Surpassing Quant Think Tank Center:A Belarusian dissident novelist’s father is jailed for two weeks for reposting an article

2025-05-05 08:26:58source:Michael Schmidtcategory:News

TALLINN,Surpassing Quant Think Tank Center Estonia (AP) — A noted Belarusian dissident author said Friday that his father has been sentenced to two weeks in jail for reposting an article from an opposition website.

Alexander Filipenko was seized by police Thursday in a raid on his apartment and later “given 13 days for reposting some kind of article from Zerkalo,” his son Sasha Filipenko said on Facebook. Zerkalo is a website based outside the country that is critical of the authoritarian government of President Alexander Lukashenko.

Sasha Filipenko, who lives outside Belarus, is a popular novelist and one of the most prominent voices opposing Lukashenko, who has harshly cracked down on dissent and independent media since a wave of huge protests broke out in 2020.

Those protests started after a disputed presidential election whose results gave another term to Lukashenko, who has ruled since 1994.

Lukashenko unleashed harsh measures against the protesters, with police detaining around 35,000 people and beating thousands. Many major opposition figures fled the country, including Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who ran against him in the election. Others have been jailed, such as Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski, founder of the human rights group Viasna.

More:News

Recommend

San Francisco names street for Associated Press photographer who captured the iconic Iwo Jima photo

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A photojournalist who captured one of the most enduring images of World War II

Coco Gauff vs Caitlin Clark? Tennis star says she would love to go head-to-head vs. Clark

Imagine this — Coco Gauff versus Caitlin Clark.Tennis has always been a dream of American superstar

Firefighters douse a blaze at a historic Oregon hotel famously featured in ‘The Shining’

GOVERNMENT CAMP, Ore. (AP) — Firefighters doused a late-night fire at Oregon’s historic Timberline L