Andrei Tsypak
defendant in Black Book of Belarus case
Date of birth: 12 February 1993
Date of detention: 13 January 2023
Charges indicted:
Art. 130 of the Criminal Code — Incitement to hatred
Art. 352 of the Criminal Code — Illegal acquisition of computer information
Art. 203-1 of the Criminal Code — Illegal actions with respect to information about private life and personal data
Sentence: unknown
Judge: Vera Filonik
On March 23, 2023, the Brest Regional Court began the trial of Andrei Tsypak, a former employee of the MTS (Mobile TeleSystems) company from Brest arrested in early November 2022. In the "repentance" video, he said that in 2020-2021, he worked at MTS and had access to personal data. According to law enforcers, Andrei Tsypak leaked the data of several government officials and prosecutors to the Black Book of Belarus Telegram channel.
His former cellmate told human rights defenders that Andrei Tsypak was badly beaten during the arrest.
He was accused under three articles of the Criminal Code: Part 3 of Article 130 ('Incitement of other social hatred'), Part 3 of Article 352 ('Illegal acquisition of computer information'), and Part 3 of Article 203-1 ('Illegal actions with personal data').
Andrei Tsypak was tried behind closed doors, so the outcome of the trial is unknown to human rights defenders.
