World
Belarus hands six-year jail sentence to dissident’s girlfriend after forced plane landing
2022.05.06 11:59
(Reuters) – A Belarusian court on Friday sentenced Sofia Sapega, the girlfriend of a dissident detained after their commercial flight was forced to land in Belarus last year, to six years in prison for inciting social hatred, the Vyasna rights group said.
The 24-year-old Russian citizen was flying with her boyfriend Roman Protasevich, a dissident blogger critical of Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko, on a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius in May 2021 when it was diverted to Minsk by Belarusian authorities.
