(Moscow) The prosecution demanded Monday in Belarus 19 years in prison against the opponent in exile Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa, tried in absentia since January in this former Soviet republic, in full repression of any voice critical of the regime of Alexander Lukashenko.
A refugee in Lithuania, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, 40, is the target of a dozen charges, including those of high treason and “conspiracy to seize power unconstitutionally”.
During a hearing on Monday in a court in Minsk, the prosecution requested 19 years in prison against her, the official Belarusian Belta news agency reported.
A similar sentence was demanded against another exiled opposition figure, Pavel Latouchko, a former culture minister and ex-director of the Belarusian State Academic Theatre, Belta added.
For three other allies in exile of Mme Tikhanovskaïa – Maria Moroz, Olga Kovalkova and Sergei Dylevski – tried in the same trial, the prosecution requested 12 years in prison, according to the same source.
Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa, who ran for president in 2020 in Belarus in place of her imprisoned husband Sergei Tikhanovski, had during the campaign gathered crowds across her country, raising hopes for change.
Forced into exile, the one who once presented herself as a simple stay-at-home mother is now the face of democratic forces in Belarus and the enemy of a regime whose brutal abuses she tirelessly denounces.
In an interview with AFP in January, Mme Tikhanovskaya called her trial a “farce” and “personal revenge” by Alexander Lukashenko against the one who shook his power in 2020.
During the summer of 2020, Belarus was shaken by a historic protest movement to denounce the controversial re-election of Mr. Lukashenko, in power for almost three decades.
Mass arrests, forced exiles and imprisonment of democracy activists and journalists have shattered this movement.
The husband of Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa, a popular blogger who fiercely criticized Mr. Lukashenko, was sentenced in December 2021 to 18 years in prison, in particular for “organizing massive unrest” and “inciting hatred in society”.
In early January, a Belarusian court also began trying Ales Bialiatski, a jailed democracy activist, co-winner of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize and founder of the human rights center Viasna. Mr. Bialiatski and his associates each risk up to 12 years in prison.