Belarusian journalist Valeryia Kastsiuhova, founder and editor of independent analysis and opinion website Nashe Mneniye (Our Opinion), has been serving a 10-year prison sentence since being convicted in March 2023 on charges of conspiring to seize state power, calling for actions aimed at harming national security, and incitement to hatred. Officers of the Belarusian State Security Committee (KGB) in Minsk, the capital, detained Kastsiuhova in June 2021.
Kastsiuhova wrote analytical pieces for Nashe Mneniye about the Belarusian protests following the disputed August 2020 reelection of President Aleksandr Lukashenko. She is a political scientist, according to Viasna, a banned human rights group.
On June 30, 2021, after raiding Kastsiuhova’s apartment, KGB officers arrested her and took her to the Akrestsina detention center in Minsk, according to a report by Current Time, the Russian-language online TV project of U.S. Congress-funded broadcasters Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and Voice of America.
The journalist’s daughter, Nastasya Kastsiuhova, told CPJ via messaging app, as well as in an interview with independent Polish-based broadcaster Belsat TV, that her mother was charged with “conspiracy or other actions committed with the aim of seizing state power,” which carries a prison sentence of up to 12 years, according to Article 357, Part 1, of the country’s criminal code.
The daughter also said Kastsiuhova was charged with “calls for actions aimed at the detriment of the external security of the Republic of Belarus, its sovereignty, territorial inviolability, national security, and defense capability,” which carries a prison sentence of up to 12 years, according to Article 361, Part 3, of the criminal code.
On July 2, 2021, Nastasya Kastsiuhova, who lives in Lithuania, posted on her Facebook page that her mother was transferred to the Pretrial Detention Center No. 1 in Minsk, informally known as Valadarskaga.
On March 17, 2023, a court in Minsk convicted Kastsiuhova of conspiring to seize state power, calling for actions aimed at harming national security, and incitement to hatred, and sentenced her to 10 years in prison, according to media reports, Viasna, and the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), an independent advocacy and trade group operating from exile.
On July 25, the Belarusian Supreme Court upheld Kastsiuhova’s sentence, BAJ reported.
On August 31, the Belarusian State Security Committee added Kastsiuhova to a list of people allegedly involved in terrorist activities, according to Viasna.
Kastsiuhova is being held in Prison No. 4 in the southeastern city of Homel, according to Viasna.
Nastasya Kastsiuhova told CPJ via messaging app in October 2023 that she has been in contact with her mother, and that she was feeling fine. “Her psychological and physical condition are as acceptable as possible in prison,” Nastasya said.
In October 2023, CPJ called the Belarusian Ministry of Interior for comment, but nobody answered the phone. CPJ emailed the Belarusian Investigative Committee but did not receive any replies.