Jailed Belsat TV journo may stand trial soon, family says

In mid Novem­ber, Bel­sat TV jour­nal­ist Kat­syary­na Andreye­va (Bakhvala­va) and cam­er­a­woman Darya Chultso­va were detained imme­di­ate­ly after their livestream­ing and cov­er­ing the bru­tal crack­down on pro­test­ers who gath­ered in the so-called Square of Change, one of the off­street yards on Charvyak­ou Street in Min­sk. Ear­li­er, Minsker Raman Ban­daren­ka had been abduct­ed from that yard and beat­en to death.

Chultso­va and Andreye­va are accused of ‘organ­is­ing and prepar­ing actions that gross­ly vio­late pub­lic order’ (Art. 342–1 of the Crim­i­nal Code). If found guilty, the two girls may be sen­tenced to up to three years of impris­on­ment.

On Novem­ber 24, Belaru­sian human rights activists recog­nised them (along with TUT.BY reporter Kat­syary­na Bary­se­vich) as polit­i­cal pris­on­ers. It is an open secret that mes­sages from out­side give enour­mous sup­port and encour­age­ment to a pris­on­er; that is why we urge our read­ers to send let­ters to the jailed jour­nal­ists:

Кацярына Андрэева (Бахвалава): 222160 Беларусь, г. Жодзіна, вул. Савецкая, д. 22а / Kat­syary­na Andreye­va (Bakhvala­va): Savet­skaya Street 22a, Zhodz­i­na, 222160 Belarus

Дарʼя Чульцова: 222160 Беларусь, г. Жодзіна, вул. Савецкая, д. 22а / Darya Chultso­va: Savet­skaya Street 22a, Zhodz­i­na, 222160 Belarus

Кацярына Барысевіч: Беларусь, 220030 г. Менск, вул. Валадарскага, д. 2. СІЗА № 1 / Kat­syary­na Bary­se­vich: Deten­tion facil­i­ty Nr 1, Val­adars­ki Street 2, Min­sk, 220030 Belarus

Don’t for­get to enclose an emp­ty enve­lope so that the girls could respond to your let­ter. Thank you for your unin­dif­fer­ence!