A Journalist as an “Extremist”
- Admin of the NAM
- Dec 2
- 3 min read
Legal qualification:
Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute: persecution of an identifiable group (independent journalists) on political grounds.
Article 7(1)(k): other inhumane acts (intentional destruction of a profession).
D.S., 30, was one of the best investigative journalists in the country. He worked at the leading independent news portal in Belarus (let’s call it “the Portal”). His specialization was not protests but corruption in the upper echelons of power. He uncovered schemes related to drug procurement, construction of luxury real estate for officials, and businesses close to the Lukashenko family.
After 2020, his work became not just difficult — it became impossible. The authorities launched a total purge of the information space. First, the Portal lost its media status. Then its website was blocked. Then, in 2021, the KGB designated the Portal and all its social media channels as an “extremist formation”.
That changed everything. Any work for the Portal — even sending a picture or a message to the editors — became “participation in an extremist formation” (Article 361-1 of the Criminal Code of Belarus), punishable by up to 7 years in prison. The editorial team had to urgently evacuate to Warsaw and Vilnius.
D.S. left together with his colleagues. But his elderly parents remained in Belarus. His father fell seriously ill and needed a complex surgery. At the beginning of 2023, despite all warnings, D.S. decided to travel to Minsk. He went as a private person, “clean” — no work laptop, an empty phone. He hoped to pass unnoticed.
He was taken off the bus at the border. Two men in plain clothes silently took him by the arms. “Come with us, Dmitry. We've been waiting for you.”
He was taken straight to the KGB pre-trial detention center. The charges that followed shocked even his lawyer. He was accused not only of “participating in an extremist formation”, but also of “High Treason” (Article 356 of the Criminal Code).
The logic of the KGB was the following: by working in the “extremist formation” (the Portal), D.S. published corruption investigations. These investigations, according to the investigators, “discredited the Republic of Belarus internationally”, “damaged national security”, and constituted “assistance to foreign states in hostile activities”.
In other words, his journalistic work — his articles exposing officials’ theft — was officially equated with treason.
Interrogations were conducted personally by a KGB colonel. “Who are you working for, Dima? For the Poles? For the Americans? How much do they pay you to betray your Motherland?”
“I work for my readers,” D.S. replied. “I write the truth.”
“Your ‘truth’ is betrayal,” the colonel snapped. “You are an information saboteur. And you will serve time as a saboteur.”
The trial took place in a regional court behind closed doors. The case was marked “Secret”. The lawyer was under a non-disclosure agreement, even regarding the details of the indictment. No one was allowed into the courtroom — not even D.S.’s mother. The process became a pure formality. The “evidence” of his “treason” consisted of his own articles from the past three years.
The prosecutor claimed that D.S., “using his professional skills, intentionally collected and transmitted to foreign organizations (the Portal's editorial office) information discrediting the country’s leadership, with the goal of destabilizing the situation.”
Sentence: 10 years in a high-security penal colony.
“They have created a legal precedent,” D.S. managed to whisper to his lawyer after the verdict. “They have officially declared that journalism is treason. That telling the truth about those in power is a crime equal to espionage. They have killed the profession.”
D.S. was transferred to a colony, where he was immediately placed in a PKT (cell-type confinement) as “prone to extremism”. He was denied correspondence and visits. The regime completely isolated one of the most dangerous people for them — a man who knew how to find and reveal the truth.
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