Belarus: Experts Demand Immediate Release Of Activist Viktoria Kulsha

Geneva, 19 May 2025

Independent human rights experts* today called on Belarusian authorities to immediately release Viktoria Kulsha, imprisoned in Zarechye Correctional Colony No. 24, in order to save her life.

“Ms. Kulsha's condition has been life-threatening for some time now. According to recent reports, she has been on an indefinite hunger strike since the end of April. We are gravely concerned for her health and deeply fear for her life. Her release is urgently needed to ensure her safety,” the experts said.

Kulsha is a former administrator of the ‘Drivers 97%’ Telegram channel and chat room, which supported street protests against the re-election of Aleksandr Lukashenka in 2020. Apprehended in November 2020, she was sentenced to two and a half years of imprisonment under article 342 of the Criminal Code for “gross violation of public order.” Although she has served her initial term, her detention has been extended three times under article 411 of Criminal Code for “malicious disobedience” to the penitentiary administration. A fourth investigation under the same provision has recently been opened, prompting Kulsha to go on hunger strike.

Over the past two months, the experts have raised concerns about Kulsha’s life-threatening condition and the severe ill-treatment she has been subject to in detention, in a letter to the authorities and a public statement. The experts also stressed that repeated extensions of her prison sentence under article 411 of the Criminal Code may constitute further arbitrary detention and violates article 14 (7) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ratified by Belarus on 12 November 1973, which prohibits repeated trial and punishment over an offence for which the person has been finally convicted.

On 9 May 2025, Belarus announced a large amnesty for vulnerable prisoners. However, none of the prisoners convicted in relation to the 2020 protests were released. Neither has Kulsha benefited from a series of presidential pardons announced over the past year.

“We have received many reports about widespread cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of inmates in women’s correctional colonies in Belarus, particularly targeting women convicted in relation to the 2020 protests. We are calling on the Belarusian authorities to immediately free those women, including Viktoria Kulsha, and to provide them with remedies, reparations, and rehabilitation,” the experts said.

*The experts: Nils Muižnieks, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus; Laura Nyirinkindi (Chair), Claudia Flores (Vice-Chair), Dorothy Estrada Tanck, Ivana Krstić, and Haina Lu, Working group on discrimination against women and girls.

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