­ter, sig­ni­fy­ing that he has been for­mal­ly charged with a crim­i­nal offense.