Larysa Shchiryakova

Affiliated media: Freelance journalist

Incident date: February 18, 2022

Attack type:

• Confiscation/seizure of property, vehicles, equipment, documents

Who attacked: Authorities

Source: Belarusian Association of Journalists

Location: Belarus, Gomel

Additional information:

The police searched Larysa Shchiryakova's home and said that she might be involved in a criminal case for organising mass riots in the city on September 20, 2020 (Article 342 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus). As a result of the search, her computer, camera, and smartphone were seized, yet the copy of the seizure report was not left. After the search, the journalist was taken to the police department for interrogation, but she refused to testify. According to Shchiryakova, the law enforcers asked her «whether she would take her son and go abroad». In response to the journalist's answer that she had quit her profession (which she had publicly announced the day before on Facebook), they offered her to record a «penitential video statement» about her refusal to practice journalism. Shchyryakova disagreed. This was the fourth search of the journalist's home in the last two years. Previously, she worked for the Belsat TV channel.