With opposition voices rising just a couple of months before a presidential election in August 2020, Belarusian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko began doing what threatened authoritarians do: rounding people up, especially those who had a voice or a platform.
On June 25, 2020, RFE/RL journalist Ihar Losik was one of them.
With no warning, he was arrested in the morning at his home in Baranavichy. Taken from his wife and young daughter -- she recently turned six -- with little explanation.
In the five years since, Losik, who worked for RFE/RL's Belarus Service, known locally as Radio Svaboda, has endured isolation, and significant physical and psychological pressures.
"Ihar Losik has lost five years of his life to wrongful, cruel imprisonment at the hands of Belarusian authorities. His family has been fractured, simply because he wanted to ensure Belarusians had access to truthful, independent reporting," RFE/RL President and Chief Executive Office Steve Capus said.
The 33-year-old was sentenced to 15 years in prison in December 2021 for "organizing mass riots, taking part in mass disorder, inciting social hatred," and several other charges that remain unclear. Losik, RFE/RL, and Western governments say the charges are politically motivated.
He was tried together with popular blogger and potential Lukashenko opponent, Siarhei Tsikhanouski, who appeared poised to mount a serious challenge to the president. Tsikhanouski was released from prison over the weekend along with 13 other prisoners -- including another former RFE/RL journalist, Ihar Karnei.
"Last week, President Trump demonstrated true leadership by securing the release of 14 innocent people from Belarusian prisons, where most were held in isolation and without any contact with the outside world. The abject cruelty suffered by Ihar Losik must end today with his immediate and unconditional release,” Capus added.
Losik has not been heard from in about two years aside from a being paraded before a camera on a Belarusian state TV propaganda program that accused jailed RFE/RL journalists of "trying to set Belarus on fire."
In 2020, tens of thousands of people took to the streets to protest the result of a presidential election, which was widely considered by international observers to be rigged. Belarus security forces responded with a brutal crackdown, arresting over 30,000 people, many of whom reported torture and ill-treatment while in custody.
The crackdown has pushed most opposition politicians to leave Belarus fearing for their safety and freedom.
Many Western governments have refused to recognize the results of the 2020 election and do not consider Lukashenka to be the country's legitimate leader.
Denial Of Basic Rights
Losik has spent most of his imprisonment in the Navapolatsk colony, where, for a year and a half, the administration denied him any communication with family and access to care packages.
According to accounts from former inmates, Ihar was frequently punished by being placed in a punishment cell.
All four of Ihar Losik’s defense attorneys have either left the country or been stripped of their licenses.
Darya Losik, Ihar's wife, was sentenced to two years in prison in January 2023 on a charge of facilitating extremist activity. She was released in an amnesty in July 2024.
Meanwhile, his younger brother was detained in April and remains in jail in his native Belarus on extremism charges related to Russia's war against Ukraine, according to a rights group and RFE/RL sources.
Mikita Losik, 25, was detained in mid-April, the Country For Life foundation said in a Telegram post.
Sources who spoke to RFE/RL on condition of anonymity for security reasons in the tightly controlled country said he was detained in the northeastern city of Orsha.
Mikita Losik is accused of "assisting extremist activity" for allegedly sending photographs of the movement of Russian military equipment in 2022 to Belaruski Hayun, a defunct independent Telegram channel that monitored military activity, sources said. He is jailed in Vitsebsk, also in the northeast.
The head of Belaruski Hayun announced its closure in February, saying Belarusian authorities had hacked into a database and gained access to information about contributors.
International organizations, governments, and politicians from democratic countries -- including the US State Department, the UN Working Group, the European Parliament, the Helsinki Commission, and the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the US Congress -- continue to call for Ihar Losik’s release.
