{"id":141402,"date":"2025-06-05T12:00:28","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T09:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/141402\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T20:40:57","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T20:40:57","slug":"reprisals-musician-arrested-over-critical-songs","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/141402\/","title":{"rendered":"Reprisals: musician arrested over critical songs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

June 5, Pozirk.<\/em><\/strong> Security officers have arrested Alaksandar Chichiel, a musician from the Viciebsk region’s Miadzie\u0142, for performing songs critical of the Belarusian government and Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, a pro-regime source reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Friday, a Hrodna court sentenced 72-year-old Stanis\u0142a\u016d Bujnicki, a co-owner of the building that hosts the Polish consulate in the city, to a prison sentence of two years and six months suspended for one year. The man was found guilty of tax evasion. In addition, he was fined 84,000 rubels, or more than $25,000. Bujnicki was tried in his absence, as he lives in Poland, Viasna reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The property of Anton Matolka, a blogger who was also sentenced in absentia, will be auctioned off. According to Matolka’s Facebook page, it includes an old Mazda, a summer cottage and a plot of land in the Minsk district. The state will collect the proceeds as a fine. On June 3, prosecutors reported that the Hrodna Regional Court had sentenced and fined Matolka on extremism-related charges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cina Pa\u0142ynskaja, a former journalist and Catholic faithful from Po\u0142ack, Viciebsk region, and her 22-year-old daughter Marharyta were placed in the Viciebsk region’s Detention Center No. 2. Chry\u015bcijanskaja Vizija reports that they may be facing criminal charges. Communication with her was lost in late May.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

KGB agents raided the homes of Belarusians who interviewed people as part of polls conducted by the Warsaw-based Belarusian Analytical Workroom, Pozirk <\/em>reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mediazona<\/em> reported that a court ruled to transfer D\u017amitry Rezanovi\u010d, an anarchist activist designated as a political prisoner, from a penal colony to a prison. The man is serving a 19-year sentence. In 2024, he spent six months in the colony’s internal prison.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of June 5, human rights defenders identified at least 1,182 political prisoners but the real number is considerably higher because many cases go undocumented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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