Pavel Dabravolski was detained on January 22, 2025, and is serving a nine-year prison sentence after being convictedin March 2026 on treason charges. Dabravolski’s detention was first made public on August 26 by Belarus-based human rights group Viasna and the Pozirk independent news agency.
Pozirk reported that Dabravolski was detained “in connection with his professional activities” under Article 356, part 1 of the Criminal Code.
Dabravolski had worked with independent news agency BelaPAN before the KGB declared it an “extremist group” in November 2021, Pozirk reported. According to Viasna, Dabravolski is a former journalist with Naviny.by, a news website affiliated with BelaPAN. He had previously worked for both Belarusian and foreign media, including the independent Ukrainian news outlet New Voice of Ukraine, according to the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), an exiled advocacy and trade group.
Dabravolski was first detained while covering 2020 protests demanding the resignation of President Aleksandr Lukashenko, Viasna reported. According to Pozirk, he was arrested for 15 days in Minsk, the capital, in October 2020. He left Belarus in the fall of 2021 and returned to Minsk in October 2024.
In October 2025, CPJ emailed the KGB for comment on Dabravolski’s detention but did not receive a reply.
Dabravolski’s trial started on February 27, 2026.
On March 6, a court in Minsk sentenced him to nine years in jail on treason charges, which stem from his coverage of the 2020 nationwide protests demanding the resignation of President Aleksandr Lukashenko, according to Pozirk.