Tsikhan Shliukhtsits
electrical technician, sentenced to 2 1/2 years in penal colony
Date of birth: 19 February 1994
Date of detention: 13 September 2021
Charges indicted:
Art. 342 of the Criminal Code — Organization and preparation of actions that grossly violate public order, or active participation in them
Sentence: 15 months
Penalty: imprisonment in a general-security penal colony
Prison sentence start date: 1 March 2022
Judge: Marharyta Lantsevich
Prosecutor: Ihar Yakimovich
Prison: Penal colony No. 2
Tsikhan Shliukhtsits is an electrical technician from Hrodna. He was detained on September 13, 2021, as a defendant in a criminal case under Part 1 of Art. 342 of the Criminal Code ('Organization or active participation in group actions grossly disrupting public order').
According to the indictment, on September 6, 2020, Tsikhan Shliukhtsits posted seven comments in the local Telegram chat room, "expressing intolerance to the existing political regime and constitutional system, with the aim of organizing group actions in Hrodna grossly breaching public order, combined with obvious disobedience to the legal requirements of the authorities, and aimed at disrupting the operation of the transport".
The court sentenced him to 1 year and 3 months of imprisonment in a general-security penal colony.
In early March 2022, Tsikhan Shliukhtsits was transferred from prison #1 in Hrodna to penal colony #2 in Babrujsk (Mahilioŭ region).
According to human rights defenders, the final punishment for the political prisoner is two years and six months of imprisonment in a general-security penal colony. The reasons for the extension of the sentence are unknown.
