News
UN human rights experts condemn Belarus executions
GENEVA (12 December 2018) — UN human rights experts condemned Belarus for its continued use of the death penalty, following local news reports that the country, in defiance of the Human Rights Committee’s requests for a stay, had executed three people: Aleksei Mikhalenya, Semyon Berezhnoi and Igor Gershankov. Read more…
Campaigners against the death penalty win national human rights prize
Belarusian human rights defenders marked the International Human Rights Day by awarding the 10th annual National Human Rights Prize. The ceremony was hosted by the newly opened education space “Territory of Rights.” Read more…
Belarus: Amnesty International condemns execution of two more prisoners
Last week, the families of Siamion Berazhnoy and Ihar Hershankou confirmed to the Belarusian civil society organisation Human Rights Centre Viasna that they have been officially informed of the executions. Also according to information from Viasna the men were likely executed on the night of 19-20 November. Read more…
EU, CoE, PACE, Amnesty International condemn executions in Belarus
Brussels and Strasbourg have released official comments on the recent execution of two death row prisoners in Belarus, Siamion Berazhnoy and Ihar Hershankou. Read more…
Belarus executes two more prisoners
Death row prisoners Siamion Berazhnoy and Ihar Hershankou have been executed by shooting, according to information received from the prisoners' families. Read more…
Swiss abolitionists ask Lukashenka to spare lives of death row prisoners in Belarus
L’ACAT-Suisse, a Switzerland-based human rights organization working to end torture and capital punishment, has sent a petition to President Lukashenka, asking him to commute the death sentences handed down to Aliaksandr Zhylnikau and Viachaslau Sukharko. Read more…
Week against the Death Penalty: We do not celebrate, we express solidarity
The fifth annual Week against the Death Penalty concluded on October 12, World Day against the Death Penalty, with an artistic event at the Lithuanian embassy in Minsk, which told about the pain suffered by the families of death convicts. Read more…
Viasna again calls to halt executions at PACE event on World Day against the Death Penalty
On October 10, the issue of ongoing executions in Belarus was discussed at a meeting of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of the Parliamentary Assembly pf the Council of Europe. The event was scheduled to mark the World Day against the Death Penalty. The discussion involved Valery Varanetski, chairperson of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives, and deputy chairperson of the Human Rights Center “Viasna” Valiantsin Stefanovich. Read more…
Treatment of death row prisoners in Belarus
While on death row, convicts face a number of violations of their rights. During their one monthly visit with a family member (a right accorded under Article 174 of the Criminal Law Enforcement Code), they are forbidden from referring to detention conditions. Read more…
Belarusian Orthodox church supports moratorium on death penalty
His Eminence Metropolitan Pavel of Minsk and Zaslavl, the Patriarchal Exarch of All Belarus, has spoken in favor of introducing a moratorium on the death penalty in the country. Read more…
EU, CoE reiterate call to introduce moratorium on executions in Belarus
Joint Declaration by the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and the Secretary General of the Council of Europe on the European and World Day against the Death Penalty Read more…
Week Against the Death Penalty: October 5-10
From 5 to 10 October, the annual Week Against the Death Penalty will be held in Belarus. This year’s evets will focus on the conditions of detention on death row. Read more…
“They should have shot me instead”: The stories of death row inmates’ family members
In Belarus, you cannot sentence a woman to death — this is the law. But it is women who suffer most from death sentences. Over the 27 years of Belarus’s independence, more than 400 men have been shot in Belarus. Behind each of them, there is the ruined life of at least one woman. We collected the stories of five of them. Read more…
Pope Francis declares death penalty inadmissible in all cases
Pope Francis has changed the teachings of the Catholic faith to officially oppose the death penalty in all circumstances, the Vatican has said. Read more…
Death row prisoner Ihar Hershankou loses 18 kilos on hunger strike
Ihar Hershankou started his hunger strike on June 27 to protest violations of his right to correspondence, after all his complaints, including to the Prosecutor General, the Department of Corrections and Belarus’s envoy to the UN, as well as many letters to relatives, failed not reach their destinations. Read more…
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