Kyril Pazniak is a Belarusian journalist who spent more than a year in prison in Belarus before being released on September 16, 2026, one of 25 prisoners freed after months of U.S. diplomatic efforts. He was immediately deported to Lithuania, according to the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ).
Pazniak was detained in September 2025 and was handed a three-year six-month sentence on June 26, 2026 after he was convicted of creating an extremist group and discrediting Belarus.
Two other journalists -Dzmitry Navazhylau, and Andrei Aliaksandrau - were also freed alongside Pazniak on September 16 and deported to Lithuania. Pazniak’s daughter Yanina, who had been arrested at the same time as her father, was also freed.
The releases followed a meeting between Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and John Coale, U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy to Belarus who has been charged with securing the release of hundreds of people including human rights campaigners, political activists, journalists and lawyers.
Case history
Pazniak worked for the YouTube channel Platform 375, which covered politics and the economy in Belarus. Pazniak hosted discussions between the government and opposition supporters until 2022.
He was detained in Minsk on September 3, 2025. The next day, Belarusian authorities designated Platform 375 as extremist and also arrested his daughter Yanina.
Independent news website Pozirk reported that Pazniak had been detained on suspicion of involvement with a banned “extremist” online outlet. Authorities later additionally charged him with “discrediting Belarus.”
On May 22, 2026, Pazniak’s ex-wife Alena Pakala said on Facebook that he was in critical condition at the hospital attached to pretrial detention center No. 1 in the village of Pashkovichi, near Minsk, the capital. “He is suffering from advanced complications of pneumonia and COVID-19, which he contracted at the Akrestina temporary detention center [in Minsk] eight months ago,” she said.
The trial of Pazniak and his daughter had been scheduled to start in Minsk on May 14 but was postponed to June 17 because of Pazniak’s health status.
On June 26, a court in Minsk convicted Pazniak and fined him 24,750 Belarusian rubles (US$8,530).
Yanina was convicted on similar charges but her prison sentence and fine were unknown as of late June 2026. State prosecutors had requested three years in prison, according to Belsat TV, on charges that stemmed from the fact that she registered Platform 375 on TikTok.
In June 2026, CPJ emailed the Belarusian Investigative Committee, the law enforcement agency in charge of pretrial proceedings, for comment on the charges against Pazniak and his health status but did not receive a reply.