Ирина Халип. Фото: Facebook
The Belarusian Prosecutor’s Office has opened a criminal case against special correspondent of Novaya Gazeta Europe Iryna Khalip. She reported this on Facebook.
«It has been a long time since my parents last had a search. I cannot say they missed it and spent their free time running to the post office checking for summonses, but today someone came. A search in connection with a criminal case against me. They interrogated my mother. She is 89. What is curious is that the criminal case under an extremist article (no details were given as to which exact extremist article) was opened by the Novopolotsk Prosecutor’s Office. I have been to Novopolotsk twice in my life — I came to visit my husband in the colony. I have no other memories of Novopolotsk.», she said.
As Khalip told Novaya Gazeta Europe, on the morning of 27 November law enforcement officers came with a search to her parents’ apartment in Minsk. They presented a ruling stating that the investigative actions were carried out within the framework of a criminal case opened against her. According to them, the case was initiated under an “extremist” article, but they allegedly did not know the details. The search was conducted by police officers, while the case, they said, had been opened by the prosecutor’s office.
During the interrogation of the journalist’s mother, Lyutsina Belzatskaya, officers tried to establish Khalip’s whereabouts and asked for her phone number. No items related to the correspondent’s professional activity were found in the apartment.
In spring 2011, a Belarusian court sentenced Khalip to two years of imprisonment with a two-year suspension for “mass riots” in Minsk in December 2010. After the suspension expired, the court released her from criminal liability.