Journalist, writer and poet Kaciaryna Andrejeva was arrested in Minsk on 15 November 2020 together with her colleague from Belsat TV, Daria Čulcova. They were livestreaming a peaceful protest honouring the memory of artist Raman Bandarenka, who was reportedly killed by Belarusian security officers following the fraudulent presidential elections of August 2020. Andrejeva and Čulcova were sentenced to seven days of administrative detention on 17 November 2020, before being charged with ‘organising and preparing of actions that grossly violate public order’ under Article 342, Part 1, of the Belarusian Criminal Code, and placed in pre-trial detention. On 18 February 2021, a court in Minsk found Andrejeva and Čulcova guilty and sentenced them to two years in prison. Their sentence was upheld on appeal on 23 April 2021.  

 Andrejeva was scheduled to be released on 5 September 2022, yet on 13 July 2022, a court in Homel, southeastern Belarus, sentenced her to an additional eight years in prison on bogus charges of ‘state treason’, under Article 356, Part 1, of the Belarusian Criminal Code. The trial was held behind closed doors. The verdict was upheld on appeal on 20 September 2022. Andrejeva still has to serve the remaining three months in prison left in her first sentence.  

 Born on 2 November 1993, Andrejeva’s is an award-winning Belarusian journalist and writer. She was working for the leading independent broadcaster Belsat TV at the time of her arrest. Her documentary book Belarusian Donbas, co-authored with her husband, journalist Ihar Iljaš, and published in 2020, details their investigation into the role of Belarusian citizens and organisations in the war in Donbas, Eastern Ukraine. The book was deemed ‘extremist’ by the Belarusian authorities and subsequently banned in 2021. Andrejeva started composing poetry while in prison. Her poems, published and translated by the #FreeAllWords initiative, are available here. 

 The situation in Belarus remains of grave concern. As documented in a report by PEN Belarus published in July 2024, the past four years have been marked by repression on a global scale, with 1289 people being held on politically motivated grounds at the time of writing. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights concluded that some of the violations it documented may amount to crimes against humanity. Meanwhile, the stigmatisation and repression of Belarusian language and literature show no sign of abating.  

 For more information about the work of PEN Belarus, including their monitoring of cultural and human rights violations against cultural workers, please click here.