{"id":529856,"date":"2026-03-30T21:45:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-30T18:45:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/reform.news\/?p=529856"},"modified":"2026-03-31T06:54:23","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:54:23","slug":"passports-annulled-for-former-political-prisoners-expelled-from-belarus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/passports-annulled-for-former-political-prisoners-expelled-from-belarus","title":{"rendered":"Passports Annulled for Former Political Prisoners Expelled from Belarus"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>Former political prisoners who were forcibly expelled from Belarus are having their passports annulled. One of the former political prisoners <a href=\"https:\/\/t.me\/euroradio\/72926\">told<\/a> Euroradio.<\/p>\n<p>He said he visited the Interior Ministry\u2019s website to check his status but saw that his passport was invalid. Other former political prisoners have encountered the same problem. So far, it does not affect those who were released this year.<\/p>\n<p>A representative of the United Transitional Cabinet for Social Policy, <strong>Volha Zazulinskaya<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/t.me\/CabinetBelarus\/4798\">stated<\/a> that such tactics by the authorities are a continuation of repression. Annulment of a passport means difficulties with legalization, access to work, housing, and basic services. People without passports will also have to urgently obtain alternative travel documents.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00abThis once again shows that this is not about \u201chumanity\u201d or \u201cgestures of goodwill\u201d that the Lukashenka regime is trying to demonstrate. This is a continuation of repression \u2014 simply in another form and already beyond the country\u2019s borders\u00bb,<\/em> she noted.<\/p>\n<p>Zazulinskaya said the issue would be raised in negotiations, including with the American side, as well as with the authorities of Lithuania and Poland.<\/p>\n<p>Passports were declared invalid for those who were given their documents upon being expelled from Belarus.<\/p>\n<p>One of the former political prisoners expelled from Belarus in September last year <a href=\"https:\/\/spring96.org\/be\/news\/119931\">told<\/a> the human rights center \u201cViasna\u201d that his passport and the passports of others in his group had been annulled.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00abThose I keep in contact with from our group also checked. It turned out that everyone\u2019s passports are invalid. I think this situation applies to absolutely everyone who left with documents, which is about 20\u201325 people\u00bb,<\/em> he said.<\/p>\n<p>According to the former political prisoner, his passport was valid until 2031, and as recently as November 2025 he had used it and it was still valid.<\/p>\n<p>Blogger <b>Dzmitry Kazlou<\/b> is among those whose passport was annulled. It had been valid until 2032. According to Kazlou, just a week ago he traveled to Warsaw and flew to Brussels using this passport. <em>\u00abMy documents were checked, and there were no problems. Perhaps this does not affect European checks because Belarusian Interior Ministry databases are not consulted there\u00bb,<\/em> he said.<\/p>\n<p>According to human rights defenders, passports have also been annulled for former political prisoners who were released in December 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former political prisoners who were forcibly expelled from Belarus are having their passports annulled. One of the former political prisoners told Euroradio. He said he visited the Interior Ministry\u2019s website to check his status but saw that his passport was invalid. Other former political prisoners have encountered the same problem. So far, it does not [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":494776,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sharing_image":{"poster":"https:\/\/reform.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/69cb4572eb5d9.jpg","width":1200,"height":630,"template":"691142dd","mode":"auto"},"_sharing_image_fieldset":{"dTVKfmI95PYT":"Passports Annulled for Former Political Prisoners Expelled from Belarus"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[142339,142338,143127,143090],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-529856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-main","category-news","category-society","category-politics"],"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/494776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reform.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}