One of three Russian drones that crossed into Belarus as Alexander Lukashenko was flying from his residence crashed in a populated area, witnesses of the crash arrested.
Poland expresses support for Lithuania's ICC Referral over Lukashenko's alleged crimes.
Seven defendants sentenced in absentia to 25 years in prison for damaging Russian A-50 military aircraft in Belarus in a 2023 drone attack.
Belarus extends sentence of U.S.-Belarusian citizen Yury Ziankovich, jailed in Belarus on politically motivated charges after he was forced to “confess” and plead for pardon on state TV.
Belarusian Investigative Committee launches in absentia probe against 45 opposition figures over alleged election obstruction plans.
Belarus labels Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya’s chief advisor Franak Viachorka as a terrorist, and adds him to the KGB's growing list of opposition figures.
Three Russian Shahed-type drone cross to Belarus while Lukashenko was in helicopter
One of the three Shahed-type drones that crossed into Belarus on Oct. 3 as Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko was flying over the country crashed in a populated area, the monitoring group Belaruski Hajun reports.
The witness of the crash was arrested, Hajun reported on Oct.3. The group said that the three Russian Shahed-type drones had entered Belarusian airspace from Ukraine's Chernihiv Oblast while Lukashenko was in his helicopter midway between his Ozerny residence and Minsk.
Two drones crossed from Ukraine into Belarus over Novaya Huta, heading north for Homiel, while another flew over Loyew, which is situated on the banks of the Dnipro River, right on the Ukrainian-Belarusian border. One of the drones reportedly crashed near Kalinkavichy, a town with a population of 40,000 about 52 kilometers north of the Ukrainian border. Residents of Kalinkavichy said they heard an explosion, Belarusian Hajun noted.
No casualties were reported, and Lukashenko regime officials have not commented on the incident. However, the next day, on Oct. 4, the Belarusian Interior Ministry published a video of a raid on the house and arrest of a resident of Kalinkavichy. Belarusian independent media linked the arrest with CCTV footage of the drone crash recorded from this house that had been published on a local Telegram channel. The official charges against the arrested woman include “aiding extremist activities.”
Lukashenko later confirmed drones had violated Belarusian airspace during his helicopter flight as he spoke to local residents in a neighboring region on Oct. 4. He said both Russian and Ukrainian drones have been going off course due to the “impact of electronic warfare tools” and were being downed en masse in Belarus.
“There have been several such cases both from Russia and Ukraine,” state-owned news agency Belta reported Lukashenko as saying. “We shoot down a lot of them. We don’t look at whether they are Russian or Ukrainian.”
Since July, monitoring groups, including Belarusian Hajun, have reported dozens of cases of Russian drones entering Belarusian airspace and sometimes traveling as far as 250 kilometers across the country. Belarusian authorities have officially confirmed only one downing of a Shahed-type drone, on Sept. 5.
While largely ignoring Russian drone incursions, Lukashenko claimed on Aug. 9 that several Ukrainian drones were downed over Belarus, calling the incident “a Ukrainian provocation.”
Belarusian Hajun said the claim was false and that no Ukrainian drones had been detected. Drone incursions continue, and on Oct. 7, Belarusian Hajun reported four new incursions. On the same day, Lukashenko signed a decree granting prosecutors, investigators, and emergency units the right to down drones on equal footing with the military.
Poland supports Lithuania’s ICC referral over Lukashenko’s alleged crimes
The Polish foreign ministry fully supports the Lithuanian government’s referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC) of cases against Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko and his regime, Polish Foreign Ministry spokesperson Pawel Wroński told the Warsaw-based independent Belarusian broadcaster Belsat on Oct. 2.
“We agree that there are reasonable grounds for claiming that the Lukashenko regime may have committed crimes as defined by the statute of the International Criminal Court,” Wroński said. “We will read the arguments of the Lithuanian side with interest. This means the full support of the Polish Foreign Ministry for the Lithuanian appeal.”
The Lithuanian Ministry of Justice announced on Sept. 30 it was filing a formal request to the ICC to investigate alleged crimes against humanity by Lukashenko’s regime, including deportations and the persecution of Belarusian citizens.
The Lithuanian authorities assert that the mass exile of Belarusians due to domestic political repression may constitute the crime of mass deportation. Lithuania has called on other countries affected by the wave of Belarusian refugees to refer their own cases to the ICC.
As part of a campaign by the Belarusian opposition to win international support of Lithuania’s referral, Belarus opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya met with Polish Justice Minister Adam Bodnar on Oct. 3.
Meanwhile, Belarusian Foreign Minister Maksim Ryzhankou dismissed the allegations as “absurd and far-fetched.”
“The outgoing Lithuanian administration … has decided to make use of Western-controlled judicial institutions, the biased nature of which has long been obvious to everyone,” said Ryzhankou, who recently called for the restoration of diplomatic relations between Belarus and Lithuania.
Despite Belarus not being a party to the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty, the court has jurisdiction due to the crimes being committed on the territories of signatory nations. Lithuania currently hosts around 60,000 of the over 300,000 Belarusian citizens who have fled the country amid the Lukashenko regime’s crackdown on dissent.
Belarus sentences 12 people to up to 25 years in prison for sabotaging Russian A-50 military plane
Minsk City Court sentenced 12 individuals to prison terms ranging between two and 25 years for committing an act of sabotage at Machulishchy military airfield in Belarus in 2023, the Office of the Belarusian Prosecutor General reported on Oct. 4.
The case refers to damage done to a Russian A-50 reconnaissance aircraft, which was hit by a drone attack on Feb. 26, 2023. At least seven sentences were handed down to defendants in absentia.
Machulishchy air base is extensively used by Russia’s air force. The organization of former Belarusian law enforcers in exile Bypol claimed responsibility for this attack, saying it was carried out by Belarusian partisans in coordination with Ukraine’s SBU.
The Belarusian KGB claimed to have arrested 30 individuals in connection with the drone attack, footage of which was uploaded to social media sites and shared widely.
The closed trial of the defendants began on Aug. 19. Some of the suspects were charged with up to 11 criminal articles, including terrorism and treason.
The list of defendants includes Ukrainian national Mykola Shvets, jailed in March 2023 and considered the main perpetrator in the case, according to Belarusian state-controlled media. Shvets was released in July this year and returned to Ukraine as part of a Russia-Ukraine prisoner swap. The court nevertheless sentenced Shvets in absentia to 25 years in prison.
Besides six other defendants sentenced in absentia, several defendants detained in Belarus were convicted of renting their apartment to or sharing a ride with the saboteurs, even though they had no knowledge of the sabotage operation.
Russia used the A-50 early warning and control aircraft to coordinate the attacks on Ukrainian targets, guide missiles, and detect air defense systems. Although Belarusian officials claimed the attack failed, the aircraft was sent to Taganrog Aviation Plant for repair and has not yet returned to Belarus.
The Russian Air Force is known to have lost another two of these planes, which cost around $330 million, in early 2024 – one in January and another on Feb. 23, to Ukrainian attacks. According to Ukraine's military intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, Russia has only six planes of this model left in service.
Martin Fornusek
US-Belarusian citizen, filmed for Belarusian propaganda, has prison term extended
A court in Belarus has extended by two years the prison term of U.S.-Belarusian citizen and political prisoner Yury Ziankovich, who was recently shown on Belarusian state TV pleading for clemency, bringing it to thirteen-and-a-half years.
Ziankovich, who was first detained in 2021, was earlier sentenced to 11 years in prison on charges of conspiracy to seize power and attempting to assassinate Lukashenko.
While in detention, he was given a further six months in prison for “insulting a representative of the authorities.” The latest sentence thus extends his total term to thirteen-and-a-half years in prison, the Viasna Human Rights Center reported on Oct. 7.
Human rights activists say that the ruling was issued in August but has only now been made public – three weeks after Belarusian state-controlled television aired a film showing Ziankovich “confessing” to conspiring to seize power and pleading for a pardon from Lukashenko.
Human rights activists say Ziankovich’s appeal for clemency was likely made under duress. In the film, Ziankovich, looking emaciated following several hunger strikes, asks U.S. presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump for help.
U.S. Charge d’Affaires in Belarus Peter Kaufman condemned the broadcast.
Some political analysts have said they consider the broadcast to be a “bargaining offer to Washington” from the Lukashenko regime, as it comes against the backdrop of the recent release of 115 Belarusian political prisoners, “pardoned” by the Belarusian dictator.
In late July, Lukashenko participated in a historic East-West prisoner swap by releasing German citizen Rico Krieger, who had earlier been sentenced to death in Belarus for espionage.
Around 1,300 political prisoners remain behind bars in Belarus following Lukashenko’s four-year-long crackdown on dissent after the 2020 presidential election, which he claimed to have won but which has been condemned by international observers as neither free nor fair.
Belarusian Investigative Committee launches in absentia probe against 45 opponents of Lukashenko
Belarusian investigators on Oct. 8. launched a probe against 45 exiled Belarusian activists, accusing them of planning to disrupt the 2025 presidential elections in Belarus and undermining Belarus’s authority internationally.
The Belarusian Investigative Committee said in a press release that cases against Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya supporters, including 22 activists not previously charged, had been launched in response to Platform-2025, a document on collaboration between Belarusian democratic forces that was adopted at the “New Belarus” conference in August.
Belarusian law enforcers said the document, which sets out the joint position of the main Belarusian opposition forces regarding the upcoming electoral campaign, to be evidence of a conspiracy to seize power and an extremist crime.
Additionally, an investigation was launched against 23 exiled Belarusians for taking part in rallies on Aug. 9 to mark the anniversary of the 2020 presidential elections in Belarus. Participation in rallies abroad, according to the Investigative Committee, constitutes the creation of extremist formation and involvement in it.
Having crushed any form of dissent domestically, the regime of Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko is now trying to silence the opposition in exile: In May, Belarusian law enforcers launched a massive probe against 257 Belarusians running for the elections to an opposition body, the Coordination Council.
Additionally, over 100 exiled citizens were charged for taking part in Dzen’ Voli (Belarusian Freedom Day) celebrations.
Belarus brands Tsikhanouskaya’s chief advisor a terrorist
The Belarusian security agency the KGB has added Franak Viachorka, Chief Advisor to Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, to its list of terrorists, the Viasna Human Rights Center reported on Oct. 4.
A long-time political activist, Viachorka was tried in absentia in July on charges of conspiring to seize power, organizing mass disturbances, creating an extremist group, and defaming Lukashenko. He was sentenced to a 20-year prison term.
Additionally, on Oct. 6 the Belarusian Interior Ministry included Viachorka on its list of “extremists.”
The KGB’s “list of terrorists,” meanwhile, currently includes 1,170 individuals. The list is an inter-governmental register introduced in 2011 and originally designed to fulfill Belarus’s international obligations to fight terrorism. Prior to the 2020 presidential elections in Belarus, which Lukashenko claims to have won, the list mainly included radical Islamist groups’ members.
However, after the Lukashenko regime unleashed a crackdown on all and any forms of dissent, the list became a tool for political repression, with prominent members of the Belarusian opposition like Tsikhanouskaya and Pavel Latushka being added.
Media professionals such as NEXTA opposition media editor Stsiapan Putsila and TUT.BY editor-in-chief Maryna Zolatava are also now on the list of “terrorists.”
