Pavel Pernikaŭ

On 7 April 2022, Pavel Alexandrovich Pernikaŭ , a 30-year-old Belarusian human rights activist and Wikipedia editor, was sentenced to two years imprisonment for "discrediting the Republic of Belarus" by making two edits to Wikipedia about political repression in Belarus and posting one article to the website of a human rights organization about torture and extra-judicial killings in Belarusian detention centers. Days after his imprisonment, he was recognized as a political prisoner by Belarusian human rights organizations.

Background Pavel Alexandrovich Pernikaŭ studied at A.S. Pushkin Brest State University. In 2013, he participated in a student works competition for the 20th anniversary of the World Conference on Human Rights, and received a diploma from the UN office in Belarus. and as of 2021, headed its press service. In 2020 and 2021, Pernikaŭ posted to his social media accounts material about the persecution of independent Belarusian media outlets such as Novy Chas, Intex-Press, and Brestskaya Gazeta, and about Belarusian journalists working in exile after being forced to flee Belarus. had been transferred to court, accused of "committing acts that discredit the Republic of Belarus", a violation of Article 369-1 of the Criminal Code of Belarus, punishable by up to four years in prison.

On the following day, 29 March 2022, the Brest Regional Court held a closed session to hear Pernikaŭ's grievances regarding "detention, house arrest, extension of the period of detention and house arrest, as well as forced placement in a forensic psychiatric expert hospital." At trial, the prosecutor, Elena Tikhanovich, requested that Pernikaŭ be sentenced to two years in prison based on three alleged violations.

First, prosecutors accused Pernikaŭ of adding a paragraph about the murder of Gennady Shutov and the Belarusian authorities' refusal to take responsibility for the deaths of antigovernment protestors to a Belarusian Wikipedia article about deaths related to the 2020–2021 Belarusian protests.

Second, prosecutors accused Pernikaŭ of adding a mention of the 2004 murder of journalist Veronika Cherkasova to a Belarusian Wikipedia article about censorship in Belarus.

Third, prosecutors accused Pernikaŭ of posting an article about torture and death in Belarusian penal colonies and detention centers on the website of the International Society for Human Rights.

Reaction On 11 April 2022, Pernikaŭ (together with 17 other Belarusians) was recognized as a political prisoner by Belarusian human rights organizations Viasna Human Rights Centre, Legal initiative, Belarusian Association of Journalists, Lawtrend, and Belarusian Human Rights House. They called for the immediate release of Pernikaŭ and other political prisoners of Belarus, and for ending the criminal prosecutions against them.