Belarus jails Eduard Babaryko, son of jailed rival to Lukashenko

A Belarusian opposition activist who was detained while running his father's presidential election campaign in 2020 has been given an eight-year jail term.

Eduard Babaryko denied tax evasion and complicity in organising riots, charges widely viewed as politically motivated.

Belarus's exiled opposition leader, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, accused the government of seeking revenge for his father's election bid.

Viktor Babaryko was jailed for 14 years in 2021 on corruption charges.

There has been no word on the former banker's health since he was moved from his jail cell to a hospital last April.

Pavel Sapelka, a lawyer with human rights group Spring 96, told the BBC that Mr Babaryko's long sentence was not a surprise because every defendant in a "politically motivated criminal case" risked an extremely long jail term.

That was especially the case, he said, "if the accused is the son of one of Lukashenko's most successful rivals in the presidential elections".

The pair were both detained on 18 June 2020, two months before Alexander Lukashenko was handed victory in a vote condemned as rigged by the EU and US.

Mr Lukashenko has run Belarus since 1994, but after protests spiralled in the aftermath of the election he became increasingly reliant on Russia's President Vladimir Putin for support.

Eduard's girlfriend, Alexandra Zvereva, told BBC Russian that he had been jailed as an act of revenge by Belarus's leader, simply because Viktor Babaryko had dared to put himself forward as a candidate.

"This seems to me the most painful punishment for parents, when their children are held responsible for their actions - it should be stressed when there was nothing wrong," she said.

Viktor Babaryko is one of a number of high-profile Belarusian political prisoners who have had no communication with their families for several months.

Opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya said the last time she had received information about her husband Sergei was in March.

Mr Tikhanovsky was a popular YouTube blogger when he stood for the presidency, but he was detained five months before the 2020 vote, well before Eduard Babaryko and his father.

Ms Tikhanovskaya subsequently became a candidate herself and claimed victory in the election, but she was forced to flee the country after the incumbent said he had won by a landslide and cracked down brutally on protesters and opponents.

Late on Monday, she said she had received a "strange and horrifying message" from a unknown individual that her husband had died in Zhodino prison, without providing any evidence to back up the claim.

By Wednesday afternoon, pro-Lukashenko activists had posted CCTV prison video date-stamped 5 July, apparently showing Sergei Tikhanovsky doing neck exercises and having a meal inside a jail cell.

Spring 96 said Mr Tikhanovsky had been unable to see his lawyer or his family to provide any details about his fate, and the rights group said the sinister message sent to his wife was most likely a provocation involving Belarus special services.

There has been silence from dozens of other political prisoners, such as Maria Kolesnikova - who also took part in Viktor Babaryko's election campaign.

She joined Ms Tikhanovskaya's team when her candidate was arrested and refused to leave Belarus after the vote, becoming one of the faces of the protests.

Ms Tikhanovskaya said she was glad to see her husband "alive and strong" but said now it was time to show the faces of other political prisoners and to allow their lawyers to see them.