A court in Gomel, Belarus, has sentenced Katerina Andreeva, a reporter for Belsat, a Poland-based independent Belarusian TV channel, to eight years behind bars for “committing high treason,” Belsat reports.
Igor Iliash, Andreeva’s husband, reported charges against her on 7 April. She was sentenced to two years earlier for “disorderly behaviour” after she had been detained alongside fellow reporter Daria Chultsova on 15 November 2021 in Minsk for covering a memorial event in tribute to Roman Bondarenko, a man who was killed by unknown masked people, presumably state-related.
Katerina was expected to be released from prison on 5 September 2022. She was, however, transferred into a pre-detention facility in Gomel on 10 February, her relatives oblivious of her status for 55 days.