On 4 August, the Minsk City Court sentenced the “lead singer of one of the Belarusian bands” to four years’ imprisonment. As reported by Radio Free Europe’s Belarusian service, a statement from the prosecutor’s office suggests that the individual in question is Sergei Mikhalk, leader of the bands ‘Liapis Trubetskoy’ and Brutto.
According to the prosecutor’s office, the musicians posted “videos on Brutto’s social media channels and groups containing a negative assessment of the President of the Republic of Belarus, expressed in an indecent and, in particular, obscene manner” on social media. Mikhalk was found guilty of inciting hostility and insulting the president (Belarus’s authoritarian leader, Alexander Lukashenko).
The statement does not specify exactly which remarks formed the basis for the criminal prosecution. Last year, the Belarusian authorities classified the song ‘Don’t Be Cattle’ by the band ‘Liapis Trubetskoy’ – based on a poem by the classic Belarusian poet Yanka Kupala – as extremist.
At the end of July, the Viasna Human Rights Centre reported that Mikhalok’s case had begun to be heard in absentia in court. The musician himself has not yet reacted to the verdict.
Sergei Mikhalok is a Belarusian and Ukrainian singer and the frontman of the band Brutto; previously, he was one of the founders of the band ‘Lapis Trubetskoy’. Since 2010, he has been a vocal critic of the Belarusian authorities, including in his songs. Since 2015, Mikhalok – whose most famous song, ‘Warriors of Light’, is dedicated to the events of the Euromaidan – has been living in Ukraine, where he was granted a residence permit and, in 2020, was awarded the title of Honoured Artist.