Russian citizen Sofia Sapega, convicted in Belarus, was refused a pardon

"The Commission (on pardon issues under the President of Belarus) considered the petition and refused", - RIA Novosti quotes Sergey Dudich.

On January 2, Sapega received two responses from the commission, and then wrote about this decision in court. The lawyer of the Russian woman, Anton Gashinsky, confirmed that the commission had made a negative decision and clarified that a request would be submitted for Sapieha's transfer to Russia to serve his sentence in the country. A Russian citizen was detained in May 2021 after the forced landing of a Ryanair plane in Minsk.

Together with her friend, opposition journalist Roman Protasevich, she was returning from Athens to Vilnius. Both were arrested. Protasevich was subsequently released from arrest, after which he announced that he was cooperating with the pro-government organization "Systemic Human Rights Protection". Subsequently, it turned out that Sapega was the editor of a telegram channel in which the personal data of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Belarus was "leaked" and sent to a colony. In June last year, she asked the President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko to pardon her.

She admitted that she had come under the influence of a "destructively minded group of people" and asked for forgiveness for her actions.